Exercise, Lactic Acid and the Importance of Breathing to Lose Weight Fast

The best weight loss plan is one that focuses on your overall goal. You can lose extra pounds with a combined approach; that’s one that successfully combines a healthy diet and a top weight loss supplement. By adding a regular exercise program to the mix, you’ll achieve much more than just losing weight.

Turn a diet into a lifestyle with food choices to reduce weight, a routine to tone and firm muscles, adding the best dietary supplement allows you to improve your overall health and get a little more muscle tone, fat and overall weight loss.

It is not uncommon for breathing to become labored during periods of intense exercise. It’s a common part of cardio exercise and we expect to gasp or even gasp for air at the end of our morning run.

Our lungs are automated wonders, expelling a used breath and expanding to inhale as needed. The respiratory muscles of the chest also expand and contract to accommodate the changing size of our expanding and contracting lungs, and these same muscle groups also control posture.

Breathing is a two-part process. Breathing brings oxygen to the lungs while circulation disperses oxygen throughout the body to where it is needed. Oxygen circulation is made possible by respiratory muscles such as the diaphragm, abdominals, and intercostal muscles. The oxygen we inhale does not provide energy, but it unlocks the energy stores in the food we have eaten. Basically it helps boost the process by which biological energy units (ATP) are released from caloric reserves (carbohydrates, proteins, lipids)

The alveoli in the lungs allow the body to absorb oxygen, and only the oxygen that reaches the alveoli is used when we breathe. Only the oxygen that reaches the alveoli can be used by our body. This is demonstrated by the physical response of someone who is breathing very fast and shallow during a panic attack. The person may lose consciousness from lack of oxygen. People feel the lack of oxygen, but the lack is caused by shallow breathing in which oxygen does not reach the alveoli of the lungs.

This is why proper breathing and ventilation – deep breathing is very important. Your lungs have a certain amount of volume, called “dead space,” that is not involved in gas transfer. Instead, these areas are primarily conduits; larger tubes that carry gases to the alveoli. Because a small part of each breath is used to move gas through these tubes (bronchi), rapid, shallow breathing will decrease the volume of gas reaching the alveoli. Fortunately, oxygen transport is a relatively fast process. It is the transport of CO2 from the blood (carried as lactic acid) that takes the longest and is therefore most sensitive to decreased ventilation and duration of gas exchange. Even without lactic acid buildup, simply hypoventilating will lead to a buildup of CO2 and actually have the same effect of increasing lactic acids in your body from sustained muscle work! (cardio, weight, etc.)

Yes, breathing and more importantly how we breathe is very important. The concentration of oxygen in your body is a balance between the supply of oxygen to the alveoli for circulation and the amount of oxygen your body demands. When you are at rest, balance is easily maintained, but when you exercise, your body demands more oxygen, requiring more breaths per minute to deliver sufficient levels of oxygen to your lungs. During exercise, deeper breaths turn into faster breaths, and eventually the exertion will starve you of oxygen, as your body expends more oxygen than it can absorb.

Lactic acid is an alpha hydroxyl acid (AHA) produced in our bodies and is also known as milk acid. If you feel the burn during a workout, you can thank lactic acid for that.

Exercise causes sugar to break down producing energy for the muscles. This breakdown of sugar produces carbon dioxide and water in the end if it gets all the oxygen it needs.

Strenuous exercise can cause an oxygen deficit and lead to the production and buildup of lactic acid in the muscles. Through a complex chemical process, lactic acid accumulates in the muscles during vigorous exercise. Muscles can contract more efficiently when lactic acid is present, which is why athletes like to feel the burn during exercise. For them, it means that their muscles are being exercised to the best of their ability.

When lactic acid buildup causes your muscle to start to ache, you breathe faster and generally slow down to allow your body to get the oxygen it needs. As depleted oxygen is restored (returning to normal breathing), lactic acid is converted to carbon dioxide and water that is expelled as you breathe.

It is the buildup of lactic acid during intense exercise that creates the need to allow muscle groups to rest and recover on alternate days. Your muscles may be sore the day after exercising and this is due to lactic acid buildup. Resting for a day or two allows the lactic acid to dissipate and the muscle to recover.