What should a runner do with their breath?
Before you set off, two minutes of the four-in, six-out timer above, standing, through the nose. On the run, let the breath find the stride and keep the exhale the longer half. After, walk a few minutes, then run the same two minutes to bring the heart rate down. That is the whole plan. It settles the start and the finish; it does not make you faster, and nothing on this page claims it does.
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Runners think about breathing more than most people, usually because it has gone wrong: the first kilometre that feels like drowning, the stitch at thirty minutes, the ragged gasping at the end of a hard interval. Most of that is pacing, not breathing, and the honest thing to say first is that the breathing follows the effort. Slow the effort and the breath slows with it.
What a paced session can do is bracket the run. Two minutes of slow nasal breathing before you start means you begin from a low breathing rate rather than from the car-park rush, and you have a baseline to notice the climb from. Two minutes after means the heart rate comes down on purpose rather than on its own. Both are worth having. Neither is a training effect.
Before, during and after
Three different jobs, and only the first and third use the timer.
- Before: two minutes standing. Shoes on, watch started, phone in your hand. In through the nose for four, out through the nose for six, with the belly moving before the chest. Twelve breaths. Then put the phone away and go.
- The first five minutes: easy, nose if you can. Start slower than feels necessary. If you can keep the mouth closed for the first five minutes you are running at the right warm-up pace; if you cannot, slow down until you can, then build.
- During: breathe with the stride. Many runners settle into a ratio, three steps in and two out at an easy pace, two and two when it gets hard. The point of an odd ratio is that the exhale lands on alternating feet. If counting steps makes you tense, drop it and just keep the exhale the longer half.
- When it gets hard: mouth open, exhale long. At a hard pace the nose is not enough air and nobody should pretend otherwise. Open the mouth, and spend your attention on a full exhale rather than a big inhale; the next inhale takes care of itself.
- A stitch: slow down and breathe out. Ease the pace, exhale long and fully a few times, press the fingers into the spot on the exhale. It usually passes in a minute.
- After: walk, then two minutes. Walk until the gasping stops, then run the timer again, standing or sitting, through the nose. In for four, out for six. The long exhale is the signal to come down.
- Do not lie flat straight after a hard effort. Keep moving gently until the breathing is ordinary.
Nose or mouth
The argument for nasal running is that it filters and warms the air, keeps the breathing slower, and, for people who train it, becomes comfortable at surprisingly hard paces. The argument against is simpler: at a hard enough effort the nose cannot move enough air, and forcing it is unpleasant and pointless.
The one small study on this, which I could not open in full and so will not quote, tested ten recreational runners who had already trained themselves to breathe nasally for months and found no loss of peak oxygen uptake through the nose. That tells you nasal running is possible for people who have adapted to it. It does not tell you to switch tomorrow. If you want to try, do it on easy runs only, and treat the first few weeks as practice rather than training.
What a paced timer is not
There is a kind of breathing work that does improve endurance, and it is worth being clear that this page is not it. Respiratory muscle training means breathing against resistance, through a small hand-held device, for a few minutes most days over several weeks. It strengthens the muscles of inhalation the way weights strengthen anything else, and the review below found it improved endurance performance, most for people who were least fit to begin with.
A paced session on a timer involves no resistance and trains no muscle. It is a way to breathe slowly for two minutes. It has value before and after a run for the reasons above, and if you want the performance effect, the device is the thing, and a coach or physiotherapist is the person to ask about it.
Before you start
The four-six pattern has no holds and no fast breathing. The cautions that belong to running:
- Never run the timer while running. The two minutes are for standing still before and after; a paced count on the move is a distraction and a trip hazard.
- Breathlessness on a run that is out of proportion to the effort, chest pain, or dizziness that does not pass when you stop are reasons to stop running and see a doctor, not to breathe differently.
- If you have asthma, exercise-induced bronchospasm, or any heart or lung condition, follow your doctor's plan for running and use the breathing on this page only on their say-so.
- The energizing breath is not a warm-up. It is fast breathing that can make you faint, and its page says who should skip it.
Nothing here treats any condition or improves performance. It is a way to start and finish a run on purpose.
What the evidence shows
The evidence for breathing exercises and running is thinner than runners' folklore would suggest. The one solid thing is about training the breathing muscles, not pacing the breath.
A 2012 systematic review and meta-analysis in Sports Medicine by Illi and colleagues analysed "46 original studies" of respiratory muscle training in healthy people. They found that "less fit subjects benefit more from RMT than highly trained athletes", that "the type of sport does not influence the magnitude of improvements", and in the pooled trials "a significant improvement in performance after RMT". Their conclusion: "RMT improves endurance exercise performance in healthy individuals with greater improvements in less fit individuals and in sports of longer durations."
Two things that is not. It is not a paced timer: every study in the review used resistance or sustained heavy breathing through a device, over weeks. And it is not a measure of how a race feels; the gains were in laboratory endurance tests, which the authors note detect the change better than ordinary incremental tests do. For rhythmic breathing on the run, for breathing before a race, and for nasal running, I found no trial I could open and quote, so those sections above are described as what runners do, not as what has been shown.
Common questions
Should I breathe through my nose or mouth when running?
Whichever gets you enough air. Nose breathing is comfortable at an easy pace and many runners prefer it; at a hard pace almost everyone opens the mouth, and that is fine. The one small study of trained nasal breathers found they could run at every intensity through the nose with no loss of peak oxygen uptake, but they had trained that way for months. Do not force it.
What is rhythmic breathing?
Matching breaths to steps in a fixed ratio, such as three steps in and two steps out, so the exhale starts on alternating feet. It is a widely used coaching habit with little trial evidence behind it. If it helps you settle, use it; the pattern on this page is for before and after the run, not during it.
Does breathing before a run improve performance?
Not that anyone has shown. Two minutes of slow breathing settles the start and gives you a baseline to notice your breathing from. The breathing work that has evidence for performance is respiratory muscle training with a resistance device over weeks, which is a different thing from a paced timer.
What helps a stitch?
Slow down, breathe out long and fully, and press the fingers into the spot while exhaling. Running on the exhale of alternating feet is the usual advice for prevention. None of this has strong evidence; all of it is harmless and most runners find something in it works.
How do I bring my heart rate down after a run?
Walk for a few minutes, then run the two-minute timer: in for four, out for six, through the nose if you can. The long exhale is the part that signals the body to come down. Lying flat straight after a hard effort is the one thing to avoid.
Is the energizing breath a good warm-up?
No. It is deliberate fast breathing that can make you light-headed, and the warm-up for running is running slowly. Keep the fast pattern for a seated session on a day you are not training, and read its cautions first.
A note on what this is
Nothing on this page is medical care or coaching, and none of it replaces a conversation with your doctor or a running coach. Read the medical disclaimer. Breathlessness that does not match the effort is a reason to see a clinician, not a reason to breathe differently.