ROLE OF OXYGEN IN SPORTS PERFORMANCE

The two main factors that affect athletic sports performance most are nutrition and oxygen.

Nutrition is something you have total control over. What you eat and when can have a dramatic effect on how your body performs on any given day. So, as an athlete, you can give you body higher quality nutrition to gain an advantage over your competition.

When it comes to oxygen, however, there really hasn't been a safe, easy way for the everyday person to gain an advantage... until now.

Sure, you could:

• train at high altitude and hope that all your competitions are at low altitude...

• you can buy an expensive altitude training tent to sleep in. this would get your body used to less oxygen in the air so that when you come out of the tent, your body gets flooded with more oxygen than it is used to and can perform better.

• try blood doping... which increase your red blood cell count so that your muscles can get more oxygen. (this is illegal in most organized sports)

• you could get your doctor to prescribe oxygen for you... but then you would have to lug that huge oxygen tank around with you every where you go... not very practical or convenient.

• you could even purchase in-home oxygen concentrators... but these cannot be used conveniently on site.

So what is the best alternative?... In this day and age, canned oxygen is your best option!

But why is oxygen so important to athletic performance?

Just like an automobile engine, your body needs oxygen to mix with fuel to produce energy. The bottom line is that oxygen is responsible for up to 90% of your body's energy. With greater oxygen intake, the body metabolizes food faster and more efficiently, generating more energy and fuel for a healthier body.

According to most experts, athletic performance is directly related to the amount of oxygen supplied to the muscles. The supply of oxygen is dictated by how often the heart beats, the volume of blood transported by every beat and the amount of oxygen in that blood. There really is no argument... the more oxygen you get to the muscles (and the brain), the better they perform.

During vigorous exercise the body needs a lot more energy. It gets this by breathing in deeper and faster and rushing the oxygen to the muscles in dilated blood vessels. Soon, a point is reached when the body cannot breathe any faster or harder, and aerobic respiration alone cannot meet the enhanced energy demands. At this point, your body begins to produce lactic acid, which accumulates in the muscles and causes muscle fatigue and failure. To avoid damage to cells, lactic acid has to be broken down to carbon dioxide and water immediately after the exercise has finished. This is an oxidation reaction, and requires oxygen. This extra oxygen needed to neutralize the harmful effects of anaerobic respiration is called an "oxygen debt.".

In order to get the extra oxygen to 'pay back' the debt, the body continues to breathe deeply for some time after vigorous activity has ceased. When all the lactic acid in the muscles is broken down, the oxygen debt has been repaid and normal aerobic respiration resumes. This is why oxygen is also so crucial in recovery times.

Have you ever seen a football player make a long run, then sit down on the sidelines and breathe in oxygen for a couple minutes? Well... they're doing that to reduce lactic acid build up and speed up their recovery time to they can get back in the game right away and still perform at a high level.

Another main factor we have not touched on yet, but is also very crucial to performance in any sport is Brain Function. It is a fact that low oxygen levels in the blood cause reduced brain function. This is very evident with high altitude sports like mountain climbing. If mental alertness and response time is important to your sport, using oxygen might give you more of an advantage that you had hoped for!