Training your lungs!

Same for me! I have tried over and over again to get used to it, but just can't. My chest feels like it is ready to cave in, but the rest of my body feels like it could keep going. I too have switched to other forms of cardio.

Go slower. Seriously, I know it sounds crazy but it's true. Go a bit slower and you'll find that you lungs stay with you longer. Use interval training and simple milage to increase pace and eventually it will all fall into place. I have RAD (reactive airway disease) and I actually went to the doc afraid I was hurting myself because my chest and lungs would actually HURT. She looked at me like I was nuts! No I can go around 7 - 8 miles in 1:20, then I could hardly do 3 in :42. It does come in time.

I have the same thing, I talked to my dr about it. She said it is exercise induced Asthma and put me on an inhaler that I take 15mins before I work out. I no longer have an issue.

Two methods. 1st try interval training for 25% of your run. Sprint for 30 seconds jog 60 sprint 30 jog 60. Repeat. The 2nd method is to try steady state work. If you normal run 30 minutes at a pace that leaves you wiped out in a respiratory sense at the end..try walking at a very brisk pace...just below a run...for an hour...every other work out.

Intervals are the key to life!

intervals helped me a lot. Also, slow down, only jog at a pace that you can breathe comfortably at, get to the point where you can jog your desired distance, THEN work on doing that distance faster.

I can't comment on the asthma part but what worked for me was going slower AND longer. Working towards a longer and higher weekly mileage will enhance your blood vessels’ O2 carrying ability. Running at a steadier but slower pace increases blood hemoglobin concentration which is the key to not running out of breath when running.

Also, if you have the time, I highly recommend swimming. It's a great compliment because it is low impact and it gives your joints a break from the pounding and high impact sport of running.

There are lots of free podcasts online with prompts on when to run/walk. I'm doing the Couch 2 5K and love it. I'm only 4 weeks in and can already see a dramatic improvement.

Bravo for working so hard at it! Keep it up and I believe you will get your lungs stronger too. I wanted to strongly encourage you to always have an inhaler with you (or whatever you may use in case of an asthma attack) when you are running. Also, I wanted to encourage you to talk to your doctor to ask her how your asthma may be affecting your lungs when you run hard and how you can push past this in a safe and healthy way while still challenging your body to go father. Don't give up on it unless the doctor advises against it (then you might need to think it through), but as long as it's safe then keep with it! You can do it!

Unless you have a lung disease, the "lungs" are almost never the problem during exercise or with exercise breathing.

In some cases, people tend to tense up or "brace" themselves during activities like running, so they might actually restrict their breathing. These people benefit from developing patterns, mantras, images, etc that remind them to relax and to breathe. However, this is also a relatively small group.

By far, the biggest reason healthy people have trouble breathing is that they are working at an intensity that is too high for their cardiovascular system to handle. They never reach aerobic steady state. The oxygen demands of the activity are greater than their capacity to deliver and process oxygen; as a result, the body sends all the usual signals to "breath harder--we need more oxygen". Which means that, in healthy people, breathing difficulties are mostly due to cardiac insufficiency--it's the heart that's the "problem", not the lungs (actually, to be clear, it's not a "heart problem" either--just a mismatch between fitness demand and fitness ability).

Improving your cardiovascular system can be done with either interval training, endurance training, or both. I always recommend a combination of steady endurance training, medium-intensity, longer intervals, and harder, shorter intervals. A beginner would concentrate on the first two and not even introduce the hard stuff for awhile.

Once again you cannot "train" your lungs because the lungs aren't the problem. Even an Olympic athlete at peak effort still has greater remaining lung capacity than he or she can utilize.

Running, even at relatively slow speeds like 5.0 mph, is a fairly intense activity.

So I agree with both those who say "slow down" and those whose recommend intervals. For your steady runs, you should find a speed that you can maintain without feeling like your breathing is out of control --no matter how slow that is. For intervals, it's best to start with walk/jog--again, the interval speed at the start is not going to be that fast--something you can sustain comfortably for 30-60 sec.

If you can't find ANY speed that is comfortable, then you may not have the fitness level to be running at all at this time.

And once again, this applies only to healthy people for whom asthma, ongoing or exercise-induced--or some other lung problem has definitely been ruled out.

Take voice lessons. Its hard to explain, but partially the relaxation, partially the conscious changes you make to your throat and mouth while you sing, opens up your air passages. Also, singing a tune forces you to control your breathing speed and increase the volume of each breath rather than gasping for air .