The content of this blog is purely based on my personal experience.
I am here to simply share my experience and the experiences of my clients. These
are our personal observations and not in any way an illustration describing the
benefit of yoga practices on the cardiovascular system.
Breathing &
cardiovascular system: The foundation of yoga practice is breathing. The
body is moved in complete synchronisation to the flow of breathing. While doing
the practice, we use certain specific pattern of breathing. It is not only that
we engage the diaphragm muscle by means of abdominal deep breathing but also we
consciously force the exhalation duration (Et) and keep it longer than that of inhalation
(It).
Et > It and typically Et is 1.x of It
where x = 1 to 9. Typically, Et
is 1.5 of It.
With regular practice
of yoga, I have seen dramatic differences in the physiological behaviour of the
cardiovascular system before and after the practices. I noticed these in many
of my clients.
The science: Before
explaining those parameters, let me first explain the science behind the effect
of breathing on the cardio vascular system. A typical breathing cycle consists
of three phases: Inhale, retention and exhale. Inhale tones up the sympathetic
nervous system and exhale tones up the parasympathetic nervous system. That is why;
we feel energised on inhale and relaxed on exhale.
The heart simply follows the rhythm of the breathing
pattern. The heart beat increases with inhale and falls back to the normal
state on exhale. With regular practice, one can train the heart agreeably with
such a simple deep breathing exercise.
The catch: Just a
simple deep breathing alone is not sufficient enough to generate the shift in
the physiology of the cardio system. The body movement plays a vital role. Flow
exercises such as sun salutation enhances the flow of blood throughout the body
and that in turn augments the distribution of blood. So combinations of
breathing as well as the movement of the body are essential for the shift to
occur.
The parameters:
Resting Heart Rate:
For an adult, a typical resting heart rate (RHR) is 70 beats/minute (BPM). When
I started my yoga practice many years before, my RHR was 90 and above. Now, it
has drop down around 55. For many of my clients, I noticed a minimum downward shift
of 20 BPM. This indicates that there is an increase in the pumping capacity of
heart. Or in other words, the stroke volume of the heart is much better with the
practice of yoga.
For athletes, it is natural to have a strong heart muscle
because of the physical workouts and they usually have RHR around 50 BPM.
Heart Rate Variability:
The heart rate variability ( HRV) is one such parameter which is used in the
medical world to determine the health of the heart. With the above yoga
practice, again we noticed an average increase in the HRV parameter. With a
minute observation the HR varies by a minimum of 10 BPM.
HR recovery (HRR) :
The HR recovery is the recovery time of
the heart as it moves towards its normal state after some intense physical
workouts. After the practice, our heart jumps to 140 BPM, roughly 70% of the maximum
HR. In most of the cases, a 2 minutes relaxation provided a minimum downward shift
of 25 BPM. Better will be the health of the heart when the HR recovery is faster.
So, a regular practice of deep breathing combined with
movement of the body play a trick to increase the health of the heart.
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