Lung-burning

My old track coach told me that the burning bit is caused by sucking in air too fast. Once your lungs get used to the effort, you sohld be fine.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Kiara2K
[B]I have been riding for more than a year now .(mountain biking) I have stopped smoking recently (6 weeks now) and when I climb steep uphill HR at around 145-150 my lung felt thighten or feel like burning.
My legs are still good but my lung is not. So I have to stop .
[/QUOTE]


If your lungs burn and your legs don't, try using a bigger gear. When pedaling fast, you use more oxygen and generate power from your aerobic system. When pushing a big gear, you generate more lactic acid and cause your legs to burn, but ease the burden on your lungs.

During training, it's good to switch between small gears and big gears, from pushing your cardio system to pushing your leg muscles.

Ideally, you eventually want to find the most efficient gear where your lungs and your legs burn out at the same time.

Congrats on kicking the smokes....I had the same problem when I knocked off the "suicide on the installment plan". I don't know how long you smoked or how much, but let's be real, we did some damage by the stupidness.

Personally, I think my lungs give out before my legs do now because without all that damn carbon monoxide in my blood from smoking, there's more available oxygen to fuel my muscles, whereas when I was smoking, it was not the case -- the legs gave out because there was less available oxygen. Make sense??

Keep going. Clean the [censored] out of the lungs. Keep going. Keep getting stronger. Keep moving. It's all about healing. That's the little mantra I keep chanting to myself when I have these moments.