#229 How Athletes Boost Recovery by 46% With 5.5 Breaths Per Minute | Adam Ludwin @FivePointFive

Think your breathing has little impact on performance? 

Adam shows how BioHarmonizing your breath with 5.5-second rhythms, CO2 tolerance, & HRV tracking can improve sleep, reduce stress, & raise endurance.

Meet our guest

Adam is a serial entrepreneur who, after selling Captify Technologies in 2021, became fascinated with the power of breath work. He studied under Patrick McKeown, the world’s #1 functional breath work expert & now lead advisor at FivePointFive, a breath work app built to enhance mental & physical fitness while tracking results in real time.

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Key takeaways

• Resonant frequency breath rates around 5.5 seconds in & out optimize nervous system balance & boost HRV
• Wearables & apps track markers like HRV & VO2 max, helping you personalize & monitor progress over time
• Breath work isn’t one size fits all. Optimal rates & techniques shift based on your health, training, & daily needs
• HRV is more than daily changes. Look at trends over time & compare to your own baseline, not others
• Specific breath work improves oxygen use & increases VO2 max by up to 8–11% within weeks—huge for athletes
• Higher carbon dioxide tolerance trained with nose breathing & breath holds helps your body use oxygen more efficiently
• Slower longer exhales & relaxed breathing after exercise speed up recovery by up to 46%—faster performance gains
• Breathing through your nose especially in childhood shapes facial & dental structure & boosts immunity
• Intentional breathing is the quickest way to shift your nervous system within seconds you reduce stress & regain focus
• Functional breath work is research based & used by top athletes. Ignore old myths about breathing being just spiritual

 

Episode highlights

0:00 Introduction

01:09 Why 5.5 breathing matters

03:10 How to measure breath & nervous system health

13:53 How breath work boosts recovery & performance

17:42 Practical tools for safer, smarter breathing

47:11 Common breathing myths & mistakes

56:13 The FivePointFive platform & future of breath work

Links

• Watch it on YouTube: https://youtu.be/8UwPvUohZec 
• Full episode show notes: outliyr.com/229

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Do you have questions, thoughts, or feedback for us? Let me know in the show notes above and one of us will get back to you!

Be an Outliyr,

Nick