Breathing in thru nose and out thru mouth is important for 2 reasons. One, in thru nose, the air is humidified by the sinuses and nasal passages before it reaches the airways and lungs. Otherwise, the dry air will irritate. Two, out thru mouth, larger air passage to exit faster. Plus, it also allows for vocalization at the moment of exertion to focus your strength and power.
Why do you think quite some top players scream during a smash? It's not only intimidation, they breath out, but quite extreme.
My take in breathing is that you must control your breathing so that you can breath rythmically. When you are moving fast for a period of time you will be out of breath and you will breath so quickly. i think you will lose control of your stroke when you breathing quickly.
Its equally important to practise regular breathing exercises prior to play; every day if you can. Maybe just 10-15 minutes a day. You will find many good videos on yoga and breathing techniques online. This has many benefits that last through the day.
@cobalt practising regular breathing is to ensure that while we play badminton we still using that technique not the usual breathing. I think gollum is correct, we should use diaphragm breathing, i read that if we use that technique also called deep breathing, it will transform to energy faster or something like that. last week i try to breath with this technique in a game. I think my technique is far from good although i had been practising for two weeks. The result is very good. i rarely forced to an out of breath situation and even when i am out of breath i recover faster. This is when i play against opponent who are the same level as me. Imagine if i also have a good footwork?? that would help a lot if i play against tougher opponent.
I think this breathing topic should not just touch the situation during rally. A good breathing technique off rally is as beneficial as well. Right after playing a tough rally, control your breath can calm your body and mind down, take a minute rest for your heart. It gives you time to recover and prepare for the next rally. As the rally getting tougher, your body will get more exhausted, it is good to take that 1 minutes to calm down and recover as much strength as you can. During rally, I tend to "forget" to control my breath, as i just let my body does it naturally. After 1 rally, what I did is use the time (from pick up the shuttle till getting ready for serves) to recover my strength. I take a slow breath in through nose, hold it 1 or 2 sec, then release it fast through mouth. By repeating it, my heart beat will slow down a bit (which was really fast after a rally) and cool down my body a bit. I thought about mentioning this as sometimes i saw players "grabbing" for oxygen after 1 tough rally, they didn't control their breathing and they have played worse and worse after each rally. Pardon my powderful Ingelishh... Just my 1 buck thought XD
