Mouthpieces in swimming?

Will the mouth guard stop people from saying stupid stuff?

During monday night football last night the announcers were talking about a special type of mouth piece that the New Orleans Saints use that somehow improves flexibility, power, and oxygen flow. Test show that vertical leap, power, and overall performance are better when wearing one of these things. If power is increased while wearing this, wouldn't it be useful to wear one of these things for swimming? I don't want to get in a "tech" argument but I thought this mouthpiece is pretty cool. makkaradvantage.com/.../ I have am looking into getting one. My dentist told me about it a couple of weeks ago. Costs about $2K. But I am doing it because I run, not because I swim.

One of the amazing things about Olympic sprinters is how relaxed their faces are. They appear to have no tension in their neck and jaw. Swimmers actually need to do the same thing, but we dont work on it because out face is underwater and thus your coach cannot tell you to fix it. A tight neck and jaw area will lead to tightness in your trapezus. And I think we all agree that tightness in the trapezus will hinder athletic performance. Will this mouthguard help you keep your neck and jaw loose? I think it will. And will that lead to an increase in performance? I think that is true too. But I am more inclined to think that it will be useful in training (when I am tired sometimes I clench up) than in a race. The airway passages thing is just silly, I agree. But my dentist did not say anything about that when we talked about it. And the instant improvement seems silly too. I wouldn't get wrapped up in the sensationalism. Oh and I have to have a wisdom tooth pulled before I get one. So it might be a while.

This sounds a lot like some other products that have cropped up over the years. They all claim to help open or clear the passageways into the lungs. I remember one from about 30 years ago. The manufacturer claimed TMJ was ubiquitous, and his mouthpiece reduced neck strain so much that it improved overall athleticism. Here's a Sports Illustrated article about it, from 1980: sportsillustrated.cnn.com/.../index.htm More recently, football players were wearing sports strips because they swore it allowed more oxygen to enter the nostrils. Do players still wear them? Anyhow, in my book this is a fad until proved otherwise. I guess if you have $2K extra, go for it. Otherwise, you might wait a year or two. Let other people be the paid guinea pigs. If you start seeing everybody at a meet wearing them, go out and buy one. By then they will cost a lot less than $2,000.

Three systems carry oxygen ultimately to the cell: the breathing, the exchange in the lungs, and the blood circulation. Most of the air you breathe in is not used at the alveolar level, so there is always a surplus there. Unless you have emphysema or some other lung disease your lung will process all the oxygen that it can. Then the blood will carry it to the cells where they will be used. When you run hard, or sprint in swimming, your breathing rate goes up, your heart rate goes up and all systems coordinate to get more oxygen to you cells. Eventually the system will start breaking up, mostly at the cellular level, where there is a maximum speed of oxygen processing. So what will eventually make you slow down is not your heart rate or breathing, but the complete inability of the cells to metabolize more that is needed. Even if you had pure oxygen, you wouldn't go faster. Oxygen is beneficial when there is a problem, a disease, a lack of oxygen, but having more of it won't make you faster or make more of it available at cellular level. In other words, those nose strips are good for snoring sometimes, they look good and the people who make them make lots of money and the pros who use them (in a racing car?) also make lots of money. This is snake oil medicine, nothing to gain from it. billy fanstone