In March of last year (2024), I started my MTB season full of hope. I kicked off the season with a race in Germany, which unfortunately didn’t go as I had hoped. The start went well, but after about five minutes, I began to experience intense pain in the back of my head. I tried to keep going for another 15 minutes, hoping the pain would subside, but it didn’t. After just over 20 minutes, I had to abandon the race.
Since I had never experienced such intense headaches during a race, I immediately contacted my sports doctor. I also consulted a neurologist. Because I continued to suffer from severe headaches during races throughout March and April—even when taking painkillers before the start—I decided in early May to end my season and look for the root cause of the headaches.
Through my coach, I was referred to Filip Pyl. Filip explained to me that the headaches might be caused by breathing pattern disorder during races. Together, we began working on a series of breathing exercises to prevent this hyperventilation. Quite quickly, I began to notice changes in my breathing. I felt that my breathing became calmer at night in bed, and I also noticed that I could control my breathing better during stressful moments. I practiced breathing exercises on a daily basis. With the breath-hold exercises, I noticed that I was able to hold my breath for longer and longer. In the beginning, I also experienced tingling sensations throughout my body, but these gradually diminished over time. With the Powerbreathe, I was able to breathe with increasingly more power. At first, I sometimes felt a bit dizzy during the exercises, but that improved the more I practiced. During the on-bike exercises, I still experienced some headaches at the start of the intervals, but that also disappeared as I kept doing the exercises consistently.
Since everything indicated that my breathing was improving, I scheduled two road races at the end of August, both of which I was able to complete without any headaches. Before my first cyclocross race on September 16, 2024, I was still a bit worried that the headaches might return—but again, I had no issues during the race. Since working with Filip, I only experienced a headache once during a cyclocross race—on December 15. I believe the headache that day was mainly caused by stress, which led me to start breathing incorrectly again after the start. For races nowadays, I always make sure my breathing is calm and that I minimize stress in the days leading up to the event. For that, I primarily rely on the 5-5-5-5 box breathing technique. I’m very happy that I got to work with Filip, as he helped me perform again at a high level.
In the beginning, we were in contact almost daily so we could quickly adjust if needed. I never doubted Filip’s analysis and trusted his assessment that my headaches were caused by hyperventilation. I’m very grateful to him for his guidance.