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Comment by maxwellg | Hacker News Reader

Hypoxic altitude tents have always interested me as a runner living in sea-level San Francisco. You're supposed to sleep in them for a few weeks in order to simulate being at higher elevation. However, they're apparently pretty terrible to use - the vacuum is loud enough to disrupt sleep, the inside of the tent is supposed to get hot and sticky, and you need to spend 12+ hours a day to get real benefits. If you're mountaineering, the suffering might be worth it, but if you're a hobby jogger the sleep disruptions alone negate the performance impact of the EPO boost. Supposedly.

But Xenon?

> Furtenbach, whose training rides and runs have been 10 percent faster for days after xenon-fuelled climbs...

Something to muse about.

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> > Furtenbach, whose training rides and runs have been 10 percent faster for days after xenon-fuelled climbs...

Furtenbach is the person selling the $5,000 Xenon sessions.

Keep that in mind when considering the claims.

Xenon and Argon doping are officially banned by WADA. So while obviously you will get away with it if you aren't one of the top athletes on the planet, you will technically be cheating if you breathe Xenon then run in the San Francisco Marathon.

I listened to a podcast recently about a hypoxic training that was interesting. The company makes masks and different levels of equipment for different uses. For me it a simple curiosity, I need to work on recovering from ~1.5 years taking care of an ill family member. Maybe then it is worth a thought but for me it seems unlikely to really appeal.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/95-brian-oestrike-ceo-...

> For me it a simple curiosity, I need to work on recovering from ~1.5 years taking care of an ill family member. Maybe then it is worth a thought but for me

Hypoxic training would be detrimental to an untrained athlete. Restricting your oxygen intake would reduce the volume and duration of exercise you could tolerate, which would slow your progress.

So please don't use a hypoxic training mask. It would do the opposite of what you want to achieve.

Even within athletes the benefits of hypoxic training for general performance are questionable once you get away from people with a vested interest in pushing it (like the person interviewed in your podcast).

Oh I'm very much a dabbler, before I consider hypoxic training there is so much room for athletic optimization in my life. Including focusing on a few activities instead of rowing, skiing, biking, occasional bouldering, etc. I was listening out of curiosity, not for my own use.

I'm back at sea level, but when I was living between sea level and the mountains I could feel the lag in my runs when I switched and gained elevation.

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