Breathing and score in young archers: Bostanci 2021

In 42 Turkish recurve archers aged 9 to 12 (31 boys and 11 girls, with a little over two years of shooting on average), the authors compared measures of lung function with the score from 30 arrows at 18 metres. Across the whole group the total score rose slightly with forced vital capacity (FVC, r = 0.378) and with the volume breathed out in the first second (FEV1, r = 0.367); the other measures, including peak flow and the strength of the inspiratory muscles, showed no link. Taking the sexes separately, in the 11 girls the total was linked to FVC with r = 0.631; in the boys the total still followed FVC and FEV1 (r = 0.378 and 0.359), and the second set of 15 arrows was also linked to maximal expiratory pressure (MEP, r = 0.370).

The girls had a slightly higher mean score (242.00 against 221.71 out of 300), but the difference was not significant, and neither was any of the breathing differences between the sexes. The authors themselves conclude that there are no strong links between breathing and score, and suggest that they may grow with age and years of training.

The archers, all licensed and competing for at least a year, were measured in Samsun in 2019, after a pilot session a week earlier to get them used to the tests. Spirometry (CPFS/D USB, MGC Diagnostics) gave FVC, FEV1, their ratio, peak expiratory flow and maximal voluntary ventilation; a handheld metre (MicroRPM) gave maximal inspiratory and expiratory pressures, each taken three times with the best value kept.

A week later each archer shot 30 arrows indoors at 18 metres, in two sets of 15 with 15 minutes' rest between them, scoring 0 to 10 per arrow. The link between breathing and score was tested with Pearson correlation, first on the whole group and then by sex; differences between boys and girls with a t-test.

The correlations found are weak: with r = 0.378, FVC accounts for about 14% of the differences in score (my calculation; the paper does not give it). The authors ran 21 correlations for each of three groups without any correction for multiple comparisons, so some positive results may be chance, especially in only 11 girls. There is also a more basic problem: in children FVC and FEV1 depend heavily on height and growth, and a bigger, more developed child also tends to shoot better. The analysis does not account for age, height or years of shooting, so the link may run through body size rather than breathing.

The text has some inconsistencies: the discussion calls a difference between the sexes significant while quoting p > 0.05, and the limitations say the spirometer did not calculate peak flow, which nonetheless appears in the table (in litres per second, with values that only make sense in litres per minute). The target face used at 18 metres is not stated. Finally, the study does not look at how archers breathe during the shot: it measures lung capacity at rest, a week before the shooting test.

For a young archer, the study does not show that breathing training adds points. It shows that, in 9 to 12-year-olds with two years of shooting, those with larger lung capacity tended to score a few points more over 30 arrows at 18 metres, with a weak link that may simply reflect growth. The authors' closing recommendation, to add breathing exercises and respiratory muscle training, does not come from their data: nobody did those exercises and nobody was followed over time.

For a youth coach there is one useful negative result: inspiratory muscle strength, the measure closest to what specific breathing training can change, had no appreciable link with score (r = 0.058 across the whole group).