You've been training. You've mastered the one mile run without stopping. You felt amazingly accomplished, as you should. So, you kept training. Soon, you were able to run 3 miles without stopping. You felt like a million bucks. Suddenly you had dreams of running races and hanging medals on the wall like one of those runners you always dreamed of being. Then, you go out for a longer run, maybe 5 miles or more, and you can't catch your breath. You have to stop to walk not because of your legs, but because of your lungs. All of a sudden your dreams of crossing the finish line are crushed. But wait, you can still do it.
The secret to running longer distances lies in your lungs and in your brain. Take it from me, a person with a history of asthma, you can run a half marathon (or longer) if you just train smart. If you're anything like me, you have to train more than your legs. You have to train your brain and your lungs as well. Your brain will likely want to quit pretty quickly. Your lungs will give out shortly after, but your legs can keep going forever.
So, how do you train your brain and your lungs to race? I'm not going to say it's easy, but it's definitely doable. For me, the brain is the toughest to train. You have that element of self-doubt combined with a little fear, anxiety, worry, stress, and more. You begin to think that you're not capable. You begin to think that every part of your body hurts (it doesn't). You begin to think that it was a silly idea to train for this race in the first place (it wasn't). And, you begin to come up with all these reasons why you should stop, and then you convince yourself that the "should" has turned into "must."
Don't let your brain trick you into giving up. Just don't. I like to think of my brain as a lazy couch potato. If I let my brain pick my workouts, I'd be constantly sitting on the couch eating chips and Girl Scout cookies and my only exercise would be walking back and forth to the kitchen. So, when I'm on a run and my lazy old brain starts to kick in with thoughts of quitting, I pump my music louder. I sing along with whatever song is playing, even if I don't know all the words. I look at the scenery around me. I try to find as many blue cars as I can, or try to count the number of houses with rock landscaping instead of grass. Whatever I can do to distract myself and occupy my brain with something other than doubt and thoughts of quitting, I do that.
As far as my breathing is concerned. For me, that took a good 8 months to a year to control. I have to make a conscious effort to breathe rhythmically or I find myself hyperventilating or gasping for breath. When running uphill, this presents an extra challenge. So, I tend to look down at my feet when running uphill. This way, I trick myself into not thinking about the elevation change. Doing that also helps me to calm myself down so I don't hyperventilate. Really, it's a win-win situation for me. I do find that if I'm running uphill and I don't look down, I easily run out of breath before the top of the hill, no matter how much I concentrate on my breathing and no matter how short or long the uphill climb is.
I've heard people say that to get your breath under control while running, you should just breathe when you feel the need to breathe. The thing is, your brain likes to trick you into breathing more than you need to (or even less than you need to) which can cause problems. So, if you find yourself having trouble with breath control on a run, try breathing to a rhythm. Try breathing in for 3 counts, then breathing out for 3 counts. If that doesn't work, try it for 4 counts. Experiment a bit and find a rhythm that works for you, but try to keep it consistent, and concentrate. It might take a few months to get it to be a habit for you, but once you get used to it, you'll be able to run longer and longer distances with ease. And, the bonus is that concentrating on your breathing will help tune out the self-doubt coming from your brain as well.
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