Repeated apneas do not affect the hypercapnic ventilatory response in the short term.
Long-term training of breath-hold diving reduces the hypercapnic ventilatory response (HCVR), an index of the CO(2) sensitivity. The aim of the present study was to elucidate whether also short-term apnea training (repeating apneas with short intervals) reduces the HCVR, thereby being one contributing factor explaining the progressively increasing breath-holding time (BHT) with repetition of apnea