Side Stitch

 I experienced a side stitch yesterday. Side stitch is the cramp kinda thing you get below your rib cage. I've experienced it before but yesterday I was just wondering why do I get this and how to stop it. 

The main problem happens because the diaphragm is strained. The diaphragm is the muscle below your lungs, it helps the lungs to expand and retract. It contracts when the lungs expand and expands when the lungs retract. A bad breathing pattern may stress this and cause it to pain.  A filled  stomach can cause organs do rub into each other and cause the discomfort. 

How to prevent it: Give enough time for food to digest to avoid this. You'll still need energy to perform well, but you cant have too much food in the stomach for that. So have food that has high carbs to get more energy out of less volume.  Another thing I am guilty of doing is gulping a lot of water in a single go. This can cause all the water to juggle around in the belly and cause discomfort leading to a stitch. You have to have a few sips more often rather than gulping water only once or twice the whole session. And the last one is to breath in as much as possible and breathe out as much as possible. This will let your diaphragm have equal duration during the expanding and contraction letting it rest enough. Short and shallow breaths don't give it enough rest causing it pain. 

There might be other ways that I'm not aware of, but for now  That's it