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The Blood Racecourse

Think of the travel of blood as a racecourse. Blood takes one lap through our body in a matter of seconds. This is in thanks to our heart. So how does blood flow?

Your heart is made up of several parts. It is divided into four chambers. Think of your heart as a box. The top two boxes are the atria (atrium, if talking about one). The lower ones are the ventricles. Dividing the heart in half is the septum. This is part of the heart muscle that runs vertically. The two sides are simply called the left and right. The left side is were the deoxygenated blood comes in and the right is for the oxygenated blood. You could call them the blue and red sides.

Between each box' in the heart is a valve. There are four valves. The valves make sure the blood only travels in one direction. The tricuspid valve is between the left atrium and the right ventricle. The next valve is the pulmonary valve which allows deoxygenated to leave the heart and travel to the lungs. The first valve blood meets on the left side of the heart is the mitral valve. It separates the left atrium from the left ventricle. The last valve is the aortic valve. This allows blood the leave the heart and give oxygen to the rest of the body.

There are many vessels of the heart. The main ones are veins and arteries. Veins bring blood to the heart and arteries take blood away. Blood enters the right atrium through the inferior and the superior vena cavas. The superior vena cava brings blood in from the upper parts of the body such as the head. The inferior vena cava brings in blood from the lower body. The first artery blood will meet is the pulmonary artery. This takes blood to the lungs to be oxygenated. Then, blood will go to the pulmonary veins which will drop blood off into the left atrium. Then blood is pushed from the left ventricle in to the aorta. This is the largest artery in your body. It delivers blood to the rest of the body.

So know that you know the parts associated with the path of blood, let's put them in order. You can start at any place since the blood travels in a huge circle:

1) THE RIGHT ATRIUM
Blood is pushed into the right atrium by the inferior and the superior vena cava. Blood is pushed through the tricuspid valve.

2)THE RIGHT VENTRICLE
This part of the heart pushes blood into through the pulmonary valve and into the pulmonary artery.

3)THE PULMONARY ARTERY
This artery is responsible for carrying blood to the lungs.

4)THE LUNGS
Blood enters the lungs and is oxygenated by the tiny air sacs called alveoli. The blood then goes to the pulmonary veins.

5)PULMONARY VEINS
These are in charge of pumping oxygenated blood into the left atrium.

6)LEFT ATRIUM
Blood is entered and pushed through the mitral valve into the left ventricle.

7)LEFT VENTRICLE
This is the largest and most important section of the heart. It has the job of pumping blood through the aortic valve and into the aorta.

8)AORTA
This is the largest artery. It takes blood to the whole body.

9) ARTERIES/ ARTERIOLES
As blood makes it way through the body it travels through arteries. Then as it gets ready to go back to the heart it will go through arterioles, which are just smaller arteries.

10) CAPILLARIES
Next is the capillaries. These are the smallest blood vessels in the body. They are like a bridge between arterioles and veinules.

11)VEINULES/ VEINS
After the capillaries, comes the veinules. They are smaller forms of veins.
After those comes the veins. From the veins comes the inferior and superior vena cava.

12)INFERIOR/ SUPERIOR VENA CAVA
These bring blood from the body into the right atrium were blood starts another lap through the body.

Learn more about this author, Jennifer Clark.
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