Training to be a Frogman

[JHolloway77]

Hello. My name is John Holloway and I am training to become a US Navy SEAL. I have not undergone the official training yet, but when I do one of the evolutions I must complete is a 50 meter underwater swim. It is just one side of the pool to the other on a single breath. I was wondering if anyone could help me and provide me with information or training programs to prepare me for this.

Underwater swimming and breath holding is an important skill for me to learn and any help would be appreciated. Thank you.

[island_sands]

Originally Posted by JHolloway77

Hello. My name is John Holloway and I am training to become a US Navy SEAL. I have not undergone the official training yet, but when I do one of the evolutions I must complete is a 50 meter underwater swim. It is just one side of the pool to the other on a single breath. I was wondering if anyone could help me and provide me with information or training programs to prepare me for this.

Underwater swimming and breath holding is an important skill for me to learn and any help would be appreciated. Thank you.

hi John
welcome to DB.. there are loads of postings here that will give you good advice. look under the training and techniques section.


Just remember while training dynamic apnea you should not do it alone...

[cantshoot]

Hi John,

safety first:
Don't forget to get a dive buddy to watch you while you train or atleast notify the life guards (Very important)

You may also do a search on "breathe up" and "CO2 tables"

With a bit of training and determination 50m should be a breeze for you crazy seals.

Good luck at BUDs,
Roland

[land shark]

ok John, I'm confused.
Whats it gonna be. Frogman or Seal

jim

[stoneshot]

John,


Pm me


I can help you to complete that and any other questions you may have a " Hell week". Okay, oh and good luck!

[JHolloway77]

First I would like to thank everyone for there responses, they gave me a lot of good info to start with. I have just one more question that I have not been able to find an answer for.

I do a lot of cardio, 6 days a week I am either running, swimming or kickboxing. I have read that cardio can affect your max breath hold. Is there a optimum amount of time before or after an aerobic exercise for me to practice static or dynamic training?

And to answer Land Shark's question, frogman is just nicname for SEALs. It dates back to the frogmen of WWII who later became the SEAL teams.

[smellsfishy]

Check out the Discovery channel's excellent series on Navy Seal training. http://shopping.discovery.com/stores...atalogId=10000

I believe they have you jump in do an underwater summersault then swim 25 meters push off and come back. So you lose the initial push off. I believe they also have you do it maskless.

I've actually found that on some days I performed better statics or dynamics after doing cardio. I think a guy who's in good enough shape to join the seals should be good enough to pull off 75 meters with some training. I think it's really about 1. learning to relax and get past the urges to breathe 2. training your body to adapt to higher levels of co2 and lower levels of oxygen.

Good Luck.

[efattah]

John,

Some pointers:
- I would wait 24h after a hard cardio session before trying to do a maximum breath-hold swim
- I would assume that for your exam you are not allowed to use any sort of weightbelt, neck weight or suit? If so, then you must train in exactly the same configuration that you will be tested with.
- You can learn to pack your lungs, gettings as much as 3 litres of extra air; however this will make you VERY buoyant, which may cause problems since I assume you can't use a weight belt
- To adjust your buoyancy, recall that the depth you swim at affects your buoyancy-- the deeper along the pool that you swim, the more negative you get, so if you are finding yourself buoyant, swim along the bottom as closely as possible
- When doing the maximum swim, it essential that you are quite cool; almost cold, but not shivering
- It essential that prior to starting the swim, you must not move for at least 5 minutes. It is hard or impossible for your body to store oxygen and energy if you are moving about in any way during the 5 minutes prior to the swim
- In that sense, I would say the best preparation would be to lay down motionless, near the edge, for at least 5 minutes, if you are allowed to do so
- By practicing with a buddy, and following the above tips, you should blow past the 50m goal. Try to impress your instructors by doing 100m! Keep in mind that the world record (without a wetsuit) is 166m, although that was done with a neck weight.
- The more deeply you breathe before the swim, the better your lungs will feel, but this will reduce your ultimate distance. The urge to breathe, however unpleasant, increases the distance at which you will ultimately black out. If you are finding that the urge to breathe is what is stopping you, then breathing a bit more before hand may help (always with a buddy!). On the other hand, if you are finding that having blackouts or sambas (shaking) is your limiting factor, then breathing less before hand will help.
- Your stroke mechanics will have a huge effect on distance. Try to glide as much as possible, using fewer strokes to cover the same distance. Try to relax and go limp during the glide phase. Every muscle that is clenched is burning precious O2.

[efattah]

One extra point:
- You must be VERY well hydrated. That means a diet high in complex carbs, and reasonable amounts of salt, and LOTS of water for 48h before hand
- But, you must not eat for at least 3 hours prior to the swim, except maybe for some gatorade or sports drink
- In my experience, heavy foods such as eggs, bacon, meat, etc., are okay during training, but for maximum performance I would avoid such heavy foods on the day of the attempt, and maybe also the day before. Some fruits help you become more alkaline.

[smellsfishy]

I'll add a couple of comments to Eric's excellent post.

1. Make sure your buddy swims along the surface with you and knows how to respond properly. He needs to know to look for loss of air (bubbles), erratic movements, loss of motor control (samba, or spasms), lack of movement, etc. All things that may indicate you're in trouble. He needs to be able to bring you to the surface, support your head above water and resuscitate you if necessary (often times just supporting your head and blowing air over the eyes will snap you out of a blackout and start you breathing again). search the site for more info on proper safetying this is by no means a complete list. The point is don't just have somebody "keeping an eye out for you" as that's how people die every year doing this sort of thing.

2. When doing the underwater strokes keep your body streamlined by looking down and not ahead. looking up will interrupt your streamiline and slow your glide substantially. (check out some world record videos online)

good luck !

[Sommerlund]

Just a little pointer,
one of my friend tried out for the danish navy seals, and it is not the wather extercise which will be har but all the hiking with a backpack while your are deadtired that is what you need to train a lot off too. at least 70 km a week at a 7 km an hour pace