Swimming ability of freedivers

[Apnea_Addict]

Thank god - I am not the only one ;-)

Í can do breaststroke but I don´t really like it - and not really liking it doesn´t really motivate you to do some training. My crawl really sucks - I never really figured out how to time the breathing.

I was thinking about taking up a swimming class in the fall.

[yugyug]

I can swim ok - my freestyle is a bit dodge but ok for short distances. What I've found tho is that my best overall swimming style is one I was never taught at school but worked out for myself - 'the squid' - backstroke but with your arms doing a breaststroke style movement to your sides (not over the top like regular backstroke so you don't get water up ur nose ). With either a freestyle kick or a breast-stroke kick I can swim for ages and its kinda fast too.

[DeepThought]

I am pretty confident about threading water or getting from place A to B in water, just never bothered with speed, efficiency or style.
I will usually swim under water for a while, pop up, swim above water for a shorter while trying to mimic breast-stroke (or front crawl if I feel shameless), turn on my back and swim a little more above water with no defined style, repeat. I use my lungs buoyancy to save energy quite often when out in the sea. Might have covered a Km at sea a couple of times and have surely threaded water/swam for an hour or more in the past. I feel confident that I am not likely to drown unless the sea is in a really bad shape, but then I will not go for a long swim.

I can't really do front crawl or butterfly and my breast-stroke might not seem like swimming to the unsuspecting eye.

[trux]

I am rather surprised there are so many "non-swimmers" or bad swimmers here, especially because I never saw such cases in the clubs I've been member of. Hmm, it may be because the clubs were too selective, and some people who would otherwise stay, were scared off. So for example, in the scuba training I did some 20 years ago, besides all the theory and scuba exams, we had also some life saving and swimming exercises - who did not manage to swim 1500m with and without fins in a time limit, could not drag a (simulated) drowning victim 100m, could not jump from 8m tower, or could not do 50m on apnea, was not admitted to the scuba exams. I think it was not that bad, and I think that everyone with little bit of extra attention from the trainer can learn the freestyle enough to swim 1500m in the time limit. And I also think it is very useful and extremely important to be able of all of this - being in water or close to water often, it is only question of time when you encounter a critical situation when efficient (fast or/and long) swimming will be needed.

[jimqpublic]

Trux-

I don't think those of us who aren't much for swimming are bragging- it's just a fact. True, in the "old days" things were different. Here in my town the LA County Dept. of Parks and Recreation started dive training in 1954. The County and local clubs such as the Fathomiers and the Neptunes emphasized the logical progression to becoming a Waterman. Swim, skindive, spearfish, and eventually SCUBA. Now a lot of people getting into SCUBA have trouble with the swim requirements and never even consider skindiving to be an end in of itself.

Me, I feel like I want to become a well-rounded waterman. Maybe it's just post-dive euphoria but having comfortably gone well underwater this weekend I think the ocean isn't as scary as it was last week. Plus, in the twenty-odd years since I was a teenager unable to float I've added 20 pounds of bouyant matter around my waist.

Jim

[sickbugs]

before replying to this thread, i went down to the bay and swam a few laps (i figure the bay is about 130 meters long, from the jetty to the south cliff) and i realised that my freestyle isnt nearly as good as it once was, id never consider myself competition material (not fast enough) but i used to be able to swim easily for 25-30 mins, freestyle, now, after about 10 mins, my arms and shoulders feel very uncomfortable. because i do a lot of dynamic no-fin, my breaststroke is still as good as allways, i did about 10 laps of that until i got bored, then came home.

i guess the freediving is a bit to blame for this, also i havnt surfed much lately, so im not really using my shoulders in the water.. will have to fix this problem

[naiad]

Originally Posted by Narsil

I can do a longer dynamic than I can comfortably freestyle I'd say.

Me too.

Originally Posted by efattah

Here is a cool joke: In Canada, at a certain level of swimming instruction you must tread water for 5 minutes with CHIN ABOVE THE WATER. When taking this test, just do this:
- Breathe up on the edge of the pool
- Pack to the max
- Jump in the water
- Hold the breath for 5 minutes

Because of the huge volume from packing, your chin stays above the surface of the water even without doing anything! You pass the test without knowing how to tread water!!

That's a lot of packing!
I must try that, I am very buoyant anyway. That is one of the reasons why my swimming ability is not much of a problem. It takes only minimal effort for me to keep my face out of the water.

Originally Posted by jome

Now then, maybe I should give freestyle another try...I get tired very fast in that too, but I think I've identified the problem. My kicks are not relaxed enough, way too much effort there

Same with me. I have tried kicking in a more relaxed way, but then my legs sink.

[Sergiu]

I see the triathon guys at the local pool going on and on for one hour, in freestyle "mode" and I go "damn, i suck, i get tired after 200m". Then i realised it the pace that counts a lot, endurance pace it's needed for long distances and a style that is friendlier so i started doing breaststroke for 10min or 400m at the time...I tried once to go for 30min or 1km whichever comes first and stopped mid way - it's a total bore!

Now i try to trick myself to do some endurance swimming with different exercises the best is the "pyramid" in which i do 50s (meters) breathing every 7,9,11 and 13 strokes plus a full lenght of the pull on breath hold. Then back, to 11, 9, 7 and ... it works, keeps me busy . That's with freestyle but i started receintly with breaststroke as well and it works at least for the moment.

serge

[Bill McIntyre]

If "swimming" means freestyle, I've never been any good at it, but I don't think that has much to do with freediving, and I don't agree with those who said that a diver should be good at it as a basic survival skill. If you were left by the boat 10 miles offshore, do you really think that freestyle is what you should be doing with your energy?

I think I could stay afloat all day, but I wouldn't be doing the freestyle.

When I went though U.S. Navy Scuba School in the early 1960s, we had class races at distances of 500, 1000, and 1500 yards in a side loch of Pearl Harbor with no fins, and then later with fins. Since this was military training and we wouldn't want to be splashing around alerting the enemy to our presence, we were only allowed to use the breast stroke and side or back stroke with underwater recovery during the swims without fins. I won every won of them, but they were not at all concerned with ability to swim freestyle. If you were to make me swim freestyle, everyone would run off and leave me.

[jimqpublic]

Bill-

True- If you're 10 miles offshore having a good wetsuit and a signal mirror (shiny knife?) are far more important. But what about if you're shore diving on a reef 1 mile offshore. A change in tide sets up a strong current and afternoon wind creates chop that you can barely make headway against. Then you lose your fins.

In this case being a strong swimmer in choppy water would be a good idea. I have a buddy who had just this scenario (except he didn't lose his fins) off a small South Pacific island made it back only because he's a strong swimmer. What had taken him an hour to swim out took over three hours back, and it was well after dark when he got there. Since water there was warm he wasn't wearing a wetsuit and only had 5 pounds on a weight belt, which he ditched. He was exhausted, cold, and cramping when he finally hit the shore. Dumb decisions of course (dive solo, don't tell anyone, don't check tides & currents, start back with only two hours daylight...)


Since most of my diving will be shore dives I'll get plenty of practice surface swimming. Since there are lots of boats out there I'm going to put a dive flag on a Boogie Board which will add to the safety factor if I drift too far.

[Morg]

Originally Posted by Sergiu

I see the triathon guys at the local pool going on and on for one hour, in freestyle "mode" and I go "damn, i suck, i get tired after 200m". Then i realised it the pace that counts a lot, endurance pace it's needed for long distances and a style that is friendlier so i started doing breaststroke for 10min or 400m at the time...I tried once to go for 30min or 1km whichever comes first and stopped mid way - it's a total bore!

Now i try to trick myself to do some endurance swimming with different exercises the best is the "pyramid" in which i do 50s (meters) breathing every 7,9,11 and 13 strokes plus a full lenght of the pull on breath hold. Then back, to 11, 9, 7 and ... it works, keeps me busy . That's with freestyle but i started receintly with breaststroke as well and it works at least for the moment.

serge

I found the same results. I stumbled upon a training method somewhere on the net and found a pretty good strenght training method that I worked a few times.

It went something like this.

200 Meters - Warm Up
25 Meters - %90 - %100 Effort
Rest 15 Seconds
25 Meters - %90 - %100 Effort
Rest 15 Seconds

It went like that for about 6 or 8 reps. It was somewhat difficult. My arms were sore at the end which is good .

I also agree with many people here swimming laps in a pool for 30-60 minutes is very boring . I would much rather set off in the open water and swim around a small island or something . (I really plan on doing this in 4-5 weeks )

[laminar]

If any of you want to improve your swimming, the best book for that is Total Immersion by Terry Laughlin. I wrote a review of it on Deeperblue many moons ago. Do a search for it and I'm sure you'll find a thread with comments.

Pete

[Bill McIntyre]

Jim,

Your buddy made it back "because he is a strong swimmer" but you said he didn't lose his fins. Did he do the crawl while using his fins? Would he have made it if he had lost his fins and been swimming freestyle? I'm guessing that the answer is "no" to both questions.

I'm a pretty strong swimmer with fins too- I didn't lose the race at any of those distances when using fins. Of course at 67 my legs are not as strong as they were then, in spite of the cycling, running, and weight work with which I try to stave off the inevitable, but I think I'm still above average, and I think that is far more important to a freediver than freestyle ability.

And while I guess anything is possible, how likely is it that a diver will lose his fins and be facing a long swim? Going through the surf is the most likely way to lose fins, and then a long swim is not the problem.

Its true that you will be getting plenty of practice surface swimming on your shore dives, but it will be practice waving fins. I doubt you will be doing any freestyle while carrying a speargun.

I can't recall knowing of a single instance in which any of my diving friends have done any freestyle, but I can sure recall examples of having to swim strongly with fins. I recall a time when a sudden strong wind came down a canyon at Catalina and my anchor dragged, letting my boat head off toward the mainland. It may not have been the wise thing to do, but I decided to try to chase it down. I swam just as hard as I could with those fins without cramping, and finally caught the boat about a mile and a half off the island. I didn't do any freestyle, and I have serious doubts that anyone but an Olympic caliber swimmer would have caught that boat swimming freestyle in that choppy water.

I guess it would be nice to be a great freestyle swimmer, but I think it will be much more useful for a diver to work on being a strong fin swimmer.

[Oldsarge]

I'm with SThompson. If I exhale, I can stand on the bottom of the pool. With a lungfull, I float with only the top of my balding head above water. Shoot, when wearing diveskins, I ride lower in the water than gonetobaja does with 10lbs of lead! My parents were desperate for me to learn to swim and I finally sort of did, though there were enough bad moments in swimming class to make me phobic around water for years afterwards. Overcoming that phobia was one reason that I took up this crazy pasttime and even today, my wife would have a panic attack if she thought I was out there in the ocean without my wetsuit/pfd. I'd never have made the old San Diego Bottom Scratchers when all they had was goggles, trunks, fins and handspears. Thank Heaven for neoprene!

[Cliff Etzel]

I personally like the idea of both fin swimming and standard swimming - especially here in the PacNW where the water can be quite chilly the majority of the year. I think it provides a total body workout. I personally do find swimming somewhat boring per se', but it is a chance to calm my mind down, get some water time in, and in many instances, it provides mental space for problem solving and creative solutions. Adcd to thatr yoga and it does tend to be a mental vacation so to speak.

I would hate to swim lap after lap for 1000 meters, hence I break up the pool time with dynamic apnea with fins (typically 600-800yrds) and cardio breast stroke without fins (Typically 400 yrds). As anyone with precious little time, I prefer to keep a level of fitness that isn't competition level, but provides for me what I want in my fitness level and for freediving as a whole.