02 / CO2 tables - Effective or a waste of time?

[Ol Dirty Diver]

Hey Pete,

I just started thinking that if you want to test the importance of static tables, you should perform an experiment where you have relatively inexperienced individuals who try both approaches to developing static ability---with and without the aid of static tables.

I am definitely a beginner or amateur apneist (only one year of freediving with any dedication). Like I mentioned before, I am pleased on how I've done with little apnea-specific training so far (best CW depth = 120ft). In the interest of serving as your "non-static tables" guinea pig, I thought I'd try a dry static this morning (only my second time doing this), and I managed to reach 5:46 on my second of three intended attempts. I felt pretty sure I'd nail 6:00 on my third attempt, but I lost the willpower (which is what I feel that static apnea really boils down to, just like the endurance sports I do; how far are you willing to push yourself?). I was applying some of the advice from 'jome', measuring the length of my struggle phase (2:54), and counting my contractions in order to try to reach a higher goal number of contractions each attempt (reached 70 contractions on the 5:46, 80 on a subsequent but somehow shorter one).

My dive partner, 'fishon'/Derek LeVault, just told me he hit a ~7:00 dry static the other day, and I'm pretty sure he doesn't do static tables regularly (may have tried them before though).

I'm going to continue attempting to do dry statics every week, without doing any static tables (i.e., just attempting ~3 max attempts every time). Maybe when I plateau I'll attempt some static tables, although it's been pointed out that the static tables probably help the beginners through the more amateur times (< 5:00?) more than they help the experienced with the tougher times (> 6:00?). Not sure where you guys draw the line between amateur and respectable, but I feel like surpassing 6:00 would promote me to the respectable category.

 

[Lockedin]

Tangential to the topic: does anyone know of Macintosh software with CO2 & O2 tables?

 

[trux]

Yes, I have one in works. Better told, this application is completely platform independent - you can run it on any computer with a recent web browser. It may work even on some phones (though I may need to test it first and make some adjustments). And no, you do not need to be online during the session, you need to connect just to select a table or an entire session (multiple tables or other exercises).

I still need to make some tweaking but guess I could release it in January.

 

[laminar]

Jome wrote: I give them the basics, naturally the safety, some tips and I answer when directly asked something, but don't hit them in the head with some "official truth" and leave some for them to figure out.

Nicely put. I don't think static apnea is something that has a "right way" to train since there are so many variables.

Trux wrote: With the selective training you can go actually even further in the specific trained area than you may be able to go in a max attempt where all the aspects are combined. So in focused training you can actually bring your organism into a higher and longer hypercapnia, contractions, or hypoxia than during a max. Hence I believe the effect of properly structured static session can be much better than that of a pure max session.

Trux, can you share what you group typically does for tables and how many times a week?

You can actually train harder than with max. I definitely do not agree with the claim that you cannot train as hard with tables as during the max. If you think so, then you probably do not train the tables properly. Actually, training the tables is often much more difficult, and tiring than a max performance.

trux, this is an interesting topic for discussion. For me the difference between tables is that while doing a CO2 table (long static on short recoveries) is that you experience high C02 but yet don't necessarily spend much time in hypoxia. I think the value in doing max static practice or apnea cycling to max effort, is that if you actually go for max, you experience hypercapnia and hypoxia at the same time, which to me is as specific as you can get. I would suppose is not as specific when you are experiencing only one of the two at a time with tables.

If you can explain more about what happens when you and your club members end up doing max statics at the end of tables, that would be great.

I think there is always a "struggle" between breaking down a goal into smaller achieveable chunks and specificity. I tend to prefer erring on the side of specifity. When I do tables, I feel like I get better at doing tables, and perhaps my concentration and relaxation increases. But while doing max attempts or apnea exercise to near or full max effort, I feel that the intensity is really high and that things start to change really quickly.

The point in general that breath holding is very individual is well taken here. Back to Simo's point about finding your own way and Sam's about the gospel of tables, I think breath holding really is an art. After a certain point of experience, you take steps backward and forward, even for someone of Tom Sietas' experience and ability.

Not sure where you guys draw the line between amateur and respectable, but I feel like surpassing 6:00 would promote me to the respectable category.

I think the line between amateur and respectable is not so much in terms of time, whether it's 5, 6, or 7+ minutes, but rather about the person's own understanding of breath holding, their own physiological and mental responses to it, and experience juggling the variables. As other threads on DB have shown, it is a topic for endless debate. The world record used to be under 7 minutes and now many, many freedivers have done breath holds greater than that time. I think "respectable" really depends on the effort and concentration you are putting into learning to improve it, or make it more effortless and a calming experience, rather than one of struggle and agony. For instance, I believe that Martin Stepanek was able to hold his breath for 6-7 minutes quite easily after a bit of practice. In absolute terms, that's respectable or maybe it was actually just easy for him at the time. What was respectable (well, astounding at the time) was the hard work he put into reaching 8'06" for the world record. For me, I reached five minutes in 3 weeks of dry static practice. At the time it would be considered respectable. But if it only took 3 weeks, it really wasn't asking much of myself.

I'm looking forward to trying breath holding again. I haven't done a static in a looooooooong time. Maybe more than 2 years! I've been diving FRC as well so my lung volume has decreased and I don't pack anymore for lung safety reasons.

But I'm looking at going about it a whole different way. If Umberto can reach around 7'30" and 98m without packing, then I think there's some room for me to improve. rofl

My inclination is to start with regular cycles of anaerobic exercise as for me this builds up my buffers like nothing else.

I'm tempted to give tables a go for a month or two, not sure if that is long enough for a proper trial. trux, what would you suggest I try?

I'll be training dry since I don't really have access to a training partner in the pool. Since I hate dry statics, I'll likely limit my training to:
-traditional anaerobic exercise
-apnea cycling
-max statics in water when I have a buddy

Pete

 

[jome]

I agree that it's not only the time, but how it is done that IMO earns respect. But that said, 6-7 minutes are surely impressive times and rarely does one hit those times without having learned something of breathholding (then again, I do know of cases where this has been done basically on the first try

Just out of curiosity, were these done with or without packing? I'd say 7 minutes without packing is very impressive indeed - and 6 not half bad either...

 

[Ol Dirty Diver]

I get what you guys are saying about 'respectable'. Everyone has a different starting point; some of us have a good athletic background, some don't, some enter freediving with a knowledge of meditation, etc. I have set the starting bar relatively high for myself, probably due to an athletic background, so I'm going to need to enter the realm of 7:00+ statics to accomplish 'respectable-in-light-of-my-favorable-background' times!

Just out of curiosity, were these done with or without packing? I'd say 7 minutes without packing is very impressive indeed - and 6 not half bad either...

If you were addressing me, my own almost-6:00 static this morning was done without packing. As it was only my second time attempting statics, I haven't gotten to experiment much with different methods. But, just as has been mentioned before, I have a feeling that I would feel too uncomfortable from the chest pressure if I did (dry) statics with packing. I'll definitely give it a try though. I am wearing a heart rate monitor when I do these, so it will be neat to compare heart rate patterns between the methods. I'll have to ask my partner (who did ~7:00) if he packs when he does statics.

Here's a question I have (to which I could probably find the answer by searching, but since some of you experts are following this thread...): What is a good recovery time rule between statics? I know in shallow freediving it's to recover twice as long as the duration of the preceding dive. Is this perhaps a good rule for statics too? (seems too lengthy in the absence of nitrogen issues) Maybe just equaling the duration of the preceding breath hold is sufficient?

One more question: If I were going to do a max. static attempt (as I will try to do weekly from now on), what is an ideal number of preliminary statics to do before the big one? In my mind 2 is a nice number, so that I would just have to do 3 statics altogether each sitting. In these preliminary statics, should I go for max. (which I would expect to increase in duration every time), or settle for a shorter "warm-up" duration (e.g., until contractions start, or some set duration after contractions start). I have a notion that doing the shorter warm-up statics would accomplish the same thing (to the same degree?) as doing longer statics to prepare me for a max. attempt (i.e., slowing my heart rate down, and whatever other physiological phenomena gets involved).

Thanks!

 

[jome]

Hi,

I've written tons of posts about prep for static, so I'm not going to re-iterate everything. But you can find most of my thoughts on the subject if you click my name on the top bar of this post and use the "find all posts by..." function.

Anyway, here's some really quick pointers. Not universal, but work for me:
-I use roughly a recovery time that is as long as the previous static. So 2 min static -> 2 min recovery. With the exception that I never go past 6 minutes, because I feel the warmup effect starts to fade after that
-Usually I do 2-3 warmups before the big one
-On the first warmup, I do something easy, just to settle down and get into the "mood"
-The last warmup I do almost max
-In between these I may do 1 easier one if I feel like I need it that day

So typically for example:
2:00 FRC, 2 min rest
4:30, 4 min rest
6:30 5 min rest
Max

In a way this is of course the same thing as a table, except I don't have any predefined times or targets I need to hit, I go by the feel of it...

If you're already doing 6 minutes and your friend 7, I think you both have very good potential to be world class in static with some training!
Well, I guess this has staryed off topic quite a bit though...

 

[naiad]

Anyway, here's some really quick pointers. Not universal, but work for me:
-I use roughly a recovery time that is as long as the previous static. So 2 min static -> 2 min recovery. With the exception that I never go past 6 minutes, because I feel the warmup effect starts to fade after that
-Usually I do 2-3 warmups before the big one
-On the first warmup, I do something easy, just to settle down and get into the "mood"
-The last warmup I do almost max
-In between these I may do 1 easier one if I feel like I need it that day

So typically for example:
2:00 FRC, 2 min rest
4:30, 4 min rest
6:30 5 min rest
Max

That is very similar to what I do. I usually do 3-5 min rest between long statics, sometimes the recovery time is shorter than the previous static. Any more than that and the warmup effect starts to fade. I don't do FRC as a warmup.

 

[laminar]

Static apnea prep is as individual as it comes, these are the broad categories that I've seen:

1. Tit for tat style. Equal breathe up and static times.
Eg. 3 min prep / 3 min static, 4 min prep / 4 min static, 5 min prep / 5 min static, 6 min prep / 6 min static, 7 min prep / max attempt
I believe Luc Gosselin the current Canadian record holder did 7:22 with the method. (Takes 42min+ to go through!)

2. Three's the magic number style.
Eg. No breathe up initial warm-up static to 3'30 - 4'30", 5 minutes prep or so / static #2 to 5'00"-6'00", 6 min prep / max attempt

3. Glutton for punishment style a la Tom Sietas
Eg. 10 minutes of resting (sometimes with some more active breathing close to official top) / max attempt

4. Cornucopia style
Eg. Varies considerably, but can include negative pressures in the pool, exhale statics, CO2 / 02 tables, firebreathing, and usually with a very strict preparation timing which usually causes severe anxiety as the person tries to keep track of it written down on his or her hand or watch.

5. Max, max, max!
Eg. Pretty self-descriptive: 3 minutes prep / max static, 4 min prep / max static, 4 minutes prep / max attempt

6. Variations in B minor
Eg. Variations on the above. I've probably forgotten some preparations and of course there are probably combinations that work for others.

I've used:
Tit for tat: didn't like it, took too long and I felt I couldn't sustain the apnea times.
Three's the magic number: this is what I've used in competitions most often in the past.
Glutton for punishment: I think I tried it once in a competition and it failed miserably because I was so nervous about using it. But it worked quite well in practice with regular training. In practice, I would use max, max, max for a more intensive training.

Not sure which one I'll use next! :duh

Pete

 

[naiad]

Right, here goes... I'll work through all of them and see what happens.

My best method is one that I can only do if I have done a lot of static training recently, as it is very difficult. I try to do the shortest possible intervals between attempts. If I get it right, I can do a max static with little effort.

I almost always do a 2:00 breathe-up. It is the time that works best for me. For the rest of the interval I don't do anything special.

 

[wes]

I have been doing tables for about 6 months and really enjoy them and appreciate how much they have taught me. Here are some points of what I have learned:

It's huge how you do them:
I get up between 4-5 am pee AND poop, don't drink anything, walk very slowly to the couch, put on heart rate monitor, prop feet up with pillows click on computer to run tables with audio only, no moving for response.

I always do "max" hold on last breath hold that goes beyond requirment, usually 15 or 30 secs, this gives me confidence that I can do next table next time as I have demostrated some room to spare. I have separate stopwatch to time the extra max time after the last hold

I pack only on last few holds, usually 2 packs then 4 packs next to last hold then 6 packs on last hold.

I have found its better to breathe up "less" early on in the holds to help stimulate dive response and this makes the longer holds harder, lately I have been alternating holds in pairs, one "easy" for recovery then one "hard" for better dive response. I make the holds hard or easy by breathing up differently.

Using a HR monitor is huge for me and I wouldn't do tables wtihout one as it would seem a waste of time. I can tell by how low my HR goes how much dive response I am getting also how low my BL HR is.

I also would not do tables without a computer as this makes it much more real and also relaxing.

If the table is very hard for me I make a plan of how I will do it, write out, get up, maybe Yoga stretching for 20 min then do holds with hard and easy holds marked and packs marked down then I follow this plan and its worked well for me. Also not to excercize the day before if the table is hard.

I have found if I plan a table correctly all the holds seem the same difficulty, sometimes if I am off the early holds are more difficult or sometimes the latter hold are harder so I know that I haven't optimized this table.

I have found its very important not to move at all during tables, I sit on my hands so I don't move them and don't squirm and try not to swallow or cough or anything except move my eyes to watch the computer screen and also to close eyes for some times as having eyes open used O2 I have read, also not to think about things as this uses O2 also I have read.

Then I go back to sleep for 2-3 hours and get up as normal so it doesn't take time out of my day.

So far I am up to O2 table 17. Also using this approach I decided to start with the first table even though this was easy for me and I learned a ton progressing and making it challenging by always adding the max time to the last hold. So some weeks I do one table some none and some weeks no tables at all. So far I have succeeded in doing each table only once so have never had to repeat a table.

Also the main thing I use for training is to do dynamics (I do 2x25m on intervals) and I think this provides good change is body phisiology and I use the tables more as an indicator of progress as opposed to a primary training method.

My max wet static is 5:45 though haven't done that in a while. Hope this helps and Cheers - Wes

 

[BennyB]

What an interesting topic....

Now that i've got a couple of comps under my belt and in particular after going to the World's in Hurghada this year i've seen some wide and varied static warm up routines (Canadian Crazy Tables springs to mind).

I used to subscribe to the CO2 table theory in my earlier days and I thought I got good results with them (when I was a less than 5min static person). At some point I just got sick of them and stopped.

My first 5min static was about 4 months after i'd started freedive training in Australia. At the time i'd done lots of dynamic training but almost no static for 2 months. I did 2 warm up dives and when I did my max 2 bikini girls were watching me and I was conscious of them watching me and I felt some sort of pressure to stay and do a good static and lo and behold, I did my first 5min static. A good 18 months went past till I did another one.

Now training with other people in London I had my standard routine warm up: 2min inhale static, rest for a few minutes, 3min inhale, few minutes rest, 1:30 FRC, rest, 1:30 FRC, rest, max attempt. Did this for a good year with results between 4-4:45min. One night I got sick of the long warm up with heaps of contractions so did 2:30 inhale, rest, 3:30 inhale, rest, max attempt and did 5:18 (coincidently there were 2 nice looking girls watching me at the time so I became paranoid that I needed girls watching me to do good statics ). I've used this prep ever since with good results but nothing over 5:18.

My theory is that there's only so much mental strength you're willing to allocate to a static session, and too many warm ups deplete this internal source. That's why whenever I do a good max static, I cannot comprehend doing another one afterwards as i've exhausted all my mental strength.

Now.... to complicate things a bit let's touch on what Elisabeth mentioned earlier. In Egypt after a week of diving my static improved quite a bit, to over 5 min. At the time it was rare for me to do over 5. Two days after a good attempt however I barely did a 4min static as my head wasn't in it. Three days after this, I had done no apnea and was testing some monofins. I decided to do some static after a mate said he'd spot me. Same warm up - 2:30, rest, 3:30, rest, max attempt. On the max I made 6 minutes quite clean. Was this to do with lots of depth training? In my mind, absolutely, to a degree. What else was it? Well the guy spotting me coached me well from 4 minutes onwards and helped me mentally keep down until i'd hit my physical barrier. Without a shadow of a doubt I would have never done 6 minutes without someone coaching me. I realised that I can do a static to 4 minutes (and have done dozens of them) but after that it's purely a mental game until the point where you are quite close to LMC and then it's a physical game again.

My conclusions, after all that?

1) You only have a certain amount of mental strength in a session. How you distribute that in a static session is up to you. For me it's good to have an easy warm up, a medium 2nd static and then go all out.

2) Mental strength supersedes CO2 training. If you have the mental "mongrel" in you, you will go past where CO2 training can take you.

3) When you start to lose your mental strength, a good coach will take you the extra yards you need. Of course you have to know how far you can safely go. I know I can go past 5, I just need to hear it from someone.

4) Other freediving disciplines train your static by default. I'm sure training static will improve static, but so will dynamic and constant and they're more fun.

Anyway that's enough of a rant for a late night (Simo what is it about raving about statics and late nights???). Of course these are my own opinions and I expect they differ from person to person.

Cheers,
Ben

 

[Bill]

Thanks Pete. Great topic. Let me add 2 cents worth. By the way that makes it a bargain as the metal in the two 'coppers' is now worth more than 2 1/2 cents.

1 Very good for training but I add another hold at the bottom and top. It gets me over 90% and feels easier. Use two minutes between all holds and you have my secret O2 tables.

2 Very difficult for me but if you use a few empty lung holds at first, two thirds of our national team use something like this. Try two easier holds (say two and ten contractions) then go. Deron was using something like this very effectively a few years back.

3 I wasn't able to make this work dry but it shows promise in the pool.

4 Good to prevent burnout. Just look up something that Erik has used in the past and try it for a change of pace. Be careful.

5 I consider myself a masochist and you still can't sell that one to me.

6 Try to stay with/return to the tables, they become O2/CO2 combinations, like the real thing. Try breathing out more than in. Try keeping your face dry until the last hold. If you don't samba, you have no idea what the max is, try adding a few seconds next time. If you lose track of the time, that's close enough.

All IMHO of course.

Aloha
Bill
P.S. An almost all expenses paid trip to Hawaii to anyone that gets me another dozen seconds.

 

[fishon]

Bill,
Have you considered amputating a leg? I bet they rob a bunch of oxygen from you during a static. No worries, I already live Hawaii, so that's a freebie.
Does anyone know their times with and without packing? I do about 6:50 without packing, but I never tried with. A lot of times I do one pack though, which I believe is a habit that I started when I thought I wasn't getting a full breath due to my wetsuit. I don't know if it helps physically, but I seem to like doing it.

 

[Bill]

I wonder why I never thought of that.
Packing will help your static but it takes a while to get used to it. Too much and you will burn O2 during the struggle to keep it in. If you can't stay relaxed while packing (my problem) the increased heart rate will negate the advantage of more air not to mention the time you spend holding your breath while packing. I slowly worked up to 50%. Seemed to add 15-20 seconds.
Bill

 

[laminar]

i've seen some wide and varied static warm up routines (Canadian Crazy Tables springs to mind).

What are those? Sounds in-tri-guing.... :t

bikini girls

rofl rofl So true, though. I agree that willpower is very important to progressing say over 6 minutes in static. But training is also important. No amount of willpower will give a great static result if you just can't buffer the CO2 or if your static technique is bad (in terms of understanding your body and being able to relax properly) or if you've been drinking whiskey all night and your buddy tells everyone in the bar you are a kick ass freediver and that you can hold your breath for 10 minutes and bets your car that you can do it and hell, he'll throw in your girlfriend to sweeten the bet. Uh, I mean hypothetically.... :friday

But willpower in ***training*** is very important- but it has to be the right kind of training. It all boils down to intensity, IMHO, and I still think that most people don't train intensely or specifically to get the results they are looking for, especially those in the 4'00"-5'30" range (exceptions, of course).

The fact that a coach egging you on or bikini clad girls give you the will power to push through to a new pb shows that training had very little to do with the result. Imagine if you used that willpower in your training and what kind of static apnea results you would get.

The willpower doesn't necessarily have to be applied to wet static apnea training. Here's an example of what I mean:

Several years ago I wanted to train and compete. I hadn't tried any really consistent apnea exercise and didn't really have the abilty to spend months in the pool (boring, too). So I spent two months on the Concept II rowing machine doing this:

1. 20 minutes at 65-70% Max HR (about 1:50 per 500m pace)
2. Then 5 X 1'30" (working up to 2'00") at 85-90% Max HR (between 1:45-1:30 pace) on 5 minutes rest
3. Cool down 30 minutes at 70% MaxHR

Man, those intervals were brutal. :ko Although I kept the time intervals between each anaerobic interval, I increased the pace to keep the intensity high, raising every 2 weeks or so after a certain pace got manageable.

So after two months of this I started going to the pool about 2 weeks before the Regionals. After a few days, I found I could hit 6 minutes on the first static of the day - no warm-up. That had never happened before and I could only assume it came from the sets on the rowing machine since I hadn't done any other static training or anything else. Then I set my all time pb within those two weeks.

The competition went well. I set pbs for competition results in all three disciplines at the time. And they were easy. I was pretty pumped for nationals.

In preparation for nationals a month later, I discontinued the rowing machine workout during this time, perhaps because I thought I needed to "taper" or something. My statics fell off, and soon I could no longer do the 6 minutes on the first static. At the time I blamed it on fatigue from late nights at the pool which was probably a factor and to fix it, tried harder in the pool. I exprienced my first sambas and blackouts in the pool during that month (if I remember it right) and I got frustrated. At nationals, I barely made my annouced performance in static with 5'06"! (1'10" less than my previous comp) My dynamic was horrible and I felt to crappy to announce anything more than 45m in cw. :duh So while overtraining was certainly a factor (willpower applied to the wrong areas), I think that I could have done so much better just sticking with the Concept II routine and staying healthy and fit throughout.

So the long-winded point I'm making is that willpower is crucial to excelling in freediving, but the trick is finding the right way to apply it.

So Bill, where's that ticket to Hawaii?

Thoughts?

Pete

 

[BennyB]

Hmmm, maybe i'm just convincing myself I don't need to train static....

At the Worlds' Doug Sitter, Will Winram and a couple of other guys were getting into the crazy tables and a bunch of other people started doing them too - I didn't because they looked.... well crazy.

Can't remember the specifics but the involve about 4 or 5 exhale holds for a minute or so with a reducing recovery time (starting at around 2min and dropping 30s each time), then an exhale hold on your back for a minute or so then pack 3 times, hold for 15sec then pack 3 times etc. and keep going for as long as possible but no more than 6 minutes. Then 6 minute rest then max attempt.

Crazy.

 

[naiad]

How these styles have worked for me so far:
(I didn't do them all in one go, this is my general experience of static training!)

1. Tit for tat style. Equal breathe up and static times.
Eg. 3 min prep / 3 min static, 4 min prep / 4 min static, 5 min prep / 5 min static, 6 min prep / 6 min static, 7 min prep / max attempt

This hasn't worked for me so far. I never do a breathe up of more than 2:00, and the rest of the interval is spent resting.

2. Three's the magic number style.
Eg. No breathe up initial warm-up static to 3'30 - 4'30", 5 minutes prep or so / static #2 to 5'00"-6'00", 6 min prep / max attempt

I usually do best on the third attempt, so this is what I mostly do when going for a max.

3. Glutton for punishment style a la Tom Sietas
Eg. 10 minutes of resting (sometimes with some more active breathing close to official top) / max attempt

It hasn't worked for me so far, but worth trying again. Sometimes in the pool I have done an effortless 4:00 on the first attempt, and then the next ones have been more difficult, because the pool is cold. Maybe I should make the first one the max, and not stop at 4:00 because it is a warmup.

4. Cornucopia style
Eg. Varies considerably, but can include negative pressures in the pool, exhale statics, CO2 / 02 tables, firebreathing, and usually with a very strict preparation timing which usually causes severe anxiety as the person tries to keep track of it written down on his or her hand or watch.

Hasn't worked for me. I have never done a good static after exhale statics, firebreathing or tables. I use tables and exhale statics for training, but not as a warmup for a max attempt.

5. Max, max, max!
Eg. Pretty self-descriptive: 3 minutes prep / max static, 4 min prep / max static, 4 minutes prep / max attempt

Sounds good to me! I don't quite go for max on the first and second ones, but I do push myself hard. It works very well for me. After the hard warmups it is almost a relief to do the max attempt!

6. Variations in B minor
Eg. Variations on the above. I've probably forgotten some preparations and of course there are probably combinations that work for others.

I haven't found my ideal method yet, when I do then I intend to do some seriously long statics!

 

[SEDATE]

I don't have too much experience with the tables yet, but would like to do some more CO2. However I find that my statics increase DRAMATICLY after a period of depth training (which I don't get to do too often). It seems that somehow my body adapts, the contractions come later and my body saves more oxygen. (please excuse me if this is off topic...)

I have two examples of this: after 1-1,5 week of training in Dahab this summer, my statics went from 4.36 to 5.27. Then after training for about two weeks before the world championships in Hurghada (and only doing one real static max), it jumped again to 6.15. This is without ANY real static training, just depth. Also my shape was not the best the last time as I had been out of training for a month before. Can someone explain this to me? (don't get me wrong, I'm very happy about it! just want it to continue this way...)

I find it quite interesting how our bodies work differently and how we can adapt to this facinating sport

Elisabeth

maybe the reason you have a good ability adaptation to water , i do not know how to explain ..some have it

 

[laminar]

Benny,

I'd be curious to know the origin of the last part of the crazy tables set.

It sounds very much like an adaptation of interval hypoxic training (IHT) that Eric Fattah devised many years ago (I had never heard anyone else using it until now). You can find many thread on DB with discussion of IHT.

If you use an oximeter you can better keep your 02 saturation at a certain level (say 80%) but adjusting the number of packs and the frequency of when you pack. Athletes use an IHT machine that changes the 02 composition of the air fed to the athlete. Doing it this way is much cheaper.

I had completely forgotten about it. It is a good way to get exposed to a consistent level of hypoxia and experience 02 contractions at length.

Pete