After all the posts on some salacious books that don't exactly put freediving in a good light, I thought I'd mention a book I just bought that is a "must have" for any freediver. It's the DAN report from the recent freediving conference they held.
You can buy it here: https://www.diversalertnetwork.org/catalog/products/401-7800.html
There are lots of great topics including: DCS, Narcosis, SWB, Brain Damage, and something proposed by a NAVY researcher called the 60 second rule. Many of the major players are represented in here as well- Kirk, Tanya, Martin, Mandy, USN, Dr. Lundgren, ect.
I haven't made it all the way through just yet but one of the more interesting sections was on the idea of a 60 second time limit for dive outside of competition. The person who recommend it was trying to get the US navy to implement it fleet wide. IT seems that all of his data shows that dives of less than 60 seconds in nature have a very low SWB risk and that when you even extend things out to 90 seconds the rate goes up dramatically. HE sited that the AMA divers have been following this general rule for hundreds of years with an excellent safety record. Of course others int he book disagree and there's some interesting discussion that goes on but here's what I found most interesting about it. He theorizes that you can even get away with things like hyperventilation, which we all know is a big no-no for in water stuff, to make your dive more comfortable as long as you don't go past that 60 second time line.
Anyhow, there's lots more good stuff in there, like Kirk talking about his Type II bends hit from some seriously deep scooter dives and Tanya's description of what Narcosis is like past 400' on a breath hold dive.
Jon
You can buy it here: https://www.diversalertnetwork.org/catalog/products/401-7800.html
There are lots of great topics including: DCS, Narcosis, SWB, Brain Damage, and something proposed by a NAVY researcher called the 60 second rule. Many of the major players are represented in here as well- Kirk, Tanya, Martin, Mandy, USN, Dr. Lundgren, ect.
I haven't made it all the way through just yet but one of the more interesting sections was on the idea of a 60 second time limit for dive outside of competition. The person who recommend it was trying to get the US navy to implement it fleet wide. IT seems that all of his data shows that dives of less than 60 seconds in nature have a very low SWB risk and that when you even extend things out to 90 seconds the rate goes up dramatically. HE sited that the AMA divers have been following this general rule for hundreds of years with an excellent safety record. Of course others int he book disagree and there's some interesting discussion that goes on but here's what I found most interesting about it. He theorizes that you can even get away with things like hyperventilation, which we all know is a big no-no for in water stuff, to make your dive more comfortable as long as you don't go past that 60 second time line.
Anyhow, there's lots more good stuff in there, like Kirk talking about his Type II bends hit from some seriously deep scooter dives and Tanya's description of what Narcosis is like past 400' on a breath hold dive.
Jon
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