Apnea Walk & Static trials

[eren]

Hi to everyone,

I have two questions, one regarding the apnea walk training, the other regarding static trials on land.

I have heard of apnea walk a couple of days ago. Though I do not exactly know how it is done, I assume that it has something to do with walking as long as you can while holding breath. Can anyone enlighthen me on this subject in some details -like how to do it correctly etc. I sometimes hold my breath and run slowly at the same time. Can this kind of an exercise increase my breath hold capacity?

Second question is about a problem I encounter every static trial. As far as I know after ventilating enough the last breath I inhale should be as slow and deep as possible to be able to fill as much lung space as possible. In such breath-hold trials my problem is that the contractions start too early -perhaps because of the high inner pressure of the air in my lungs?- . I do not know whether one can stop the contractions by will once they start -I certainly cannot. If I am not wrong the reason why the contractions come is the high CO2 level. Either I do something wrong by filling my lungs totally before a static session or my CO2 tolerance is very low , although I am training fairly hard and am physically quite fit. To overcome this early coming contractions I tried to exhale some air when the pressure in my lungs becomes unbearable. That did not work at all.

I am looking forward for hearing your opinions about the possible reasons of that. Thank you in advance.

 

[thin_air]

apnea walking

here is an excellent thread started by guss "out of water work out..."

as for you early contractions, i dont know what could be causing those, sorry

 

[Pezman]

I have been trying to improve times as well w/o much guidance (just feeling stuff out) and I know exactly what you mean about the full lungs triggering earlier contractions. I have found two techniques that seem to help a little. The first is "bearing down" -- basically contracting my diaphragm voluntarily and holding it. The second is "simulated breathing" where I puff air into my cheeks and then pump it back into my lungs.

I am guessing that both techniques trick the body into thinking that breating has resumed. Unfortunately, these tricks do not extend hold times very much -- I'm guessing 15 to 30 seconds of benefit. I'm also guessing that this is not really a very good habit -- there are undoubtedly better ways to improve hold times.

 

[immerlustig]

hey eren

i´d like to know what your routine is when you train static and for how long you train already.

roland

 

[Guss]

second Eren’s question.

Hi Eren,


after reading your post I would like to propose to you:


It is not necessary to prolong in time complete breathings before one apnea more than the time you need to get relax because even hyperventilating you are not going to load really more quantities of O2 (never more than 2%).

Also it has not very much sense to make a slow last inhale because when you inhale your heart rate increases and when you exhale it lessens. This physiological phenomenon is more intense when we ventilate after one apnea because our body in prevision of a next apneic situation try to reload as much O2 as possible on each inhalation by increasing the quantity of blood flow in the lungs. The target during the ventilation is get relax with some belly breathings with double time exhaling than inhaling to let your heart arrive to a moderate rate. Then 3 or 4 complete breaths to refresh the air in your lungs and then a quick and complete inhale and go for your pleasant apnea, relax completely, clean your mind and enjoy. That’s all.



If you don’t make packs I don’t see any reason why to overpressure your lungs. Maybe you are not trained enough to feel your rib cage full and for that you just need time. When I was starting in static’s, apnea tables helped me a lot because you can do different exercises and achieve different feelings avoiding getting bored. The key point for me it was to learn about myself, how can I understand my feelings during apnea, that’s the first step for the static practice and really more important than making a personal beast each day. If you don’t learn feeling yourself you will be always plenty of doubts like you are now.

Tables:

Progressive:

2 ventilation/ 2 min apnea, 3 vent/ 3 apn, 4/4 5/5 6/6 and last.

Fix:

One serie of 5 reps 2 min vent /4 min statics = 5 x (2/4). If this is to much you can start with 5 x (1/2) and grow ….5 x (1.20/2.40)…. ….5x (1.40/3.20)….etc

High C02 level tolerance.

2 min ventilation/ 2 min apnea, 1.30/ 2, 1/ 2, 0.45/2, ……..1 single breath/2.

Low O2 level tolerance.

2 min ventilation/ 2 min apnea, 2/2.30, 2 /3, 2/3.30, …….. 2/last.


I ´m sure that when you work some months on this tables you will feel more comfortable and a lot of the problems and doubts you have now will disappear.


After (and only after) if you want to work specifically in your contractions tolerance I suggest you to focus in extreme CO2 tolerance series have work for me really very good, delaying my first contraction from 2.15” to 4.30” in 4 months. I still keep training in this sort of combination of Intermittent hypoxic training and extreme hypercapnea static tables.

Tables:

First serie (delaying first contraction arrival):

Start with 3 reps in a row of 2 min apnea with one single breath each rep and increase the number of reps till 20 reps. Always one single breath.

It took me one moth to arrive to the rep number 8 without breaking the row (it was hard) and then only 2 weeks to arrive to the rep number 20. At the beginning when I was able to make only 6 reps in a row the first contraction arrived to me at the end of third rep. At the end when being able to do the 20 reps the first contraction arrived in the rep 12 0r 14 so there was 12 reps single breath in a row with no any contraction and 8 reps coping with contractions.
When you finish successfully your 20 reps serie of 2 min/rep start with series of 18 reps of 2.10”. The next step series of 16 reps of 2.20” and so on, increasing only from 10” to 10” the duration of each rep and decreasing in 2 the total amount reps of each serie. Stop when arriving to 2.50” because if you continue you will enter in the field of the second serie.

Second serie (increasing the number of contractions you are able to cope with):

A) At the same time you start with the 2 min reps do the same but with 3 min per rep serie. Start trying to arrive to 2-3 reps in a row (remember always one singel breath per serie). When I finished my 20 reps in the 2 min series (first serie) I was able to do 5 – 6 reps in 3 min (second serie). This exercise is completely different to the first serie. It is not only a question of one minute more or one minute less. Here you can face hypoxic and hypercapnic scenarios and tissue and blood O2/CO2 desaturation/saturation levels you will never be able to experience in the first serie, even making 100 reps of 2 min single breath in a row. The increasing in the difficulty of this exercise must arrive by doing more number of reps. don’t increase the duration of each rep. Keep in 3 min. When being in rep 5 or 6 it will be necessary cope with 50% of the time of each reap in contractions. It’s enough.
B) Forget your clock.
Make some warm up and: one serie of 10 reps 1 min breathing and exit at 20 contractions. Next step one serie of 10 reps 1.30” min breathing and exit at 30 contractions and so on.

Making at the same time cardio in apnea (walking, cycling, leg weightlifting) and statics has been a key point for me to break my plateaus in static. Without this combination of Inttermitent Hypoxia Training exercises I can not understand my progress in statics.


Saludos Agustín.

 

[buddha]

Static Lung Volume

The last breath for the static apnea, should not be more than 80% or your maximum lung capacity, this allows you to be more relaxed because the final breath is not decisive on your performance time.

 

[Walrus]

Quote from last post

" The last breath for the static apnea, should not be more than 80% or your maximum lung capacity, this allows you to be more relaxed because the final breath is not decisive on your performance time. "

Guess no one else is pointing out the obvious but...... Yeh it makes a difference ?!
Why do you think people use packing with statics ?

I realize you are talking about dry statics, and I can understand the problem of not being as relaxed/ comfortable with a really full breath. In water it's a bit easier as you are floating which makes it more comfortable to take a big breath.

I don't know if Martin S used packing for his static record, I would have thought he did, I know Herb Nitch does.

Part of the problem is comfort/relaxation, it does take lots of practise to learn to stay relaxed with very full lungs.

Cheers,
Wal

 

[Erik]

??????????????

Try doing a static with your lungs half full, and see how long your static is....anyone care to wager on the results?
If you do a hold with 80% volume, the relaxation factor that you say you need might let you have a 90% (of max) hold, but there is no way that having less air in your lungs will give you a max static, in water or dry if you are training properly.
I have done 1000s of breath-holds, and never achieve the high numbers without full breaths plus some packing.
If you stretch regularly with heavy packing and good yoga techniques then a full breath will be extremely comfortable, and a breath-hold with 25% of your packing capability on top of the lungs will also be comfortable........stretch man!
If you can pack 50 times, you should be comfortable with 10 to 15 packs for a max hold.
Cheers,
Erik Y.

 

[grobert]

Contractions

I have same problem. I solve it with "optimal" filling or by changing a position in which I do static apnea. Optimal filling for me is a little bit after first tension in my lung, when inhaling.

 

[buddha]

Umberto Pelizzari told me that he did training 7 minutes and 58 seconds a month ago in static apnea... with 80% of their maximum lung capacity. He always do it that way and he never packs his lungs... all is in the powerful of your mind, if you are training other way you are doing "power static apnea" not "relaxed static apnea"... think about it, static apnea is 75% mental and 25% physical

 

[efattah]

Hypocritical

Pelizzari always tells people to use 80% of their capacity for static, but if you have ever seen him doing static (from underwater cameras), even his mouth is inflated & exploding with air!

This is, in fact, one of the secrets; offload some air into your mouth to take off the pressure from your lungs.


Eric Fattah
BC, Canada

 

[icarus pacific]

works for me too.

I tell everyone that I want to beat, to go with the 80% trick.
115% Erik!


sven

 

[Erik]

I would be probably the last guy to disrespect Umberto, as he has a lot do with why I started diving, but that does not mean that I take every word he says as gospel (or anyone else for that matter).
I choose to listen to people, but make my own ideas work within the context of the things that I enjoy hearing. 80% holds don't work for me, or most of the divers I know.
If it's only 25% physical, then why breathe up at all? Yogis that do 30 minute holds (empty) do hours of breathing and concentration in preparation for this side-effect of Samahdi.
I'm not there yet, so I'll stick with a combination of the two
Cheers,
Erik Y.

 

[ivan]

hi

Her Erik are you serious 30mins empty or are you having us on,

Umberto is the reason I found out about freediving and i have the highest respect for him. 7:58 must be his personal best now. I thought it was 7:40 or something around there.

cheers

 

[Erik]

Hey Ivan,
it depends on what you are willing to believe. Yogis have been writing, and been written about for thousands of years, and there are many accounts of this sort of thing happening. There are stories about Babaji (a very well known yogi) wherein he entered Samahdi for 45 days, without moving. It is even said that he is still alive, walking the earth and cosmos, hundreds of years later.
Some will never believe any of that, some believe everything they hear (or want to hear, actually)....so it's a matter of choice. But 25 minute exhale breath-hold is not unreachable, I believe. There are animals that do it, and as a previous poster says, it's 75% mental, so conceivably one could, with years of the right training, get to a point where a dive or static could last half an hour.
Remember though, that the "breath-hold" the yogis experience is a SIDE EFFECT of what they are trying to achieve; it is not the objective. I think that any yogi that tried to do a 30 minute hold to prove he could do it would not achieve it, as competition is an aspect of EGO, which the yogi is trying to dissolve. If he (and we) submit to EGO, then we will be restricted in our endeavours.
Mayoll tried to get a yogi involved in freediving....the yogi could not perceive the point of it....if one can achieve all things within himself, then why seek outside gratification? That's the Catch 22
Cheers amigos,
Erik Y.

 

[eren]

Thank you to everyone

thank you to everyone who has posted a reply. I think your advices would help a lot.

 

[TMcKee]

Hey guss, I am trying to make heads and/or tails of your charts. What do you mean by 2vent/2min apnea...etc... on your progressive chart? Two ventilations followed by a 2 minute apnea? That can't be right. If it is, you guys are supermen, and I might as well quit.

I heard that there was this guy in the east river in New York who has been floating face down for three weeks. Who's gonna beat that?

 

[Guss]

you are right

Sorry TMcKee, you are right. There is one mistake. The correct Progressive serie must be:

2 min ventilation/ 2 min apnea, 3 min vent/ 3 min apn, 4/4 5/5 6/6 and last.

The same sistem like the other 3 series: fix, High C02 level tolerance and the low O2 level tolerance.

But remember TMcKee the series of apneas in a row with a single breath in between I also mention in the same post, and here there is no one mistake. I recommend you to start with this kind of series months before you train with the progressive, fix, CO2 and O2 series.

Saludos Agustín.

 

[TMcKee]

Im sorry, What I mean is, I need this explained to me. How to do this. What do you mean by 2 vent and then 2 minute apnea? Take two deep breaths and then hold for 2 minutes? What do you do before all of this?

Thanks,

Tim

 

[Guss]

Hey TMcKee

2 min ventilation/ 2 min apnea, 3 min vent/ 3 min apn, 4/4 5/5 6/6 and last.

This serie means: you breath during 2 minutes and then you hold your breath during 2 minutes. Then you breath during 3 minutes and hold your breath for 3 minutes and so on till 6/6 or 7/7 or as far as you can arrive.

I name ventilation to the breathing periods between apneas. It is not the same kind of breathing you are doing in this moment when reading my post, it is a conscious way of breathing that help you to get recovered from the previous apnea and prepare your body for the next one. This conscious way of breathing is what I call ventilation. You can read plenty of threads in this forum about how to do the proper ventilation to prepare yourself to go for the next apnea of the serie.

The number of times you inspire – exhale during the ventilation periods is free but don´t hyperventilate if you want to use the statics series as a training tool to improve your apneic condition for freediving.

When you came out of the apnea you must breath in the correct way to prepare your body for the next one. I do as follows; first I fully breath to recover myself and refresh my air. Then it came a period of deep and calm stomach breath using the diaphragm in which exhalations must be 2 times longer than inhalations to lower the heart rate, here the relaxation is the key. 15 - 20 seconds before the next apnea I make 3 or 4 deep and full breaths (abdomen-chest-collar bone-back breaths) and go for the apnea.

If you need any more info please feel free to post again.

Saludos Agustín.