Books to read

[Sal]

Are there any diving/spearfishing books, magazines that you would recommend a relatively new diver read.

 

[Frank O'Donnell]

"Freedive!" by Sipperley and Maas

Any of Carlos Eyles' books on freediving, hunting and photography

Umberto Pellizzari's "Corso di Apnea" (though I've heard rumors of an eventual English translation, it's available only now in Italian as far as I know, but it's worth picking through with a bilingual dictionary if necessary

 

[Tommy Engfors]

Frank,

Isn't "Freedive!" out of print these days?

Have you read that book yourself? Opinion?

 

[Frank O'Donnell]

Originally posted by Tommy Engfors
Isn't "Freedive!" out of print these days?

Hmm, I dunno ... Amazon.com shows it as a special order, not as out-of-print. I thought I saw it in local dive shops in the past few months, though some of them might have older stock on hand.

Have you read that book yourself? Opinion?

Yes, it was the first book I bought when I got interested in freediving about three years ago. I remember thinking that it didn't have as much as I hoped for on the actual technique of freediving and training to extend breathhold. I didn't run across that kind of information until I took the Performance Freediving clinic. However, I thought the book was okay as sort of a general survey of what freediving is about (leaning toward spearfishing rather than competitive freediving).

 

[Tommy Engfors]

Thanks for swift reply!

I was curious about the book (Freddive!) earlier but I understand now that it is too shallow (no pun intended!).

I searched Amazon for Carlos Eyle but didn't find anything. Can you name any books he has written?

 

[Frank O'Donnell]

Originally posted by Tommy Engfors
I searched Amazon for Carlos Eyle but didn't find anything. Can you name any books he has written?

Try again, but spell his last name Eyles with an S on the end. When I try this on Amazon, I come up with "Last of the Blue Water Hunters" (autobiographical reminiscences on freediving/hunting), "The Blue Edge" (update on reminiscences with his more recent life), "Secret Seas" (short stories involving diving and the sea), and "Dolphin Borne" (a fictional story about a diver who gets stranded in the open ocean). I enjoyed the first two books in particular.

 

[Tommy Engfors]

Frank,

Tried to give you some karma, but it didn't work (nothing happend).

I checked out the books on Amazon (with proper spelling). Thanks. I might try and get his first book ("The last of...") sometime in the future. Just a shame there aren't more books about this... (though there are loads of scuba-ones).

Thanks again.

 

[Roland]

There are not many books on the subject. Most are already mentioned here.

IANTD has two nice freedive manuals. One for novices and another for more experienced freedivers. You could try to contact them about it.

There is Jacques Mayol’s Homo Delphinus, The Dolphin within man (ISBN: 1-928649-03-3) Beautiful book with lots of storeys and nice pictures but hardly any information on how to freedive or train for it but it might be interesting for a novice diver.

There is a very good German book: Dagmar Andres-Brümer's Apnoetauchen, Grundlagen Trainingstipps, Praxis (ISBN 3-89594-086-0)

There is a French book: Henri Corriol, La Plongée en apnée : Physiologie et médecine (ISBN : 2294009193)

Freediver magazine from Howard Jones is a nice magazine (www.freediver.co.uk)
I am sure there are several other French and Italian magazines (if you understand the language). I do not know if there are English magazines on spearfishing, there might be but I do not know them.

Pippin productions used to sell instruction video's and other things on spearfishing/ freediving. I do not know if they still do.

I hope this helps.