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competitive swimmers as freedivers

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Don Kimball

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Jun 27, 2008
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I was wondering if having a competitive swimming background helped in transition to freediving and if there were any benefits with having that background.
 
It does if you used to be a competitive breaststroker. Technique goes a long way in no-fins.

I've also seen very good female freedivers that used to be synchronized swimmers, as they are used to holding their breath while physically exerting themselves.

The last benefit I can think of is being comfortable in / with the water.
 
I swam competetively from my 8th until 16th year, finishing as one of the youngest national finalists in Canada. After about 20 years of non-involvement, I resumed swimming for fitness. I currently swim about 3km a day.
I started freediving about 2 years ago and my first static breath-hold was over 5 minutes. It is now 7:24, and I do not do any specific breathing tables or training to improve. I just listen to my coaches' calming voice during the static.

I attribute the long breath-hold time to the lung formation during my younger years. And it's true about the breaststroke helping in the Constant Weight No Fins category. Plus I've always felt comfortable in water.
As for competitiveness, I've found it detrimental to improving in Free Diving. In other sports, there is a "getting pumped" psyching up approach to performance. With free diving, the more relaxed and calm you are, the better you perform. It's great therapy.
 
No judges around, Craig, so it's not official and I could even be lying ;-)

You know when some people are thinking about their "happy place" when struggling with contractions while doing static?
I think of doing static when getting stressed out during daily life. That's my happy place.
 
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It sounds possible though. I swam and was very sporty when younger, and still am. Took me a few weeks to get to 5mins though and deal with the mental aspect of contractions etc. But guess swimmers practice breath holding a lot when training.
 
You know when some people are thinking about their "happy place" when struggling with contractions while doing static?
I think of doing static when getting stressed out during daily life. That's my happy place.

This deserves a quote. Awesome. :inlove
 
Thanks for reply's. I'm a retired swim coach currently working with two free divers on technique. I think as a group swimmers would have better upper body strength and better ankle flexibility.
 
I also think that swimmers have an advantage in learning monofinning.
Greater flexibility, greater feel for the water, aqua-dynamics, confident in the water, trained breathing muscles, used to high CO2 and lactic acid, due to sprinting and training.
 
Watching my daughter, 11 yrs old, swimming and freediving (no, not competitively ;) ) it's quite clear to me that she can take learnings from one activity to the other. E.g. butterfly and freediving dolphin kicks utilizes the same type of undulating movement. The freediving has also helped her get a good sense of orientation and balance in the water, beneficial in starts and turns.
 
YES, competitive swimmers have a big benefits when it comes to all aquatic abilities (!!!) Then most of them also have the physical capacity / mental power that is needed.

/B
 
I'm sure there is a benefit, and I'm sure the technique helps out initially, but I think Akwaman has a key point with physiological development when young.

I know not very scientific (based on a sample of 1), but I believe that my early introduction to freediving (scrubbing the bottom of our family yacht while cruising age 8-12) was key. No history of competitive swimming.

Phil C
 
Why is that Phil?

I think that, all things being equal, somebody with a swimming background will do better in freediving than somebody without. But it's also possible to be an elite swimmer with a physiology that is totally unsuited to freediving. Some people can be very fit, very strong and have excellent technique but still BO after a 100m dynamic.

It's also clear that strength, fitness and swimming technique, while helpful, are not everything in freediving - it's possible (at least for the time being) to be poor in all of those categories and still be a WR-level freediver, particularly in the pool disciplines. The other physiological aspects like DR are just so overridingly important.
 
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In my experience, I gained a great deal of benefit from being a swimmer. Particularly with taking to the monofin (in the days when they were a rarity). Having swum butterfly the transition was simple. And of course breaststroke now that no fins is accepted is easy.

Compare this to those who have little swimming experience and the advantage in being settled in the water at the very first exposure to freediving is simple.

Swimming ability is probably the best foundation for a beginner freediver than probably any other sport (other than Synchro). The areas of freedive training that are peculiar to freediving can then be rapidly accepted.

It is this matter of being settled in the water that got my 'rubbish' static bests of around 4:15 get me to 157m in a dynamic 10 years ago at the Hawaii comp. (shame about the red card though).
 
Swimming background will have huge impact on your freediving, that's a fact.

First of all you have bean training for long period and you have body that is prepared for training and has nice aerobic and anaerobic background. Then you have feeling for the water and that is huge thing, some people needs years to get it. Then you have great co2 tolerance potential, because swimming is great hypercapnic activity. You have competitive spirit and working ethics. You probably have nice developed ribcage with strong inspiration and expiration muscles...

All in all, you have all prerequisites for excellent freediver.. now you just need to dive :)
 
Why is that Phil?

I think that, all things being equal, somebody with a swimming background will do better in freediving than somebody without. But it's also possible to be an elite swimmer with a physiology that is totally unsuited to freediving. Some people can be very fit, very strong and have excellent technique but still BO after a 100m dynamic.

It's also clear that strength, fitness and swimming technique, while helpful, are not everything in freediving - it's possible (at least for the time being) to be poor in all of those categories and still be a WR-level freediver, particularly in the pool disciplines. The other physiological aspects like DR are just so overridingly important.

So do you think it´s genetic? Or can everyone become a 200m+ guy etc ?
 
Largely genetic. Although pretty much everybody responds to apnea-specific training to some degree, the extent of that response seems to be genetically determined. I think that goes for every sport (I could never be a top powerlifter, for example). It's just that the relevant traits are less visible in freediving and harder to measure, so there's a bit more romanticism about people's potential. That doesn't sound particularly inspiring, I know. But it's the reality in all sports.

Of course, training and technique still matter. They matter for an individual who wants to get better; they matter in competitive diving and this will become more pronounced as the sport grows and there is a bigger pool of equally talented athletes competing for the top spot. But they're not everything, by a long way.
 
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Swimming background will have huge impact on your freediving

agreed... how could it not as it´s both swimming. interestingly having this idea of swimming puts lane swimming into a meaning of a being just a special case of swimming.


...

Swimming ability is probably the best foundation for a beginner freediver than probably any other sport

i´d like to add:

"(Some ways of gaining)? swimming ability can be the worst fondation for a beginner freediver"

one point this leads to could be the question what "ability" actually is (e.g. a process or a status).

another one, related? to the first could be the problem of unlearning and specifity, especially in activities you never do alone like tennis where there is always a ball which creates pressure - here we get into another subject, do we?
 
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Largely genetic. Although pretty much everybody responds to apnea-specific training to some degree, the extent of that response seems to be genetically determined. I think that goes for every sport (I could never be a top powerlifter, for example). It's just that the relevant traits are less visible in freediving and harder to measure, so there's a bit more romanticism about people's potential. That doesn't sound particularly inspiring, I know. But it's the reality in all sports.

Of course, training and technique still matter. They matter for an individual who wants to get better; they matter in competitive diving and this will become more pronounced as the sport grows and there is a bigger pool of equally talented athletes competing for the top spot. But they're not everything, by a long way.

But if you look the increasing performances in the last 20 years ... peope blacked out at 80m ( Herbert Nitsch for example, now he is doing 124m .... that´s more than 50% increased on a high level!

So i don´t think that there is a genetic factor that´s extremely limiting... Maybe there is something that gives some advantages. One of those is you head...

So back to my question : Do you think anybody ( in case of physiology and DR ) can reach 200m DYN or 80m CWT ? I know some or a lot will never because of psychological reasons....
 
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12 years ago I remember 60m-70m CWT was incredible, today 124m..the benchmark keeps moving as our knowledge of training and physiology increases. So perhaps in 10 years time many more people will be reaching 200m DYN & 80 CWT.
I agree with Dave, genetics determines what we will excel at, the Institute of Sport is a perfect example. they plug you in and say hey you are built to be a swimmer. Hopefully one day they will add freediver to their list.
I love your comment Dave, that you can never be a power lifter - just that image brings a smile a mile wide.
I'm involved with teaching kids to swim, freediving is a huge component to achieving comfort in the water for them. A large percentage of these kids ARE freedivers before they are swimmers, they spend the vast majority of time under the water twisting, turning and kicking. Its more natural for them to be under than on the surface, in 12 years time these kids will be the future of freediving if they continue to build on this skill and we can only imagine where the records will be then. Breath holding is a skill that previously hasn't been passed on, it needs to be incorporated into mainstream 'learn to swim' but that is another topic of conversation. So to answer your question I believe the answer is YES, someday those limits will be achievable to a higher percentage of people than they are today.
Go our future generation of freedivers!!!
 
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