Exhale Diving for the "average" diver

[laminar]

thank you for your answers so far...

ok i get the point with the mouthfill ... 100m is far beyond my limits

but i couldn't find anything about laminars " submaximal breathing" for the breathup.

Basically, it is breathing as naturally as possible so as not to alter blood pH. I don't purge, I don't have a set breathing pattern, I hold my breath often during the "breathe up" to guard against unconscious hyperventilation. Essentially, I don't waste effort with big inhalations and exhalations. Sometimes, if I'm weighted a little heavier and not floating very high in the water, I'll inhale slightly more than usual to offset the ambient pressure of the water around my ribcage.

The main purpose of the "breathe up" in my view (the term is misleading and should be changed) is to rest. That's it. If you breathe naturally, you'll have plenty of 02 and get rid of waste products from muscle work. You just need to allow for enough time. Most people ]move around or have tension when they are busy "breathing up."

Also, thinking about "breathing up" correctly can cause enough anxiety to make it detrimental.

I wasn't talking about packing for dives but using them as a dry exercise to increase flexibility.I don't know what you did in the past connor but i think eric and laminar did a lot of packing so they already had enough flexibility when they stopped packing.
So my question was more refering to dry reverse pack statics and packstretching than pack/reversepack diving.
You also recommend not to do this ?

My lungs were not flexible at all from packing in a functional way. Sure I could get 9L of air out of my lungs with a forceful exhale after packing, but that didn't help me dive deeper or avoid lung squeeze.

After most dive sessions in the old days, my lungs/chest wall would feel stretched, sore and I would often feel like I couldn't get a breath without effort. I was doing something unnatural to my breathing apparatus!

After only a few weeks of FRC diving with no other preparation, I quickly surpassed best depths on full exhale (during packing era) with surprising ease. Packing does not equal chest flexibility in a useful way.

Now, on to reverse packing, dry and wet. I still think that whether dry or wet, the chance for injury is too great. I've seen and heard of other people get squeezed from dry reverse packing! Stupid! Because the change in pressure is always too fast.

Even uddhiyana bandha done incorrectly can hurt you. Reverse packing is beyond that.

That said, many do this type of exercise and swear by it. I just think there's an easier way, less stressful that accomplishes the same thing:

Focus on stimulus that your body will actually encounter during a dive:
1. Slow long term change in lung volume
2. Dive response activation
3. Lungs and rest of body under same changing ambient pressure

The problem I see with dry or wet negatives with or without reverse packing is that both create an unusual pressure on the lungs that is not shared by the rest of the body. At the bottom of the pool on full exhale, your lungs may be at 200m ( :duh ) but the rest of you is still only at 3-4m. Not at all like a real dive.

No surprise to me that some people do negatives a lot and:
-can't equalize very deeply at all
-get squeezed
-get pressure contractions and turn around
-descend and ascend too fast because they are anxious
-end up rushing depth progression so that they don't actually learn much about the changes their body goes through and the wonderful and unpleasant sensations they may encounter.

The beauty of FRC and submax breathe up /resting phase is that from the moment you are in the water, your body knows what will be happening:

Your body is under pressure greater than 1 ATM.

That is consistent for your whole time in the water unless:
-you pack
-you breach out of the water 10 feet into the air rofl
-you are on Titan 3

This consistency allows your body (IMHAEO) to find a point of equilibrium. Why is FRC so effective in most cases and when done right in helping develop amazing ability to equalize deeply or adapt to pressure? Because while the change in pressure is something that we focus on, the constant state is being at a pressure greater than 1 ATM, even if it is only slightly greater than 1 ATM at the surface.

How else do you explain a limit of 8-9m full exhale negative pressure dive (and I do mean full exhale) after three years of variations on packing and inhale diving vs. an increase to 17-18m in two and a half weeks after gentle FRC dives to 15-25m? That's 8-9 dives per session, a session every three days, 5 sessions total.

I think the lungs prefer to function within regular parameters as much as possible. There are definitely people who can pack until the cows come home and dive deep. That's not what I'm talking about though. What's the easiest way to dive with the least amount of discomfort and chance for injury?

Luckily, FRC will take care of all your need for depth and/or distance.... for most of us, anyway.

Pete

 

[Tommy_R]

Thanks a lot,

for i don't have to break any records i think i'm just taking it easy and try to do a slow and safe improvement without the reverse packs.

Tommy

 

[cdavis]

Laminar pretty much says it all. I do things slightly differently because I think my situation is a little different. However, in my experience, he sure has been right a lot. I'm slowly edging toward taking all his advice.

My packing is all dry, never pack to dive, never do reverse pac exhales when diving. Sometimes I do a few 4-5 meter full exhales as a warm up for real diving. My recent pack-stretching is minimal and an attempt to maintain max lung volume, not certain it works, but I am sure that a lot of full lung diving increases my max capacity, by about a liter, very noticeable in the amount of weight I put on the belt.

On the advisability of reverse packing dry: Just like wet, be very very careful, descend very slowly and Laminar may be right that it doesn't do much good. I've come close to damaging myself in my very few attempts to do it dry. Its definitely possible.

A major part of exhale diving is making the first part of the dive a static, just like you were doing, works great. Getting the lung volume right comes with practice. I had the same problem initially.

3 B0s on exhale in a course? did I get that right? Could you provide some detail on how much exhale, times, depths, other details?

Connor

 

[Tommy_R]

@connor

i did a master course over 3 months.
That means i've been in the water about 3-4 hours a day ( every day for that 3 months) and i did safety for 50% of all the students in the beginner and advanced courses.So there where a real lot of students and perhaps i just got the ones that had too much party the night before.
In the advanced course they do a few frc/exhale dives just to show the students the feeling of getting compressed.
And that exercise was the only one any of them got problems.
That showed me how hard it is to estimate your reserves o2 during frc dives.
None of them was in a mental training state to really push him self to that limit.
They just didn't realize they're out of o2 ( one smiled in my face gave me an ok sighn on his way up and boed 2 seconds after that ). None of them fully exhaled and none went down more than 10m but they stayed to long feeling comfortable the whole time.
I really like frc diving but i was very careful from that point on


Tommy

 

[cdavis]

Scary stuff! How long were these guys under? Were they moving around or just hanging on the rope? What kind of breath up were they doing?

I'm aware of cautions about full exhale dives being susceptible to BO and can easilly see why if the dive reflex doesn't kick in early. I don't quite see why what these guys were doing was so different from FRC (or exhale) diving like we do, which makes BO less likely. What's the difference?

Connor

 

[laminar]

Perhaps they were diving with an "inhale style" - moving around a lot, tense, wasting energy, etc...

Diving FRC is something to approach carefully and over a long period of time. It requires a whole new mentality. Perhaps it is not a good thing to add on at the end of a course with inhale dives (and packing?).

 

[Fondueset]

Speaking of air. I've been doing a lot of shallow dives lately - as is normal around here - particularly in summer - because the deep water is out there with the boats. Anyway - these have been around a breakwall (the one with the suckers, Cdavis) - which is just busting out with life right now. Because the dives are mostly <8 meters I've been adjusting ballast with breath - diving quite a bit on half a lungful or less. I'm beginning to understand the comfort factor with this type of diving - I think it is in some measure due to the overall neurological configuration affected by exhalation. I can see a natural evolution toward more of this type of diving but, for my part, I think I'll approach it in a spirit of quantum insurgency.

 

[Tommy_R]

Hmm
they where just hanging on the rope and not moving around.
I didn't want to scare you connor i just wanted to explain why i am a lot more careful with that kind of technique.
To be honest i can't remember all their performances but they all where in good shape ( one of them did a 6min static after 4 day course .... grrr ... i still can't do that )
I didn't check their breathup but they did about the same as for inhale dives, and for all of them where very very ambitious they tended to over-( hyper) ventilate.
So i just think that ( slight hyperventilation) combined with exitement and compression which triggered enough dive response, got them over their limits.
As mentioned they really didn't move at all exept the hangling down and up the rope .... but they stayed really long ( and i think most of them where closer to empty lung than frc .... ambitious:blackeye.. )
i still think it's not too scary ... they exaggerated a bit and learned their lesson ( and so did I, by doing the safety )
For me that just points out what laminar said in all the other posts: You have to improve slow and try not to push yourself to fast.
They just didn't know how their body reacts on a empty lung dive .... give yourself enough time to learn that and there shouldn't be a problem at all.


Tommy

@ laminar : there was no packing , and it was no real " frc" divestyle lesson they just should feel the compression once.
usually they did 2 exahle dives in a course ... as a warmup for their final " deep " dive ( most of the time 20-28m).

 

[cdavis]

Tommy, thanks very much for the detailed report. I'd been wanting to get some info on exhale dive B0s.

Sounds like lowering your ventilation level is more important than I realized. I tried a lower level of ventilation in the pool today, did not cut my dive times to any significant degree. Feels kind of strange (and uncomfortable at first), going down with a higher level of co2 than normal, but I guess the body just adapts.

Connor

 

[laminar]

Tommy, thanks very much for the detailed report. I'd been wanting to get some info on exhale dive B0s.

Sounds like lowering your ventilation level is more important than I realized. I tried a lower level of ventilation in the pool today, did not cut my dive times to any significant degree. Feels kind of strange (and uncomfortable at first), going down with a higher level of co2 than normal, but I guess the body just adapts.

Connor

This style of diving is so much counter to where freediving has gone before this. Simple and effective. No "breathing up" and no effort to get down. And both are absolutely critical.

 

[Haydn]

Since my heart problems and no breathholding or diving at the docs orders for the last three years. But now with my heart fixed and medicals signed, I feel like a beginner freediver. Everything feels strange, just like it did at the start. My static is now only 3 minutes (but I know it will return with training). My limiting factor apart from low statics (PB 4:20), was always equalising, I always had to turn through failing an equalise, never because of running out of O2. In order to equalise I would pack, I needed the air to equalise to -57m. Without packing I would fail much sooner and now this thread says dont pack and even dont take a lungful with you. I find it hard to believe.

Despite that, my theory is that with my current low static, I probably wont have sufficient underwater time (for a season) to get deep enough for equalising to become the limiting factor. One day I will get deep again, so I might as well try to learn FRC as this should provide more equalisation training as I spend time above 30m getting used to being under water again.

However, the problem I see, is lack of bouyancy. It was always a comfort to me on the ascent, that I could pass through 30m and then relax, ultimately reaching the surface. Now I will have to expend much more effort swimming all the way to the surface, just at the time when O2 is dropping off rapidly through the lower intake of O2 at the start and greater effort at the end. I am not convinced and still in the old mindsight of three years ago.

I do like the idea of gliding right from the start though, and therefore having nothing else to do, but learn to equalise on less air volume. Hopefully , once trained again, I will have the equalising technique sorted and with a mended heart that beats properly now, I might even be in better condition than before.

 

[cdavis]

Update.

I've continued pool practice with all too infrequent real diving and improvement has been pretty amazing. In real depth, I'm down to 80+ and that was a while back. My guess is 90 ft will be ok the next time I get out.

In the pool has been incredible. I think the last time I posted a number, my practice dive PB was 2:15 or thereabouts, a hard dive. Now, I'm regularly doing over 2:40. If I stop at 2:30, I have very little urge to breath. Today I did a 2:55 that included a 2 minute static and a 50 yard swim. It wasn't all that hard and on an day I was a little off. No doubt I can go way past 3 minutes. No way in Gods green earth I could do that full lung. About 3 weeks back something really started to work and my times began to increase dramatically. Not sure how long this phase will last, but it sure has been fun.

I think (speculate) that there are three things working together that are allowing this. 1. Long term adaptation to FRC conditions so that my reflex is kicking in stronger and earlier. 2. Screwy minimal breathup using diaphrymic breathing only(roughly 1/2 breaths) and pausing about 3 seconds before and after each breath. 3. Doing it a lot, 3 days a week for the last 9 months. I'm also doing a couple of short reverse pack negatives before each practice dive in a attempt to deepen my dive reflex.

The "breath up" I'm using is bonkers to me, but it seems to be working fabulous. Laminar has been recommending the concept for a while and I just could not quite believe it would work for me. I tried his "submaximal" breathing idea as a way to take more co2 down with me, and shorten my dives on days I had no buddy. Did not work. After a couple of weeks acclimation, my times took off. More co2 or not, I can stay down much much longer and more comfortably. Maybe it is the greater level of relaxation, or less effort spent breathing or lower heart rate. I don't know, it just works. Anybody care to speculate on why?


Whats everybody else doing?

Connor

 

[jay cluskey]

at what depths do you start encountering narcosis

 

[Mullins]

The shallowest I've been narked is at just over 60m, but that was a recent VW spearfishing dive and I only noticed it after 20-30 seconds on the bottom. On normal CW dives narcosis is noticeable past about 80m for me, then gets really strong on the way up (producing CO2). I expect you'd get less narked on FRC dives because you don't produce as much CO2.

I guess Eric is the only diver who's been deep enough on FRC to experience narcosis. Well, him and Seb. Murat.

 

[cdavis]

A tricky question with a subtle answer.

You encounter narcosis from the surface down. The deeper you go, the worse it gets. It gets incapacitating somewhere south of 300 ft, but can be seen in intelligence an coordination tests given divers at much shallower depths, like 100ft or less. Maybe someone with more data or a better memory can give better numbers. I, and several other FRC divers, have reported feeling much more clear-headed at depths of 90 ft and deeper. That clear-headedness is attibuted to the lesser effects of narcosis resulting from diving with less than a lungfull of air(a lot less nitrogen).

Connor

 

[Mullins]

Why would having less nitrogen in your lungs reduce the amount present in your blood? I mean, the amount dissolved is presumably not limited by the amount available in your lungs otherwise you'd lose most of your lung volume over the course of a dive.

 

[Fondueset]

Mutants.

Now I feel all pathetic. I got nobody to spot me so I've just been doing limp little 50 meter monofin sprints 3 or 4 times a week - plus a couple 2-3 hour dives on the weekends.. I can't even find water thats 90 feet deep.

 

[cdavis]

Mullins, Better somebody more technically oriented than me should answer, but roughly, when you dive full lung or pack,versas 1/2 lung, there is much more nitrogen available in the lung to diffuse into the bloodstream. More nitrogen into the bloodstream = more narcosis. At least that is the theory as I understand it. Maybe also, lower lung volume means less surface area for gas to diffuse across.

I've also wondered if this is the correct explanation for being more clear headed at depth when diving exhale. It sounds good, but I wondered. Whatever, it is one of the nicest things about depth and exhale diving. Note: my "deep" and your "deep" are entirely different numbers.

Fondueset, have I got a solution for you. Check your pms by tomorrow.

Connor

 

[azapa]

Update.

Today I did a 2:55 that included a 2 minute static and a 50 yard swim. It wasn't all that hard and on an day I was a little off.

Connor

Connor, let me get this straight: you swim 50M DYN (in a pool I guess) with a monofin(?), and hang about 2 mins thereafter in static? Again, this is with about 50% full inhale, and the "submaximal breathing"? At what point are contractions starting?

Would you describe yourself as a "do good in pools" person in general or "better deep"?

Looks like something quite cool is happening to you..

 

[cdavis]

Weird isn't it, and very very cool.

In exhale style diving, you try to make the first part of the dive a near a static as possible, allowing time for the dive reflex to set in real strong. Then start swimming. I'm diving at about .6 if a full exhale (thats dropping slowly) Also using stiff, plastic bifins, not nearly the best for this kind of thing.

Exhale (FRC) theory says static till the first urge to breath then you should be able to swim an equivalent amount of time. Recently, I've had no buddy on many days and have been pushing the static portion a little and cutting way back on the swim portion, coming up well before a strong need to breath. Times kept going up as the static portion got longer and last week I was shocked to see 2:34 on the clock when I came up. Its just gotten better from there.

Better in pool or ocean? Well, I'd sure rather be real diving. Pool stuff is strictly to keep myself in shape for the real event. I don't get as good a times in real diving because the conditions aren't nearly as controlable, but better pool performance always leads to better real diving. If I had to go out on a limb, I'd guess that I'll be doing a little over 2 minute dives next time I get to try it.

Connor

Normally, once I get in the groove, I start getting contractions about !:30, but that varies quite a bit.