Freediving Reloaded - Thoughts on Paul's article

[samdive]

If you've read Paul's article, and if you haven't but are involved a bit on the scene no doubt you have some opinions on newbies and how we welcome them into the sport.

At my freedive group SaltFree, we welcome newbies all the time so I'd like to make some observations on how we do it, on how the community as a whole does it... and seek some other opinions too.

Until a couple of years ago, there wasn't really any kind of education system for freediving in the UK. The technique seemed to be (at least if you were female) to chat up a male freediver, go out with them for a while and learn what you could.... the guys were quite happy to devote some time to a reasonable looking woman who hero worshipped them.... this is how I learnt (thanks be to R!) , and how most of the girls I know seem to have picked it up. If you were a guy, then you probably read deeper blue or freediver, tried a load of incredibly dodgy stuff on your own at home, made limited progress then either gave up cos you weren't getting anywhere, gave up because you almost blacked out in the bath and scared yourself stupid or found a club and carried on training. Everyone at the club was incredibly helpful and welcoming... until you started to get better than them!

This is where I have gripes... freediving is competitive by nature, at least the kind of freediving that I and my posse do (and I know there are others who just watch fish, learn how to tie knots and and live in Plymouth...) but what we do is compete, against ourselves every time we train and against others at competitions.. and this is where we come up against a big barrier when new people come along... hell this is a newbie, I am trying to grow my sport so I'll help him for a while, but hey, he might get better than me and I'll lose my 25m no fins Constant Weight UK record, so I don't think I'll be so helpful any more.... I've seen it over and over, I've felt the rumblings of it in my own soul.... but it stinks...

at SaltFree I like to think that we have all grown up and got over this. When we have a newbie who shows promise, we welcome them, encourage them.. and do our best not to get too put out that they can just zoom head down to the bottom of the rope without touching their nose and come up smiling about how easy it was... sure it can be irritating when you have working your butt off for three years to crack 40m and someone comes along and does it on their third weekend, but hey it happens, it's good for the sport and it's one more person that you can rely on to be a good safety diver to you on your own irritatingly shallower dives...

one thing we do now do with all our newbies is ask that they complete the AIDA ** Course - whether they are natural 30m divers or natural 3m divers (and I have seen both!). This means that they have all the basic knowledge and skills to be a good diver and buddy, can help look after the rest of us while we dive and have a deeper understanding about how to grow their dives safely. The course fee of £170 is a lot for some people but very, very rarely does someone say no and not come.

The course and our general attitude to newbies is to keep it simple. Someone attempting their first static does not need to know about Hypoxic and Hypercapnic tables, someone doing their first dive to 15m does not need to know about packing or mouth fill equalisation - all that will come. Get the basics sorted, learn to enjoy your dives and then move on, if you want to. At this stage everyone asks for kit advice and - well all I can say is thank god for Cressi - nothing wrong with a pair of Garas, a superocchio and a £5 snorkel... we don't all need performance carbons, pipe masks and hypoxic tents... hell even a scuba wetsuit is fine until you have enough cash for an Elios... As Paul says, the kit doesn't have to be world class to start with, just solid, reliable, and affordable.....

Another SaltFree philosophy is that whilst we understand some people want to add metres every weekend they come along, other people are happy to come and dive 15m all year - and everyone is equally valued, everyone's dive is equally respected... I hope - and if you ever feel otherwise tell me!

But the most important thing to respect in any newcomer is not their ability but their enthusiasm. We have had people come and struggle to 10m but then come back and back and back on the snowiest, iciest of days with a smile in their hearts and a warm drink for everyone in their thermos - and those people for me are the true stars....

this is a long rant.. it comes down to one thing..
don't forget where we all came from, respect all your fellow divers, 5m to 50m... and beyond... we all have something to learn from each other.

Paul if you are serious, and I know its a long flight away, you would be more than welcome to join a SaltFree AIDA ** (newbie!) course anytime... you know where I am....

My mission for 2005 is to train at least one newbie woman who is a serious contender for the UK team next year. Even if that girl steals my place, which she quite probably would. Call it penance for all the ugly thoughts I have had on watching some of the new women threaten to smile their way deeper than me, call it girl power, call it plain bonkers... but it would make me SOOOO proud! any contenders - drop me a mail!

Sam

 

[cdavis]

Good thoughts Sam.

If you were interested in promoting participation in the sport, it would seem like a good idea to have courses, clubs, guided trips, etc that would lead free divers into various disciplines and keep them involved. Scuba divers have a similar system.

Seems like there are 4 general types of free divers, , line divers, pool divers, spearos and divers engaged in some activity other than spearing, photography, sight seeing, etc. The first two are essentially competitive, like Sam said. Spearing can be but doesn't have to be. To some degree it is in a category by itself anyway. The last category isn't competitive relative to its free diving component. As such, it should appeal to a very different mind set(s) which should be reflected in how that portion on the sport is presented. Also, it is likely to have much wider appeal than activities that are inherently competitive. There is enormous potential for growth of freediving sightseeing. It makes up the majority of scuba diving but is hardly touched by free divers. In places like Dahab, which sounds near perfect for sight seeing, most free divers seem to come for line diving and do relatively little free ranging sight seeing.

This is a little rambling, but Paul has raised some interesting and potentially important ideas. Makes good food for thought.

Connor

 

[jome]

Good thoughts. I just have one question. How do you determine the pricing for your courses? Having just aquired trainer qualification and starting my first course, I was thinking along the lines of 30-50e. If I'd slap 170£ on a course, I'd get a lot of strage looks, but no students. This is *, but I can't imagine charging much more for **.

 

[Stephan Whelan]

Simo,

Pricing should be based on one factor initially - what are your costs. You have to charge a figure that will cover your basic costs first, then decide how much you'd like to charge on top of that.

Think about what services you'd like to offer as well as basic requirements of the course (basic training, manuals, equipment hire, insurance, certification, O2, etc...) and that will also help you decide the pricing of your courses.

I think you'll find that you may need to charge more than 30-50e depending on the framework of the courses.

If you want to talk more PM or Email me.

 

[samdive]

Hi - I run a pricing workshop as part of the AIDA * Trainer course and most of our instructor candidates are surprised at how much it all add ups to. When you include everything -
pool fees, entry fees, student equipment purchase/hire, insurance for instructor and student, tax, medicals for instructor, fuel, food, drink, your own equipment, oxygen fills, first aid kit and training, ropes, weights, AIDA Certification fee (£20 in the UK), classroom hire, laptop use, photocopy of the course notes......and then add it what you would like to earn for your own time £170 is actually a fairly tight budget. The ** Course takes two full days and a pool session of about 3 hours so its not bad value, a lot cheaper than a scuba course of similar duration. We all charge about the same in the UK and not many people question it.

Sam

 

[subaquaticus]

Seems like there are 4 general types of free divers,

line divers,
pool divers,
spearos and
divers engaged in some activity other than spearing, photography, sight seeing, etc.

I like tour classification of freedivers...

This year I experienced the second type, next week the first type in Nice, but I feel that I am going to take an orientation towards the fourth type : sightseeing...

It is a good experience for me to do a little bit of competition in pools and in the Sea as well in order to gain some credibility...

But definitely my dream would be to be able to swim underwater together with dolphins or seals in a beautiful environment...

I would then put myself definitely in the 4th category...

 

[donmoore]

But the most important thing to respect in any newcomer is not their ability but their enthusiasm

What a statement! Boy what I would give for some enthusiastic people to dive with! Paul and Sam you spurred me on. Here I am complaining about not enough people to dive with and I don’t even have my local club web address in my posts. I just tried to put it in my db signature. We will see if it works with this post.
don

PS An opportunity to help publicize freediving, spearfishing and my local club recently fell into my lap. Actually I think someone from DB directed the reporter my way. The in-action pictures and the interview was done Sunday. The article is even suppose to include thoughts from a famous person who the reporter just happened to be covering Wednesday through the weekend in a golf tournament when this person’s participation ending uncharacteristically by not making the cut on Friday. Actually him not making the cut was the reason the reporter was able to leave the tournament and go diving with me Sunday -- which just happened to be the best offshore day, weather wise, we had had in weeks.

Kirk Krack turned me onto the fact this guy was into freedive spearfishing so when the reporter was informing me of his schedule and that he had to cover the golf tournament, because this guy was in it, I passed on what Kirk had said about him. Apparently the interview with this person went well and he is indeed bitten by freediving! Maybe it was God’s way of letting freediving take a little publicity away from one of the major media sports.

If and when the article is printed I will let Stephan know so maybe he can include it in the DB News.

 

[Erik]

I'm glad he was bitten, however I hope that wasn't what wrecked his game the other day
Cheers,
Erik Y.

 

[donmoore]

Seven years and 142 PGA Tour events without missing the cut! A longer streak than any pro golfer in history! This should have been bigger news than what it was.

I’m not a golfer. I only know this because I did a Yahoo news search. It’s his freediving that made me interested!
don

 

[donmoore]

I just wanted to let people know, who are not on the PFD board, that Paul demise into a typical mid life American man couch potato was not of his own choosing or lack of self discipline. I meet Paul last April at a PFD clinic and he was a stud. One look at him and you could tell he took fitness seriously!

I don’t think he has shared it on DB like he has on PFD, but he had a medical condition that the treatment required him to be inactive for a year. Paul, we know you will be back physically. Your mental thoughts and writing ability as always are a joy to indulge in! :wave
don

 

[flyboy748]

Fantastic comments Sam, and so true! I agree 100% with the enthusiasm factor. I remember talking a new freediver into a competition when her PB's were not what she considered competition worthy. I told her that her enthusiastic attitude was exactly what the sport needs... You're right, in our competitiveness we sometimes forget the real meaning of the sport.

Connor,
4 types of freedivers, exactly! I've seen myself evolve from a sightseeing snorkeler, to a competitive linediver, back to a sightseeing snorkeler! I still linedive, but more as a social/medatative practice and to enhance my recreational diving abilities. I believe that recrational freediving is the very thing that will attract alot of new divers. I know I had no interest in competition when I started! And like you say, scuba divers by the hundreds are getting certified to go sightseeing, often at depths of 25-40 feet! Easy depths for recrational freediving. But there arn't a lot of courses teaching people how to explore the reef without all that equipment.

Don,
Cool that you met a freediver who also happens to golf Also good thinking with the signature... here's mine!

Back to basics I guess!

Cheers all,
Aaron

 

[Paul Kotik]

For those of you interested enough to have found your way to this Forum, I've got some numbers, which I'll post here in order to help make sense of the numbers you see in this Freediving Reloaded series.

I didn't do much planning for my Year of Living Langorously, so I didn't systematically log the performance and physological benchmarks I should have had I known I was going to be making a study of it.

However, as luck would have it, I spent some time with the Performance Freediving crew on Grand Cayman a month or so before starting my year of down-time, and so my dive computer memory retained some useful forensic data. The recorded dives are working dives ( videography, safety diving, etc.) rather than sporting dives ( like PB attempts, competitions) so it doesn't provide a benchmark for maximum performance, rather, it can be taken as a benchmark for minimum performance: it shows that on a given day, the wearer of the computer (me) was able to dive at least so deep.

The deepest the computer has me diving in Cayman during March/April of 2003 is 141 ft/ 43m.

Also, before going down to Cayman, I'd done a couple of weeks of static apnea training tables so as not to totally disgrace myself on the job in Cayman. I didn't write much down, but did find a note in my appointment calendar remarking that 'stat tables GREAT today 6:19' . I usually go-for-broke on the last breath-hold of a training table, rather than quitting at 4:30 or 5:00 or whatever the table calls for, so I think that what we have here is evidence that on February 23, 2004, the guy writing in the appointment calendar (me) could hold his breath for at least 6:19 - again, it is not a measure of maximum performance, but just a sample that puts a floor under it. A minimum.

In the 25m pool, my pre-year-off 2004 workout log has me doing repeat 50m apnea sprints on a regular basis, and records a couple of 100m dynamics just before leaving for Cayman, so, again, we have a guy who could do at least 100m dynamics.

On the physiological side, a blood panel done in late February 2004 shows hemoglobin of 15.9 and hematocrit of 47%. I've seen these numbers a little higher in recent years, and a little lower, so I think these are pretty representative of my blood's baseline oxygen transport capacities.

My body weight the night before the official declaration of a year of downtime was 166 lbs / 75.5 kg.

On the day when my year of downtime was officially ended ( you may have seen clips of the parade in downtown Miami on CNN ) my hemoglobin was 8.8, and my hematocrit was about 27%.

On that day, I tried to get a measure of static apnea performance, dry, lying on a bed, but was not once able to stay conscious and stop the stopwatch.

A couple of days later, I held my breath under those same conditions for 38 seconds. I stopped because of an ensemble of phenomena including agony, spasms, tunnel vision, more agony, and a desire to vomit. Plus a lot of agony.

Getting in a pool was simply too scary a prospect at that time.

All right. As reported in the Freediving Reloaded articles, I'm trying to become a freediver so I go to the gym, and have been in the pool a few times as well. I'm fortunate in that my schedule coincides with that of a Performance Freediving clinic grad who is also a nurse, so I feel well-supervised with her there.

Long story short, here's where we're at as of today, May 24, 2005. My session in the pool today consisted of a set of 8 25m dynamics with a monfin, 10 recovery breaths between each repeat. Then, with close supervision, a 20-breath prep and a 50m dynamic. That was quite difficult toward the end, and I did all those newbie things like panic and start sprinting, veering from the centerline, tilting my head up to see how much farther, and so on. But I did it, and came up clean, according to my buddy. I went on to do 4 25m dynamics with no fins, and then a nice 50m surface swim to cool down. A total of 400 meters of swimming, 300 in apnea. I was quite impressed with myself !

One thing that is very apparent, and surpising, is just how badly one's technique can deteriorate. I have very little muscle memory with the monofin. I have to repeat phrases from Aaron Solomons's recent article in my head as I swim in order to keep it together..sort of together. Without fins, whereas I used to take 5 strokes to do a 25m pool length in dynamic apnea, it is now taking 8 or 9. My former student, now my coach, reassures me that it is like riding a bicycle, etc. but I've got to say it doesn't feel like it will just come back to me. It feels like it is gone, or like it was never there. A friend recommended a book on basic swimming technique, and I think I've got to buy it and study it.

Body weight is slowing going down: today's bad news was 191 lbs/ 86.6 kg. It's like carrying a small child around with me everywhere ! My coach says that in time, this, too shall pass. I sure hope so - I ain't going to any event or even to the beach until I either give birth or get rid of it some other way. Vain ! Who knew ?

That's it for today. I'm slyly imbedding many newbie errors and wrong-thinking in my Freediving Reloaded articles: things I've seen many, many times from my vantage points of instructor and journalist. I hope readers will spot them and comment in this forum thread, with added discussion of ways to guide newbies around or through these obstacles to peace and freedom. There are also good things in the story being told by the articles - newbies do figure things out for themselves, and there are ways to self-teach that are effective. All newbies should know about these, but also know their limitations and how to know baloney when they see it.

Thanks for all your help so far with this article series. It is still somewhat embarrassing, me being the reserved gentleman I am, to put my defects in the public eye, but your encouragement (public and private) has moved me along the track.


Best Wishes,

Paul Kotik
Intrepid Beginner, Medieval Scientist and Crockumentarian
Playstation, Florida, USA

www.paulkotik.com

 

[cdavis]

Paul, you are putting together an extraordinary record. Thank you.

Connor

 

[DeepThought]

Memory.

Paul, congratulations on getting wet again.

My addition:
As long as you can remember how it feels like to go down 10m into the blue and dive parallel to a wall full with life for what seems to be a blissful forever - technic and muscle memory will come with time.
I think that is true not only to old hands that are making a comeback but also to any newbie out there for whom those 30 seconds of perfection is the inspiration for freediving.

 

[DeepThought]

Blood.

Regarding your anemia, maybe you should create some blood-quality program.
Consuming enough iron supplements and iron rich food to give your body everything it needs (be aware of iron poisoning though).
Maybe one of the forum experts (Eric Fattah for example) can give you a hand on building one... When to take which supplement with what for maximal absorption.
Ofcourse you should consult with an expert physician as well (incase you haven't).
Maybe such anemia justify a short EPO program since it's health rather than sports we're talking of.

BEHATSLACHA.

 

[Paul Kotik]

תודה רבה יא מיכאל. אינש'אללה.

Update and responses to the many suggestions, pointers and reprimands I've received both in this forum and privately:

First and foremost, the account I've given in the posted articles reads like the story of a dude headed for a sad little below-the-fold headline in the local newspaper, something about a drowning in the health club pool. The guy in the articles violates the First Commandment of Freediving, even though he thinks he is being conservative, reasonable and safe.

The guy is doing 25m apnea repeats, with his "mono fin" ( soon somebody will politely tell him it's one word) alone, coming off a zero base. He even goes to the pool during hours when he knows nobody will be there, not even some poor old grandma who could at least tell his wife he went out like a man. True, he made sure to have a competent buddy when he tried his 50m dynamic with monofin, which is good thinking, but this guy is all wrong thinking he's in the safe zone doing 25m repeats unbuddied. Call it fact, call it religion, call it what you like: you're NEVER in the safe zone when you're alone. Not even in the bathtub. Somebody has got to set this Kotik straight on this point. Hopefully, the little tiny smart guy in his head will wake up and do this before something happens that will make his insurance company sad.

On the bright side, the numbers are creeping up. Kotik's training program, based on reading internet articles of unknown validity, may or may not be helping him improve: it could just be the fact of doing something as opposed to nothing. If so, he'll top out soon at some very mediocre levels of performance and fitness for the sport.

Physiology as of May 24, 2005: (baseline in parens) hemoglobin 14.1 (8.8), RBC 4.19 (2.70), hematocrit 42.4% ( 27.something %). These are all in what is considered the 'normal' ranges, but as we all know, our medical friends don't ask much of us these days. Prior to the Year of Living Langorously, Kotik's hemoglobin bounced around in the 15-16.5 range most of the time, crit usually above 47%.

Resting heart rate is gliding down, so the hard (though rather pathetic) cardio workouts in the gym are paying off: the old boy finally managed to cover 2 miles, at a slight incline, without having to slow to a walk at any time. Slo o o o w w ly, to be sure (21 minutes !) but that's a huge improvement. Resting heart rate is now as low as 59, whereas it had been in the (alarming !) 80's baseline.

In the water, some progress on technique. The infamous unsupervised 25m monofin dynamics were an embarrassment to all of us at first - grinding to a dead stop between strokes. Reading Solomons, watching a video, and ratcheting up the speed have helped. Sounds odd, but going fast seems to force one to be efficient, streamlined and so forth. It also seems to be strengthening the muscles involved. The result is that when Kotik drops down to the relaxed, slower pace he would use for a PB in dynamic, everything works better. He even goes in a more-or-less straight line the entire 25m length of the pool ! He has the sense of topping out on technique, though, and needs some expert coaching. Totally lacking in confidence to go open water, constant ballast diving with a monofin.

BUT - the time is rapidly approaching when our intrepid beginner will have to stand up, salute, and finally taste some salt. Bifins, my friends, will be the gear of choice. Just plain easier for the unschooled beginner. Best guess is that this milestone will involve the abduction, bribing, or seduction of a competent buddy from among the local Usual Suspects, a quick drive down to Key Largo, and a ride on a cattle boat out to the coral reefs in 10-12 meters ( 33-40 feet) of water. The beauty is both an incentive....and a dangerous diversion. Could this guy be stupid enough, if he finds himself getting comfortable, to do things like swim-throughs in the coral passages ? Sure, happens all the time with eager young beavers. That's why the buddy on this momentous occasion is going to be crucial. If Kotik even tends toward breaking ANY of the Commandments, well, the buddy's going to have to set him straight: "NO SOUP FOR YOU , ONE YEAR !".

Fatness has thrown an unexpected curve ball into this beginner's progress. Anybody heard of a thing like this ? A guy gets up off the couch, starts working out in the gym and in the pool, and out of nowhere grows a Guiness belly ? Speculation ? Maybe the novel increase in physical activity has caused appetite to outrun caloric output ? Has this happened to anybody else you know of ?

It seems to have impacted bouyancy, resulting in a more head-down posture doing dynamics in the pool - other wise he breaks the surface. Lots of energy wasted staying down. Feels draggy, too. Folks, all that stuff about water being 700 times denser than air, streamlining, tiny changes in form making big differences in energy consumption ? All true. No joke. ADVICE: Keep slim, maintain low body fat %. I kid you not.

Re: Michael's suggestion about iron supplementing, Kotik's medical consultants are unanimously against it, in fact, one doctor insists it is better in Kotik's case to avoid iron. There wasn't time to go into details, but I've learned two things that seem to back him up: there are types of anemia (my wife has one of these, sickle cell is another) which require patients to avoid iron like the plague, and, when I obeyed the doctor and went to buy iron-free multivitamins, I discovered that the drugstore shelves are full of them, mostly but not all in formulations branded "silver citizen" and things like that. Evidently, there is some consensus that middle-aged folks ought to limit iron intake. In any case, the blood numbers are rising at a happy rate without sucking nails, at least so far, so we'll see how far we can get.

So: help ! What about the fat problem ? What about the excessive buoyancy in the pool training and the head-down attitude it causes ? And what is both critical and missing from this start-up training program ? There's a big, big hole in the wall. Help this eager beaver find and remedy it.

Heavens, I wonder if our hero can still fit into his wet suit......

 

[DeepThought]

נראה לי שאתה כבר עם רגל אחת במים. לפחות אחת.

What about the excessive buoyancy in the pool training and the head-down attitude it causes ?

Try a neckweight or a neckweight/weightbelt combination to be close to perfectly balanced and neutral at your dynamic depth. Maybe even slightly positive as you get "heavier" during the dynamic itself. Helps to have a pertner to help you measure that.

 

[Paul Kotik]

So wait: if my head is already down, won't a neck weight make the situation even worse ? And why do I get heavier when doing the dynamic ? Please explain, for the general enlightenment, sir !

And there's still this big empty space in the room where an 800-pound gorilla should be sitting ! What's missing from this picture ?

Thank you.

 

[DeepThought]

Usually the head down position in dynamics is when someone compensates for positive buoyancy - swimming down.

Getting "heavier" is due the nature of gas. I'm not sure if it's because CO2 takes less volume than O2 and you are exchanging those in your lungs while diving or because gas dissolves in the blood during the dive or because CO2 is more soluble then O2 (or all).
Theory aside, many people have noticed that phenomenon.

 

[Paul Kotik]

Very helpful observations, Michael. Take note, everybody. Anybody know more about the heavy thing ?

He's right - the pool lane I use is about 2 meters deep. By the end of the 25 meter length, my nose is scraping the bottom and my attitude has shifted through the horizontal to a slight head-up: I'm sinking, and trying to compensate!

Still a HUGE thing missing from this whole story. Nobody sees it ?