Herbert Nitsch about his Record Attempts

[efattah]

When Jim says 'do you need to psych yourself up', he is asking if you must put yourself in a special state of mind to convince yourself to actually go all the way to the bottom.

If the dive will not be enjoyable, it can be difficult to go all the way to the bottom -- the trip down is not difficult, but you fear sinking so deep because you know that the ascent might not be pleasant.

So, he was simply wondering if you needed to find a good 'reason' to convince yourself to go down, or was it so fun that you were like Jacques Mayol and couldn't wait to get down so you could 'go and see' ??


Eric Fattah
BC, Canada

 

[Herbert]

Eric, thanks for clarifying. In this case I don’t have to ‘psych up” for the dive. I would rather call it gaining confidence from previous dives. Having a good safety system and safety divers also help to be relaxed during limiting dives. A good breath up sets my body and my mind in a very relaxed state as well.

Alun and eric, concerning the descent and ascent rate, it is something which is changing not only because of my style and technique, but also very much by the suit and weight I am wearing. I am always borrowing weights and therefore never know the exact weight, but I tend to be at the heavy side, being negative at the surface when exhaling to ½ - 1/3 of my lung volume. This makes the breath up without help a bit hard, because I would sink when breathing relaxed without holding on to something. In Cyprus I used a new suit, and the buoyancy got significantly less during the 2 weeks of training, but I didn’t want to change it just before the big day, so I was extremely heavy.