how do they do it?

[Lil Dragonfly]

How do champion freedivers manage to train for so many hours a day and still have time for work, family, other interests, etc?

 

[monkeyhatfork]

I think some of them would say they don't get to train as much as they would like even ones lucky enough to make thier living in the water teaching others to freedive. But its something I really love about this sport that someone with a normal day job can go out and set amazing records. I think this is true of most athletes though, unless you are in a popular sport like football,basketball etc most athletes don't make a living entirely from thier sport. I'm not a champion or even close right now but I do a strength and conditioning program before work and I hit the pool for 2 hrs afte,r pretty much all week, its not that hard to fit in so I imagine a professional wouldn't have too much trouble doing more

 

[Mullins]

Elite-level training needn't take a lot of time, because high intensity / short duration training seems best for freediving anyway. Fatigue is more of a problem than actual training hours, but even that is quite manageable.

Then again, it's probably different for depth disciplines. The logistics of training are much tougher.

 

[Lil Dragonfly]

How many hours a day do they spend training?

 

[monkeyhatfork]

I 'd guess that varies a bit from person to person but you'd have to get that from them. Freediving is relatively new at least as far as people taking studied approaches to training for it, it's always changing and always improving, approaches people are using right now may move to something else next year. So just learn as much you can and find what works for you. I'd take Mullins advice that quality is more important than quantiy with training, and the shorter max interval type stuff does seem to fit freediving better.

 

[Lil Dragonfly]

I seem to remember reading in the newspaper that Tanya spends 8 hours a day in the pool...

 

[fflupo]

dave, how do you manage fatigue after depth dive ?
sleep, food,stretching ..etc

i train lots of frc and max dives with full inhale

cheers
wolf

 

[Kars]

Though I'm not an example of a busy freediver, since I got unemployed a few months back, I agree with Dave Mullins' approach.

Just a training tip, I'm a skinny person and want to have more blood and muscle mass. I already made some nice improvements, and I did this with good nutrition at the right time. You see eating right after exercise is key, it's like eating your prey after the hunt LOL
Anyway what I do is very simple and time effective. I do push ups until failure, two sets. That takes me about 5 minutes while my warm food (home made hamburgers) is baking.
I find that this exercise helps my body in so many ways.

Swimming and training focus.
Also to training effective is to train with a plan, not only an day plan, but also a week and long term plan. This will help to get the most out of your precious, precious pool time.

Finally, don't spend to much time on the internet of behind any screen for that matter.

Happy training!

Kars

 

[Lil Dragonfly]

I'm a skinny person and want to have more blood and muscle mass.

I thought that muscle mass was bad for freediving because it burns up more o2? Confused

 

[Mullins]

dave, how do you manage fatigue after depth dive ?
sleep, food,stretching ..etc

i train lots of frc and max dives with full inhale

cheers
wolf

In large part, fatigue is just something you have to put up with. It can feel good to have sore legs the next day, because at least it tells you that you had a worthwhile training session. But it can become a problem by affecting the next session. I do the following things:

- start sessions with a big swim then move into apnea sprints and finish off with surface swimming. This does seem to help with the lactic.
- alternate between DYN/DNF and recently introduced some cross training in the gym.
- if I have real problems with sore/tired muscles and still want to train, I'll wear a tri-suit and go slowly. I can still do near-max dives this way without burning my legs out (combination of warmth and slow pace)

 

[fflupo]

ok i know what you mean..

i do ashtanga yoga to deal with the muscles

but i suffer the tiered felling of the body in general after dives below RV
i can sleep 2 times more than normal and still feel exhausted..
i eat lots of alkaline food and i train the lactic acid ( on breath hold and depth)

i thought i could be the low resting HR / < 50 ?
or the nutrition in the blood ?

i don t know much about food supplements ( omega3,iron,etc ) i just take care for the anti-oxidants!?

thanx wolf

 

[jome]

I thought that muscle mass was bad for freediving because it burns up more o2? Confused

I think it all boils down to what your weakness is. If you are a skinny endurance type aerobic guy, you will burn more oxygen while diving simply because you're used to working with lots of oxygen and don't go into "diving mode" quite as well.

For such a person, gym training and focusing on anaerobic workouts will make a world of difference, not so much in static, but when ever you start to to move in apnea. (always my weak point at least)

Also, if you don't have the muscles and strength to simply swim efficiently (can't complete the proper movements), naturally you will benefit from getting enough strength to "get it right".

But heavyweight body building is a different sport all together. For us normal guys and gals building "too much" muscle mass is pretty hard thing to do...

 

[sgnips]

- alternate between DYN/DNF and recently introduced some cross training in the gym.

Hi Dave,
what kind of work did you introduce in the gym?
thanks

 

[rddk]

Personally after an hard training i steal the method used by people that goes cycling, that is put ur legs up, u stay orizzontal on ur bed and put ur legs up to the wall like doing an L between legs and back, u stay 10 minutes like this and ur legs are perfect, that worked on me a lot also when i had leg destroyed after a muay thai training.

 

[picasso]

Hi Dave,

tahnks for sharing .

In large part, fatigue is just something you have to put up with. It can feel good to have sore legs the next day, because at least it tells you that you had a worthwhile training session. But it can become a problem by affecting the next session. I do the following things:

- start sessions with a big swim then move into apnea sprints and finish off with surface swimming. This does seem to help with the lactic.
- alternate between DYN/DNF and recently introduced some cross training in the gym.
- if I have real problems with sore/tired muscles and still want to train, I'll wear a tri-suit and go slowly. I can still do near-max dives this way without burning my legs out (combination of warmth and slow pace)