Max attempts training period

[georgeg]

Hello to all,

I was thinking about how long should be the training period of "max attempts", until the competition day. On the one hand, with a short-term "max attempts period" you'll be more "fresh" and feeling more "powerful". On the other hand, with long-term "max attempts period"(more max attempts) you'll be more familiar with attempts close to your limits. And there's my dilemma...

What's your opinion and your experience about that?

Greetings,
George

 

[efattah]

I recommend multiple phases of max attempts, no more than 4 weeks long, perhaps 3 times per year.

 

[dimitris33]

My opinion is that, if you train all year round and keep your body and mind in good shape then you can try max attemtps whenever you feel strong mentally and physically. I think, surprise in Apnea, can give you nice results (except depth disciplines under which u need adaptation to depth).

It might be stressfull to know that the max attempts period is coming...

So much planning is not good, at least for me.

 

[Mullins]

Depends what discipline you're talking about too. Max statics are physically fairly easy to recover from, dynamics less so and constant weight dives arguably the toughest (some might swap those last two around).

 

[georgeg]

First of all, thanks for your replies guys.

Dave, my question was mainly about pool disciplines.

Eric, that's an interesting view. Do you think 2-3 max attempts per week, in that period would be ok?

Dimi, i agree about the "surprise" you are talking about, but I think it's very important to find the "perfect balance" and not to overtrain on max attempts. Also, there is the mental part of max attempts(and that's what you are talking about, I think), but that's another thing, out of the main training program.

Thanks again,

 

[Simos]

George I think it also depends what your 'max' really is/means. eg for a beginner such as myself, doing 'max' attempts is not really an issue. I could do a max static and max dynamic in every pool training session and be ok - I don't think I would benefit at all from periodicity as I am not pushing my body anywhere close to its max.

If you are at Dave/Eric's level then it's obviously a different story. In general, listening to your body is probably a good way to go and watching for signs of overtraining. Mentally it's also important to be looking forward to the training sessions so if you find yourself loathing them because of max attempts I would switch for a while to training technique or other more 'fun' freediving training until you are ready to give max attempts a go again.

Also if you can have the luxury of decent nutrition and sleep/rest in your life then you could probably do more max attempts.

Just my 2p...

 

[georgeg]

Hi Simos,

I'm a beginner in competitive free diving too, I'm on my second training season, but I was athlete for many years before in other sport. I agree with you, as a beginner you don't have the experience to push your attempts to the limits, but I believe, even in that level, you push yourself psychologically and it's a bit hard to do it without any programming on it. Anyway, we can't say what's working or not without try it, so we need some time as beginners

Cheers,