New deep competition format? No announcements, just dive? Debate...

[CEngelbrecht]

I'm not sure about this concept, but I might as well throw it out there. I've had some discussions with a couple of people about this concept, and I'd really like a broad feedback to it.

The idea is to reconsider the format of deep competitions, especially with regards to the announced performances, possibly removing them completely.

No, hear me out...

The background is that many don't consider deep apnea events to be that TV friendly. The current format is somewhat predictable, there's a limited excitement as to what's going to happen during a competition day. Not that the excitement isn't there, 'will he make his announcement', but to the outside world, that's somewhat limited.

And before any of you say, 'So what? We don't need TV!', let me say that I don't think a little more TV would hurt freediving. TV coverage has a profound tendency to support a sport, creating a stronger foundation, whether it's for the sponsored masters, or for the 'tourist' freedivers being inspired by TV broadcast. On the flipside, TV can also ruin a sport completely, which I personally think is the case with pro boxing, so either way, we should tread carefully. But anyway, I don't think it can hurt teaming up a bit with what TV would like to have and what it has to offer in return, as long as it stays to the benefit of the game, what ever that is. Depends on the balance.


The 'just dive' concept so far goes something like this (this is just my own summary of discussions I've had with people, I'm sure I've forgot something):

* Competitors in a deep competition doesn't annouce their performance. Instead they, basically, get a 120+ meter rope and just go as deep as they can that day. No bottom plate, they turn when they wish. No AP penalty points, but still pulling penalty.
* Each athlete is allowed two official dives with a day of rest in between, the deepest dive counts. Surface protocol stays, but the achieved depth is determined solely by the official depth gauge (the Suunto D9's have become EXTREMELY accurate, so it's possible).
* For this to work, the number of competitors probably has to be limited to, say, 40 per event (eg. 'male constant weight') and not 80+ as now for the big deep events. This is normal in eg. skiing competitions (which I think is comparable to freediving in terms of setup). Downside is that it can kill some of the social aspect of freediving with the many participants we've had so far. I don't know.
* How would a freediver know how deep he/she is? Two suggestions: A) The depth alarm on the official gauge to aid a freediver when he/she is at a certain depth. One or more official 'beeps' could be announced the night before, so it can be set by the organization; or, it can be left to athletes themselves to have their own gauges and their own alarms. Also, B) the official rope is somehow colored, and changes color (yellow, orange, red, green, what ever) for eg. every ten meters. Something like that.


Safety?

Here I'm a bit nervous myself. That's one big 'if'. The standard argument for having the announcements is safety issues. No matter what we do, we can't compromise safety, I'm sure we all agree. A couple of answers to that problem have been:

* Counter ballast lift system! This seems to be working alright by now in competitions. The lanyard stays, so a deep water blackout (heaven forbid...) can be pulled up instantly. Back-up scuba divers are still waiting at the surface, which seems to be standard by now.
* Surveillance! A series of all-covering, live feeding, UW cameras situated along a wire system parrallel to the competition rope, allowing instant surveillance of the athlete all the way down and up. This would of course double to aid the judges making on site final ruling about white cards, etc. pull violations, etc., so we don't have to wait so damn long on results lists back on shore. This would also triple to allowing the same images will of course be part of the live TV transmission, enhancing the excitement, 'when she's gonna turn?', all that. And, those live TV images quadriples (?) to enhance safety, the organizer can react instantly, if they see a freediver blacking out at depth (heaven forbid...).


All this would of course be expensive as h...! Money like only TV has. Things goes hand in hand.

 

[BennyB]

Interesting idea Chris. I'm not sure how I feel about it yet but definitely worth a debate.

The thing is, we think in terms of what we can organise given the resources at hand, which normally is not much. Add some serious sponsorship $$ from the big players and it'd be a completely different ball game...

 

[Goran Colak]

I like this idea very much... only thing I am concern about is safety... but I think we can find right way to do this safe! I think we can put announcements like in pool disciplines, for forming start list... but one can go deeper then that... and still negative points for early turn. Just like pool disciplines. And one idea about how we gonna measure the depth: the diver go down with a clip, on that clip is a blank tag, when diver turns, he must place clip on the rope right next to arm that he uses for garbing the rope and stooping the fall. Then judge place depth gauge next to blank tag, wright depth on it and launch it back to the surface.

 

[deep thinker]

This could most certainly work but logistics will ofcoarse have to be fine tuned.
Sure we want Freediving to be more out there and easier to follow on TV but we dont want people to turn it into a high gloss spectator sport like Wrestling ( Im using that cause you used boxing ) or the recent David Blaine stunt. It leaves too much room for ag theire just faking it attitudes.
Keeping the basic safety setup there will definately help but I think we mite need a better depth metering system than just relying on a divers depth meter, leaves room for errors and also tampering...

 

[Goran Colak]

Well of course the rope will be measured, and scuba can put that on the tag, the rope depth, and can add the depth gauge readings as well.... well never the less, we can work on details but the concept is here...

 

[naiad]

Interesting idea.

Has anyone thought of doing the same with pool disciplines? I think it would make things easier if there were no announced times or distances, and everyone just did what they feel like on the day. There would be less safety issues than with the depth disciplines.

 

[jome]

Maybe in terms of safety you'd still have to announce some kind of reasonable maximum depth.

For example a diver in the 60m range could not have a 120m rope, but rather max 70 or something. Maybe something like "you can only have +15% of your best ranking result of rope"?

Anyway, to make it even more interesting, I'd like to see evenly matched athletes go simultaneously on 2 ropes Close enough so they can see each other.

Well, not very safe, perhaps, but interesting thought to play around with...

 

[efattah]

The N.E.P.T.U.N.E. safety system I designed and built in 2004 was designed as the all-encompassing solution for a 'no-announcement' competition. With the NEPTUNE system, the diver's depth and speed are known at all times, and the diver can be pulled up instantly far faster than any counterballast system. No scuba divers needed.

The drawback? The cost. The NEPTUNE system is one huge contraption, and it cannot be built by anyone. If someone contracted my company to build one, I would probably charge $20,000 or more. Size and transportation are another problem with it.

[BTW NEPTUNE is an acronym for Non Entangling Pulley Train Underwater Emergency System]

 

[Haydn]

Announcing a depth does limit your performance, you always have to turn around when you reach the plate, even when your dive turns out brilliantly. A bad competition dive is where you are able to equalise at the plate......that means you could have gone deeper and you limited yourself by being too safe on a day when everything is in place for you to be tested. To resolve that issue its easy to declare a depth 10 meters deeper than your best and you know you cannot possibly reach it. You have therefore removed the pressure of getting your tag. You simply dive your best and expect to go deeper than the depth you would otherwise have chosen, because you have no pressure. You have therefore given yourself the best chance for a personal best competition dive. You will gain a few points for the extra two or three meters you might make, but get an equal ish penalty. The points remain the same but you give yourself the best option for having your best dive ever. I reckon declaring a depth is best but with the plate set 5 to 10 meters deeper with bonus points for bringing back the tag.

I see removing the declaration as a tactical strategy that will force the next competitor to do or die in order to win, but with only maybe 2 to 4 minutes notice of the previous result (unless the results are secret during all dives).

 

[jome]

Just for the record, I actually like the current system just fine. I may be in the minority, but I actually DO enjoy the tension and speculation around APs, and for me setting an AP is also a very simple process of "what I think I can pull off", instead of "what I think the others will announce".

But it's fun discussing these things and I don't see why something like this could not be done even now, it just wouldn't be an official AIDA competition.

For me the main concern is that "do or die" would literally turn into that. You're not at your best to make such decisions when narced out of your mind...

 

[Billextreme]

Test competitions with some new ideas are almost always interesting. BUT I must say that free-depth and no announcement could be a little too wild. (at least inside of AIDA for the next decade)

I had an idea how to replace the bottom plate with a tennis ball; this ball will stop the lanyard and the tag that the judges drop down. THEN you have two meters of line continued under that tennis ball. One meter under the ball you have tags, pre-attached, that says "+1". Two meters under the ball you have a final bottom-plate with pre-attached tags that says "+2".

The announcement would be where the ball is, but with the lanyard stretched you could easily reach +1 or +2 and come up with a plus point.

But this idea might be to wild as well?

/B

 

[Haydn]

I have always declared personal bests at competition, and every time I have got my tag, I have dropped below and sunk my depth guage deeper just to get that extra meter on it. I believe most of us are too conservative by declaring safe depths (ones we have done before in training) and then in the comp we make those depths. I dont get the point of that.

 

[Billextreme]

We had 16 BO at WC in Sharm… soo I guess there is plenty of room for improvements, don’t you think? The point is to go deep and safe at the same time. Some athletes know how to do this, and some don't. To be safe is to make sure you can do the dive before you announce it in the competition.

/B

 

[Goran Colak]

Ok so here is another idea about this problem...

A Partial Announcements!

One announce a minimum depth, lets say 100m, that is the minimum depth and the depth to form start list for competition. But max depth for that diver is 20m deeper then announced one, so bottom plate is on 120m. So he\she can turn when ever he\she wants in range from 100m to 120m and get no penalties, and penalties for turn before 100m. If diver go's for max depth, he\she brings a bottom tag up, and if diver turns early then depth is calculate with depth gauge.

And of course that depth range of 20m can be lets say 10m or 15m....

 

[efattah]

In my opinion, the *reason* for the blackouts is the announced performance. The athlete is having a bad day, and feels compelled to reach the plate/tag, even though he doesn't want to. He knows he gets a huge penalty for turning early, so he goes all the way. BO or broken drums.

I have always felt that a 'range' announcement (as suggested) is good. For example, you announce 70m +/- 10m (i.e. 60-80m), with no penalties. This allows the diver to turn early if needed (to avoid the BO), and also allows for a lot of excitement for the spectators.

In my case, forget the announced performance-- I know the depth I can reach only in the last seconds before I start the dive, based on how I feel. In the last seconds it is not convenient to communicate the announced depth, so I am stuck with whatever I announced before.

 

[alex_russu]

Without a plate (target depth), some day you may be equalizing better and reach unsafe depts.
Here is a recent example:
After the WC I stayed one more week in Sharm and I was diving on the worm-up lines (-80 m) without having a plate at my target dept. After a deep dive I came up and realized I had an accident (blood in my lungs) and when I checked the dive computer I’ve seen I was over 10 meters deeper than my PB.
I would never try to improve my PB with 10m in a single dive, but without the plate, I was counting only on my sensations and it looks like it’s not safe enough.
Of course there are freedivers much more experienced than me, that know themselves better and could estimate very well what is the optimum turning point to have a maximum performance without injuries, but competitions are opened also to less experienced freedivers.

The announced depth with +/- 5m without penalty may be a good compromise.

 

[Mullins]

Haydn, I have also nominated PBs in every competition I’ve been in, except for triple depth where there was a depth limit. However this is just because we’re relatively new competitors in a young sport. As the sport matures and grows, athletes will need to explore their limits more thoroughly in training if they are to be competitive. They will therefore have a very accurate idea of how far they can push in competition. It will come down to single metre increments and I think the nomination format caters to that better than a ‘see how it feels on the dive’ approach. I would find it very hard to estimate depth accurately past 100m. Even an alarm is dodgy because 1. you may not hear it and 2. your response time is poor when you’re narked and you could easily go 3 or 4 metres past your target. Personally I prefer to make the decision about my depth while I am lucid the night before. I still have the option of turning early if it is a bad dive. If you’re worried about penalties, make sure you don’t have a bad dive! This may be difficult, but nearly all the factors are under the athlete’s control. If you can’t sort out your equalising, your breathup, your blood pressure – then turn early and wear the penalty. Exactly how much of a penalty there should be is another question… maybe 1p per m is too much? Or a 5m grace zone as Alex suggests?

If you’re worried about the sport lacking suspense under the nomination format, why make the start list known beforehand? Why not give the athletes random top times and keep their depths secret until shortly before their dives? If this random combination of depths mucks the scuba safety around, you could still group the top guys/girls together without giving too much away.

 

[kelp princess]

i think an announced range makes good sense and still keeps up some level of anticipation since no one knows who will reach what level in a 10- 20 meter window of range.

making the comparison of skiing a downhill course or swimming a race doesn't really make for a good comparison because people in those disciplines are working within a finite scale - it's about seeing who can perform the best and fastest in a dictated length of course.

freediving is unique in that part of the competition is about changing the depth - actually stretching the course, as it were. if plates are essential to safety, i say keep 'em. but then again i'm a safety girl.


i think offering range gets you to a new paradigm and still creates excitement without too much danger.

and announcing that a PB was achieved at the end of a comp - keeps the excitement up even at the end.

kp

 

[Haydn]

I agree with Eric. The thing is, this idea seems to be biased toward deep divers. How would this play out for those divers in their first few dives at around 30 to 40m?

 

[Mullins]

In my opinion it is the other way around - insanely dangerous for deep divers but quite good for the newer competitors whose performances are more variable and don't involve narcosis or a prolonged sink phase leading them to overshoot.