please help me out! (diving progresion)

I think frenzel is the sort of thing one has to be taught in person, not just from some confusing instruction manual.

(Not that I've ever been taught it, I'm just telling you what others have told me.)

Simple! Full exhale, open your mouth and EQ if you can do it then its frenzel. it sounds like you are doing frenzel.

the article you read no doubt was from Eric Fattah? its a very involved article which explains every step of frenzel. i found this article to completely baffel me when io first started as well. but sure enough everything he is saying is occuring you are just doing it without knowing.

Valsalva can comfortably go below 40m so you are not having to worry about it just yet.

also recognise in the article by eric there are 2 sections, one for frenzel and another one for Frenzel-fattah, this is another extension on frenzel for deep equalisation and commonly called mouthfill.

trust your instinct, if youn are njot using your stomach and can equalise on full exhale (OUT of WATER!!!) with mouth open then it is Frenzel dont stress.

DD

I thought that frenzel involved this weird tongue trick? confused

You do not need to open your mouth to verify whether you do Valsalva or Frenzel - you can do both with open and with closed mouth, so it makes little sense. What is important is exhaling fully (better with some reverse packs) and then trying to equalize. If you can, it's Frenzel.

If you want to do the "open mouth" test, then oppositely you should not exhale, but rather block the epiglottis, and push with the diaphragm strongly against it (as if you wanted to exhale strongly). In this way, with the pressure against the epiglottis and mouth open, when you unconsciously release the block of the epiglottis, you'll feel it immediately. If you mange to compensate, while keeping the pressure against the glottis without releasing it, then it's clear Frenzel again.

The only difference between Frenzel and Valsalva is that at Frenzel the Epiglottis is closed (the lungs are isolated from the sinus). All other is little important - so you can have the mouth cavity shut from the sinus by the soft palate as in the left picture below, or connected with sinus like on the right part. It plays no role and you can as well equalize with or without it with both methods (Frenzel or Valsalva).

This image demonstrates well the difference between Frenzel and Valsalva. It comes from Simo "Jome" Kurra's manual:



The position of the tip of the tongue is also not really important. If some position seems to be easier to you, just go on using it. It is actually not the part of the tongue that you have in the mouth that makes the piston, but its bottom part that is in the throat that makes the famous "piston". Most freedivers learn using it without even being aware of it, since it is much easier to dose the amount of air going into the sinus, than with the diaphragm.

If you already do Frenzel, then there is no big problem. Losing air into the mask is normal, and in fact necessary for equalizing it. The problem is probably that in that moment you also release the epiglottis lock, and your chest and diaphragm are likely not relaxed, hence you have feeling you cannot get any air into the mouth. Getting rid of the tension will help. You could also try keeping the epiglottis lock all the way down. A good way to do it is blowing the cheeks to the maximum near the surface, and focusing on keeping them full all the time - in this way you keep the epiglottis locked, while being able to compensate both the ears, and the mask. And in the same time in this way you'll train mouth-fill for much bigger depth - in the next stage you'll not fill the mouth at the surface but 20m deep (or deeper) and will be able to get much much deeper with it.

Another possibility would be trying to dive with a nose clip and pipe goggles or no mask at all. In this way you would not need to equalize the mask, hence you could keep constant pressure on the ears without opening the epiglottis, all way down. However, for reaching 25m - 30m it is not really necessary. As DivingDane wrote, if you are well relaxed, did some stretching, and have flexible diaphragm and chest, then you can get to 40m even with plain Valsalva (epiglottis open).

Trux i'm a bit confused, you say aove that you can train epiglottis closing by filling the mouth (mouth fill) and holdingn the epiglottis closed by keeping the cheeks full? how is this possible. if you keep the epiglottis closed then you can not add air to the cheeks to keep them full during descent as youdescend you use air from your cheeks/m0outh to Equalise which reduces the volume so if you were to maintain ful cheeks you would have to release the epiglottis to add more air ,NO? so to train closed epiglottisit is best to take 1mouth fill from the surface on FRC and equalise as far as possible with it. this will improve EQ efficiency and also epiglottis control because below RV if you loose epiglottis block then the vacuum in the lungs will take the air avaiable in the mouth and cheeks back into the lungs and you will no loger beable to EQ without reverse backing.

please correct me if i am wrong. i've been working on this a fair bit lately. nothing super deep deepest so far is FRC, 1 mouth fill only (no topping up) at 5m and run out of air at 32.8m. by training this way i have increased my overall depth on 1 mouth fill significantly!

normal mask (omer alien), inhale no packing, 1 mouth fill only at 15m and still had a bit of air left at 50.4m to EQ.

DD

DivingDane, I do not quite understand the confusion, because in one sentence you doubt it is possible keeping full cheeks with epiglottis closed, and keep on equalizing, and in the next one you tell the best is to fill the cheeks on FRC and equalise as far as you can.

In fact both things are the same and it is not too much important whether you start with FRC or full lungs (I mean from the perspective of learning the equalizing). I recommended the full cheeks, because when you fill your cheeks, and press against the e-tubes, you automatically and unconsciously close the epiglottis (at least at the people already using Frenzel, like dbmitch apparently does). And if you release it by accident, you feel it immediately. It is not so evident when you equalize with Frenzel but with more or less empty mouth. And when you equalize with semi-empty mouth, you need to refill it frequently, meaning you need to open the glottis - and that's exactly the problem dbmitch complained about - when he equalizes the ears, he then releases the air into the mask, but unconsciously also releases the epiglottis lock, hence losing the air in mouth, and is not being able to bring it up again. Sure, at ~20m with relaxed chest and diaphragm it should be no problem to bring back air to the mouth anytime, so it would be better working on the relaxation, but using a "mouth-fill" is a possibility too.

If you release the epiglottis lock each time you equalize and bring new air from the lungs, then you in fact do a combined Valsalva-Frenzel - Valsalva to bring the air to the mouth, and then Frenzel to send it to the ears. Nothing wrong with it, but it works well only to certain depth, and when it gets tougher, it may also lead to tense diaphragm and chest, worsening the situation.

So if you have problems getting the air from lungs to mouth (as it seems to be the case at dbmitch), then you better try not losing the air you already have in the mouth, by opening the epiglottis. At least unless you are sure you'll have no problems bringing it from lungs

no no what i was confused about was that you said to close the epiglottis and KEEP the cheeks filled. this is not possible because as you go down the cheeks reduce in volume. thats what i was confused about.

pretty much everything else i agree with, short of working on relaxation. head position, lung flexibilty and just staight out more time at depth, mouthfill EQ will work well!

i was just confused by the what you were aying because it is impossible ( i think) the keep cheeks full througout a dive if you hold the epiglottis closed (by nature of EQ and pressure the mouthfill will loose volume with dpeth) thats all.


DD

Well, when I told filled, I ment with the intitial volume of air, not refilling them, of course Yes, the volume gets down with depth, but you can keep it under pressure at reduced volume too. If you can't, it means you need a refill anyway.