Question - how long can you hold your breath for?

[Verdant]

I asked on another thread how long a person can expect to hold their breath, and the answer was that it basically depends on various factors & the individual themselves.

So out of interest I want to hear from experienced spearos - how long you can hold your breath for on a typical dive?

 

[J Campbell]

Typical real world dive for me is 1 to 1/ 1/2 minutes.

 

[Andrew the fish]

below is the abstract from studies on ama. Very much in line with J Campbell's comment above, and my own observations.

itle:	[abstract] DIVING CHARACTERISTICS OF BREATH-HOLD DIVERS IN JAPAN
Author:	Mohri, M; Shiraki, K; Hong, SK
Abstract:	BACKGROUND: The breath-hold divers made 63.6percent of all diving fishing divers. Male diver was 12,264 and female was 3,037. This is a report that daily diving pattern recorded during the entire work shift in the breath-hold divers (cachido and funadoamas) in Japan. METHODS: This study was conducted in 1989 at Matsuwa, in 1990 at Shiramazu, in 1993 on Hegura Island. In present studies, all amas volunteered. The subjects came to the field laboratory situated by the seashore at 0900h. This dive data logger recorded every 1.0 - 1.6 s the depth of an individual dive, thoracic skin and sea water temperature for up to 8 h. The subjects were 8 cachido amas who wore wet suits and swim fins, and 13 funado amas. 9 funado amas at Shiramazu did not wear wet suits and fins. RESULTS: Both cachido and funado had two shifts a day. Total time in water of both amas was 201 - 305 min per day. The ama made 26 - 118 dives per day, to an average depth of 6.9 - 16.8 m, each average single dive time lasting 37.0 - 68.5 s. The average bottom time was 23.6 s for the Hegura funado ama, 45.0 s for the Shiramazu funado ama and 19.4 s for Hegura cachido ama, 18.3 s for the Matsuwa cachido ama. Although the depth and number of dives per day were possible to develop decompression sickness, it did not occur in ama. CONCLUSION: We may assume that a relatively short duration of the shift in Japanese ama in responsible factor for a lack of decompression sickness, because Japanese ama dived for less than 3 h during one shift.

 

[cdavis]

That is a LOT! of dives, even if they are short.

Typical real world dive in good conditions: 50-70 ft, 1:30 - 1:50, less if there is current or crummy vis..