Ready to expand on my training routine

[anthropisces]

All of my pool or other training which involves breath-hold is done with a buddy.

A year ago I asked for some help with a pool training routine to help me as a hunter. The title of that thread was "help me to hunt at 100 feet". At that time I was comfortably hunting in 65-70 feet with occasional forays down to hunt at 80 feet. For the record I am not only interested in spearing, I also want to become a better freediver in general.


The folks here on Deeper Blue felt that a goal of hunting all day at 100 feet was too ambitious. Here in the forums some experienced members helped me to develop a pool training routine. I ended up modifying it so that it consisted of 8-sets of 75 meter swims (I have yet to bring any of these to the 100m mark). This routine fit my abilities and the amount of time I have to devote.

I did this for about 6 months at the end of which I noticed that my deeper dives in the ocean were more comfortable.

At about the 6 month level a more skilled apneist joined us in the pool and I observed some new techniques. Rather than doing sets of maximums, we did lots of things that put us and kept us in the high CO2 zone. These sessions last about an hour to an hour and a half. We mix it up from time to time with the 8-sets of 75 meters (people hate it when I suggest we do them because they can be tough).

The pool training is done once or twice a week depending on whether a day of spearing in the ocean occurs on the weekend. I am now more comfortable in 80 feet with occasional forays into 90 feet.

I plan to try to take my 8 sets up from 75 meters up to 100 meters each. I squeeze in an 85 meter now and then. Going for the full 100 meters is a daunting mental and physical challenge. I am not writing here to ask you to help me reach that goal (although I do welcome such advice).

What I am asking for now is something completely new that I can add to my training either in the pool, on land or in the ocean to bring me to a new level. I do a bit of land based training; I just did an iholdbreath O2 session that ended with 2 sets at 3 minutes 25 seconds, and I do a stretching routine after each pool session. More land-based training is not of great interest to me though.

Please suggest a new aspect that I can add to my training so that I may advance in terms of breath-hold (I am separately working to enhance my equalizing capabilities). Perhaps you will suggest frc training for me.

Once we identify some new training I would be grateful if you could help me design a routine.

Much thanks
Anthropisces

 

[onebreath280]

I have a very similar routine to your old routine I do sets of 75 yd usually 10 sets. I am interested in what other exercises you do now? I also do what I call dynamic Co2 and O2 tables which is just that, the tables while swimming, a freedive watch (computer) helps worlds with this as I just set the alarms and swim instead of having to watch the clock the whole time. I also found breaking the 100yd mark very challenging but had a chance to swim in a 100 yard pool and did 120 yards prety easily, not having to turn makes such a huge diference.

 

[Bussard]

What kind of things do you do to train in the Co2 zone?

Sets of maximums are how I used to train as well, progress was there, but very slow. The worst part was dealing with the disappointment in how slow I was progressing, which led me down some fruitless avenues in training theory.

I started training more to focus on what I was struggling with, mostly Co2 build-up and learning to come to grips with DR.

I rarely do maximum swims now. Every 3 months or so max. They become easier for me that way. I also take time out of the pool, a month or 6 weeks away helps me 'normalize' after weeks & months of training.

 

[Kars]

Exhale Dynamic, exhale everything, let yourself sink down, do a little static until contraction and then start swimming. The difficulty races up, but after 25m it stays level and then it becomes unnervingly easy. Plus your head feels really crystal clear when you come up, and recovery feels very fast. However make sure you have your buddy ready, because on exhale the line between great and BO is really thin.

Another thing, the crazy static.
Exhale fully, hold until you need to breath, inhale 1 mouth of air and go under again until the next need for O2, inhale another mouth fill, and repeat until your lungs are full and you cannot hold any more - do not exhale during this crazy table.

ps doing 75m repeats is rather nice! (16x50 used to be easy for me because it's within my aerobic range, but 75's are a whole lot tougher for me, as I suck at dynamics).

 

[Tony Babowicz]

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecvo-8kKXmg"]Teemu Nurmi under the ice unashamed. - YouTube[/ame]



Add this exercise to your routine. Choose your buddy wisely.:t

 

[cdavis]

Further, more specific training of your dive reflex can make it stronger and come on quicker. The result is being able to dive deeper and longer. What Kars suggests will do that.

the crazy static works well on DR, but is agony for someone with poor c02 tolerance. EricF first proposed this and I tried it. Works, but too tough for me.

Learning to dive FRC will also improve DR immensely , although it takes a while to get your depth back. The nice thing about diving FRC( around 1/2 lung) is that it forces you into good technique. You have to slow down and relax, or it doesn't work. If you go that route, improving chest flexibility with diaphragm and intercostal stretches(both are important) will get you back to 100, quicker.

Connor

 

[Simos]

Further, more specific training of your dive reflex can make it stronger and come on quicker. The result is being able to dive deeper and longer. What Kars suggests will do that.

the crazy static works well on DR, but is agony for someone with poor c02 tolerance. EricF first proposed this and I tried it. Works, but too tough for me.

Learning to dive FRC will also improve DR immensely , although it takes a while to get your depth back. The nice thing about diving FRC( around 1/2 lung) is that it forces you into good technique. You have to slow down and relax, or it doesn't work. If you go that route, improving chest flexibility with diaphragm and intercostal stretches(both are important) will get you back to 100, quicker.

Connor

I used to do some 'crazy statics' some time ago and I am not too sure that it needs a huge amount of CO2 tolerance Connor - if you think about it I don't think it's much different than a normal static in terms of CO2 but it is different in that you spend a lot more time being hypoxic than a normal static in which you have to wait ages before you get to any meaningful drop of O2 and then when it drops you can't do anything to stop it from dropping!

There was a thread I started about it somewhere, will see if I can dig it out if anyone's interested.

EDIT: found the link: http://forums.deeperblue.com/static-dynamic/90706-odd-static-training-exercise.html

 

[Kars]

Thank you to everyone here, the post just gave me the idea to try a 'crazy dynamic'.
I think of exhale, swim 25, inhale 1 mouth swim 25, etc. Though I reckon that would be really hard, so I better try the width of the pool (12,5m) first.
My goal is to teach my body to go vascular constricted early, perform well anaerobe.

 

[cdavis]

Simos,its both. Without the lung volume to unload C02 into and no DR, C02 builds up fast in the core, which kicks off DR, but too late for me. Inhaling a little bit at a time after that, not enough to release the blood shift, but enough to keep you conscious, allows a long time with a strong DR and hypoxic conditions. The theory is impecable, its the carrying it out that gets me.

The real trick is to get your DR to kick in reasonably strong before it gets uncomfortable. FRC, when I do it right, is perfect for me for that.

 

[Simos]

Simos,its both. Without the lung volume to unload C02 into and no DR, C02 builds up fast in the core, which kicks off DR, but too late for me. Inhaling a little bit at a time after that, not enough to release the blood shift, but enough to keep you conscious, allows a long time with a strong DR and hypoxic conditions. The theory is impecable, its the carrying it out that gets me.

The real trick is to get your DR to kick in reasonably strong before it gets uncomfortable. FRC, when I do it right, is perfect for me for that.

It's true that you don't have the lung volume initially so CO2 will start building faster but during the hold you are adding back the lung volume so I would expect CO2 to start moving to the lungs so CO2 shouldn't continue rising beyond what it would in a normal static right?

Same as hypoxia, I don't see a reason why one would drop to lower O2 levels than a similar length normal hold during this exercise but you'd have to hold on for longer at low O2.

I guess it all depends by what you meant by high CO2 tolerance - I take it to mean 'ability to withstand very high CO2 levels' as opposed to 'ability to hold raised CO2 levels for a prolonged period' (if that makes sense?)

Also it really depends on how long you wait before starting to take air in - if it's too hard you can just taking air in a bit earlier and adjust the difficulty/progress that way.

 

[Bussard]

The Co2 seems to build up very rapidly, likely due to the small lung volume. Upon inhales it abates, like it is being diluted by the intake of air. The rise back seems more rapid to me too though, I guess the C02 has a head start, and so rapidly builds back up to levels of discomfort.

 

[Kars]

The Co2 seems to build up very rapidly, likely due to the small lung volume. Upon inhales it abates, like it is being diluted by the intake of air. The rise back seems more rapid to me too though, I guess the C02 has a head start, and so rapidly builds back up to levels of discomfort.

I never said the crazy table was easy

I think its a very efficient way of training hypoxia, there is a lot of quality time - time spend in the low O2 numbers.

 

[growingupninja]

Thank you to everyone here, the post just gave me the idea to try a 'crazy dynamic'.
I think of exhale, swim 25, inhale 1 mouth swim 25, etc. Though I reckon that would be really hard, so I better try the width of the pool (12,5m) first.
My goal is to teach my body to go vascular constricted early, perform well anaerobe.

Hmm, I would be careful with this one. I guess it depends on the amount of exhale, whether it was FRC or max exhale, and what kind of deficit a 25M swim creates for you.

I didn't test extensively but I remember I did once a series of max exhale dynamics dry, with an O2 sat meter and I just stayed very hypoxic the entire time... The exercise I was doing was basically max exhale, leg lifts till O2 sat got to 80% on the meter, then 1 inhale followed by immediate max exhale and begin again. My O2 never really recovered and I aborted after not may reps but sort of made a mental note of an interesting dynamic exercise that could put you at very low O2 and hold you there for an extended period. Although swimming a 25 for me (and probably you) would have been much less time/work than the leglifts I was doing, so on a 25M swim I would probably still end up in the mid/high 90's as far as O2.

I know from very extensive tests I've done on myself that if while doing that set I'd held that one breath at the top for some seconds (basically a hook breath), my O2 would have started to recover, and even if I'd done the exhale set, taken a big inhale and just held it but continued the exercise holding on that single full lung, my O2 sat would reach 98%-99% or at least mid nineties somewhere during the hold, although since I'd be starting from a deficit it would drop off again much faster than usual for me....

 

[Kars]

Sure Ninja I'll be careful in my exploration, have a gradual build up. 90%saO2 does not worry me too much, actually it's my goal to be below that number for an extended amount of dives, in order to teach my muscles to start working quicker, and better anaerobically.

Like you've discovered, your muscles need more time to saturate after such extended time of desaturation. I'm ok with that. I'll plan this exercise at the end of the dive-session. Thanks!