Tandem dynamic (new discipline)

[wes]

OK don't laugh becuase my wife and I already tried this at the pool today and it rocks.

Its called Tandem Dynamic and here are the rules:

- Two people (guys and girls, guys and guys or girls and girls).
- Both people must submerge their airways at one end before either pushes off the wall.
- Final score is given to both people from the max distance swum by either.
- One person can come up early (and should safety the other person!!)

So we breathed up a bit on our second attempt and pushed off. My wife glided superman style in front and I pushed her by holding her waist and tucked in with my chest above her lower legs. While my wife rested and relaxed, I monofinned us both 2 lengths (2 x 25m) and came up and my wife did one more 25m length and a turn for a total of 80m. My wife says its cool because "we could go farther together than we could separate - wonder twin powers". I think its cool as it simulates for the rider a deep dive with a sink faze and then a swim faze, plus its really fun. Please let me know what you think and/or give it a try!!

P.S. the official Deeper Blue you post it, you own it, world records follow:

Girls and Guys Tandem Dynamic: 80 meters
Wes Lapp and Nancy Napp, Hood River Aquatic Center, 20 Dec 2006.

Guys and Guys Tandem Dynamic: Open

Girls and Girls Tandem Dynamic: Open

Cheers and happy Holidays - Wes

 

[wes]

Ok, I am replying to my own post. I don't know if that's allowed.
I would like some feedback on the tandem dynamic idea. Is it baked?, stupid, intriguing, exciting, let me know please what you think!! Cheers Wes

 

[nostres]

No Man! It's not stupid at all, no laughs. It sounds good!

I will try it next week, I am going to the pool either tuesday or wednesday but my partner can't make it. Can I go with Your wife?

 

[freedivinmike]

I have tried something similar that you can get really long dynamic distances with. In our case one person breaths through a snorkel and uses fins to swim along the surface directly over their partner pushing them by their shoulders. The person underwater closes their eyes and is basically doing a static and you are providing all the energy. Be sure to still use signals with each other just as you would doing statics. This is a combination static/dynamic event which is loads of fun to do and you wont believe some of the distances you can achieve. If you have 4 people you can actually have 50 meter, 75 meter or 100 meter races 2 against 2. Just some ideas to take the boredom out of training. Any other ideas out there?

 

[maytag]

Hey Wes,
That makes sense and it sounds cool. I don't quite get tandem no-limits, but this makes sense! The only question i have is whether it might be safer to have a 3rd or 4th person safety - after dynamics, the first person up might be too tired(?) to be able to respond to an emergency (?)

Cheers to you,

 

[wes]

Maytag,

Yeah I have been thinking about the saftey aspects of it too. I think you could do it safely with only two people as follows in a 25 meter pool:
Person A pushes person B who rests for say 3 length or 75 meters. Person A stops and does recovery breathing just before Person B gets to the wall on the final (second) turn. Person B turns at the wall and pushes off back toward person A. Person A has now done recovery breathing and escorts Person B via swimming while breathing on the surface thru the rest of thier dynamic. Person B must turn sideways and look to make sure person A has recovered and is escorting them. If Person B does not see person A escorting them then Person B stops and helps person A. Note that person B would be pretty fresh at this point as they would have only been doing a static for 60 or 90 seconds. Does this seem like a reasonable safety protocol? For my wife who can do 4 min plus static this seems pretty safe as I don't normally tap her until 2 min anyway. Thanks for the feedback and Cheers - Wes