Vertical Blue 2008

[jome]

Congratulations Will, that is one impressive dive! Sounds like when you get it right, there's no stopping you. What's the problem in Egypt? Salt? Indeed blood pressure is "everything", or at least more important that a lot of people (even quite advanced divers) give it credit for.

And congrats to Eric as well, very impressive! Did you equalize with standard mouthfill or let your sinuses flood or something?

Dave's experiences sound just scary to me. Narcosis must be pretty damn severe. Sounds too close to the horror stories from Eric's deepest dives. Are you still diving with max co2? Max packing? Have enough air for equalization? From the dive time it sounds like you don't need all that air hypoxia wise, so if eq is not the problem, maybe go with a little less air? What's the depth where you can dive without narcosis being a big problem (such as missing the tag, forgetting to kick up etc)?

Can't wait for todays update

 

[Mullins]

Yes, max packing and taking a fair bit of CO2 with me. The narcosis wasn't all that bad on the 111m dive, I just made a mistake and the narcosis probably contributed. I had planned to do a shallow training dive and even broke streamline at 70m to turn, but ended up drifting all the way to the bottom thinking 'just a few more m and I'll turn'. I shouldn't have dived at all, too tired and too cold. Also hadn't eaten enough. The narcosis came on strong on the way up. At about 50m it combined with fatigue and suddenly I could hardly move. The graph looks pretty ugly, I can ask Will to post it if anybody is interested. You can clearly see where I break streamline on the descent, and where I lose power on the way up.

That was the first time narcosis caused a problem for me here in the blue hole. I was lucid at the bottom on my 108m dive.

 

[laminar]

Natalia - turned early.
Winram - turned early.
Eric - 62m clean no tag (as planned)...
Tomoko - DQ because coach touched her after official top. Very clean dive, though. She seemed happy with it.
Leo - nice clean dive to 69m in FIM.
Ryuzo - 99.9m messed up his mouth fill, looked VERY strong at the surface.
Kathryn - 50m, surface black out. Might have held on with a good surface recovery and hook breath.

Natalia may try again tomorrow. I hope she does, aside from a sticky ear today, she looked very strong.

Winram may also try again as he turned at 60m - ish, today.

We'll see the announcements in a few hours.

Pete

 

[Fondueset]

Bet Eric does 70 Certainly 68.

 

[trux]

Eric - 62m clean no tag (as planned)...

Was it FRC DNF feet first as he announced? Any video or photos available? And BTW, does he also ascend feet first? (the last question is just a joke but he should consider it anyway!)

 

[efattah]

What's the deepest unofficial FRC CWT dive? Murat I presume?

Murat had done 60m FRC with fins and 57m FRC with no fins. Maybe deeper, but that's what I know.

 

[azapa]

Was it FRC DNF feet first as he announced? Any video or photos available? And BTW, does he also ascend feet first? (the last question is just a joke but he should consider it anyway!)

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1zSxZK2Shzk]YouTube - Vertical Blue 2008[/ame]

 

[Kars]

Too bad Eric does not have much angle on his monofin, He could have more speed down, and maintain better technique on his way up.

Personally I find FRC a bit of a spacious in describing how much air one takes down.
'Functional' can take meaning of a range of volume of air, depending on the perception of the user.
I will test it tomorrow, but without suit I can take full lungs, without packing, and be negative from 5m downwards. Without suit that would mean I would just need to have a good duckdive, and one good stroke to fall the rest of the way down.
I think I'll try some no suit diving this summer in the Meditaranian spain to see if I can adapt and relax enough.

Keep the updates comming it a great event!

Kars

 

[jump]

Any info about Dave Mullins today's dive?

 

[Fondueset]

I think we're into the 'sordid party-phase' now. It'll be months before anyones willing to talk...

 

[ADR]

What happened with Dave's dive? There are results for all the others listed as diving on Day 6, but Dave's result is missing.

 

[laminar]

Dave decided not to dive today. Feeling tired and also the officials wanted to go over what to do (with him) if he is delayed at the bottom. After the competition, Dave did a few shallower dives and I believe he did one with the counter balance released, not sure though, but that was the plan.

Natalia, turned early on her dive because of a sticky ear. She has done 65m CNF in training but this is her first WR attempt ever.

Eric was telling me how with these dives he's making, it's the descent that becomes very challenging, the pressure, the exacting mouthfill he needs, and the psychological impact of sinking for so long. He has announced 67m for tomorrow. He'll be sinking from 3m and so that it equivalent to the sinking phase on his 88m dive, more or less.

While his depths are not quantitatively as deep as everyone else, the psychological effect is equivalent, at least, plus the fact that no one has gone this deep before on FRC.

Kars, while you are correct that FRC is not clearly defined, for those who use it, I think it's pretty clear what the difference is, physiologically and psychologically on a deep dive.

Tomorrow, Ryuzo going for 101m WR, Dave 113m, Natalia 57m WR, Eric 67m, Tomoko, redoing her 54m dive, and I forget the rest. The schedule hasn't been officially posted yet.

Pete

 

[efattah]

Dave skipped his dive today; he said his legs were still tired from the 111m. He will try again tomorrow for 113m, along with Ryuzo 101m, Kathryn 48m, and more.

Answering Kars' question, I dive at about 1L over FRC. My FRC volume is 3.25L, so I dive with about 4.25L. I can get 8L without packing. When I reach the surface, I'm able to inhale and hold a hook breath, without first exhaling. I hold that breath for about 8 seconds prior to doing the surface protocol.

Taking a full breath without a suit, and sinking from 5m, is not the same for many reasons. The buoyancy change is much greater, and the lung squeeze is less, and the narcosis more. Plus you have to exhale before you can inhale on the surface.

In my case, my sinking speed is fixed at 1.0 m/s from 15m to the bottom.

On the 62m dive, my mouthfill at 15m was so enormous that I had to 'cheek' equalize down to 55m before I was able to switch to the frenzel with the air in my mouth. When the mouth is too full, frenzel is impossible. At the bottom I had so much air in my mouth I was certain I could have equalized to 100m, just as my calculations had previously shown. This is all made possible by a residual volume that has shrunk over the last 3 years of FRC diving, allowing an enormous mouthfill at 15-18m despite starting with 4.2L. According to some calculations I made, my residual volume should be about 1.0L.

What I would like to add most is that these dives have been tremendously stressful psychologically. Even if some math can predict your depth, doing it in reality is completely different, especially if you have not done it before, and especially if no one has done it before. It is hard enough to set a new pb; try adding 4m or 5m to your pb, and doing that pb in a competition, and doing it every day -- day after day. Each dive I think to myself, 'I can't possibly make this depth without hardly any air in my lungs.' And then there is the stress of getting into the water without a suit, without any goggles or nose clip, and getting water in my nose on the ascent -- all which drastically improve the dive reflex but make the dive far more scary and daunting. And yet so far it seems to keep working.

It has been wiping me out, especially since I arrived super stressed and exhausted from overwork and months of sickness. So for me, just getting in the water and doing some sort of dive already makes me feel like I have accomplished something.

I hope to get into shape later in the year, and hopefully post some depths closer to the existing record in October or November.

 

[watts]

What a comp it just keeps coming congrats Will T great dive mate.
Eric why the extra litre on frc? Just for equalizing? Why the xhale warmups wouldnt they be counter productive to a strong and lasting dive response? Do you know what your RV was when you were a packer.:t Great dives mate id say alot of people are just as interested in your Frc progess in this comp than the packers at the front.

Nat

 

[glennv]

All congrats on your great dives. Especialy Will with his well earned WR and Eric with his very interesting developments in the FRC camp.
Eric , the more info you keep feeding us the better. Great stuff and please be careful in you progress. Immense respect for what you are doing.

 

[laminar]

Quick Update:

Ryuzo - new NR 101m, tired legs
Eric - 67m, clean
Tomoko - 54m clean
Dave M -109m, turned early b/c equalizing, tired, but very clean at the surface, much less narcosis
Karol - 35m cnf, BO at 17m, unfortunately
Will T - 92m, FIM, also said he was feeling tired before the dive
Natalia - couldn't equalize below 4m so didn't dive

Hope I didn't forget anyone...

Seems like people are getting tired out now....

Pete

 

[BennyB]

Wow - certainly seems like fatigue is setting in. I hope Karol is ok - a BO at 17m on a 35m dive, for a pretty solid freediver seems pretty concerning.


Seems like a different comp now, I hope everyone can keep the motivation up.

Cheers,
Ben

ps. and massive congrats to Eric, well done!

 

[Goran Colak]

Karol - 35m cnf, BO at 17m, unfortunately

Yes that's some strange BO, what happened?

 

[azapa]

Karol's BO: She was really up after her last clean dive and decided to have on more on the day she departed, we were all up too late last night at the BBQ, (great BTW). She packed a lot and took about 14 strokes to freefall. It was all too much and when she saw a friendly face at 17M (frank) she more or less relaxed into the BO. Frank and Leo brought her up quick and she was fine.

 

[ADR]

Thanks for the update Pete, I've been on the edge of my chair wondering what would happen next. As far as day 6 went:

Stoked for Ryuzo with his 101m dive - awesome

Congrats to Eric, who seems to be getting his head around a monster freefall

All the best to Dave over the coming days as he goes deeper

And good luck to the other divers as well