weight training for freediving and spearfishing

[seaman]

I guess this is not new, but i will go ahead nevertheless: I am really improving my apnea time doing my weight reps in a slow motion also in apnea!! you will get a heart pounding but it really worths it. Weight training must fit the type of activity. In martial arts training :martial you also hold your breath and do fast and controled reps (traditionaly is called Mushimi), so when you need to hit hard and fast, your fast twitch muscles fibers are trained to do so in an efficient way. That process is called non lactic anaerobia, which mean very low oxigen is involved. That is exactly the focus when freediving and spearfishing. I have lots of friends running a lot miles and miles on a daily basis and they have little or no effect in improving their apnea time. What i do is to run and from time to time ( each 10 minutes, for 6 times at least) hold my breath and make a sudden and short sprint of 20 to 30 yards, then i slow down the pace to slower the heart rate. This training is really succesfull to me, better than just runs for miles and swim a lot.. i hope it would be useful ..

( this training method also improves your speargun cockin' ability

 

[ElCid07]

What type of excercises do you do with weights? I'm one of those who swims and does dive brick excercises along with some running and regular military PT, but never tried weights to help w/ apnea.

 

[seaman]

all your all around classics like 10x4 reps of bench press, pullover and sit ups. Being the sit ups the better excercise for apnea training. your type of weight training must match your kind of activity, otherwise you are training for something different

 

[pelagicbeing]

all your all around classics like 10x4 reps of bench press, pullover and sit ups. Being the sit ups the better excercise for apnea training. your type of weight training must match your kind of activity, otherwise you are training for something different

Hi, i know this is an old thread but does anyone know if in performing Sit ups + leg extensions etc in apnea you are at risk of getting a Hernia?

thanks

pelagicbeing

 

[gman]

I don't know a whole lot about freediving or diving specific exercises, but I do know about exercise and fitness in general. I know that you do not want to hold your breath while doing full body exercises like squats, deadlifts, overhead presses and the like. You can probably get by just fine with single joint exercises like bicep curl, and tricep extensions. You might be able to do light pull downs. Bodyweight single leg lunges would probably be okay too.
Probably doing leg raises will put too much pressure on you but flutter kicks would be good. Leg extensions and curls would brobably be fine too. Lying on your stomach doing leg curls might also afford a simulation of some pressure on your chest like you would feel at modest depths.