Seven is the new six

The last couple of weeks I had little change to train dynamic. So last thursday I went for the final two hour static training session of the year. Of the usual crowd only Jouke was there but Mark and Nanja came over from Haarlem to Zeist to train with us. Since it's chrismas holidays the hot-pool (31-33C) was available for us which is in great contrast with the -8C outside.



After the last competition of four weeks ago I stopped going for max attempts. What I did instead is trying to avoid any form of hyperventilating to make the training extra hard and to avoid constantly having my current best times in mind. I do slow tidal volume breathing for a few minutes and then 80% inhale, exhale close to residual volume and full inhale with packing. At first this gave me contractions at about 2'30'' and now just after 3'00''. My goal here is to improve my first and second attempt this way. The last few weeks my bests were just over 5'00'' on the 1st attempt and just over 6'00'' on the 2nd. These holds are not hard, just long - exactly what I want to be training for. Doing dry empty lung static with my oximeter made it very clear that SpO2% on the first atempt with this breathing was much much better then the holds with hyperventilating! So I just need to get used to some discomfort now!

I continued with a few empty lung statics. Some time ago I managed 3'35'' but lately 2'20'' seemed to be the best I could do. (not bad at all but a whole lot less then before) On monday I managed 2'35'' (dry training) after one month of hard cardio training so I was quite happy with that! Today went even better and with the 2'51'' I hope to reach the 3 minutes mark soon again. I'm still unsure about the result of cardio training for my freediving performances, but now is the best time for it. At least it will prepare me for fitness in apnea that I have planned in a few weeks.

BTW pool temperatures over 30C are not my cup a tea. it took me a good 30 minutes to have the suit configuration that kept me warm enough but not too warm.

Ten minutes before closing time I noticed I was not happy with the 'max' holds so I did a kind of end-of-year present static with hyperventilation (deep breathing from 2 minutes to 1 minute before official top). The hold itself I wanted to abort a few times so clearly not a top time (for me). Still did 7'12'' with an easy surface protocol. One year ago a training with a 6+ hold felt like a good training but this has changed...

Seven is the new six!