Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Chaos

It's been a while... I was not really in the mood for writing. Was having a rough time with personal stuff but things seem to have settled down enough to aim for some good freedive performances again.


The last couple of weeks I have been freediving outdoor about once or twice a week and mostly on FRC. During one week I also participated in a drywalk experiment of a fellow freediver - I will write some more about that later. But I (and about 10 other freedivers) had to do drywalk practices. As people that know me know, I am more a 'want to' than a 'had to' kind of guy. Never been any good at 'had to' actually. Come to think of it, practicing enjoying 'had to' moments would be a valuable live lesson for me. More on that later too - I fear.

Anyway, for the last month I've been taking garlic pills again to try to lower my heartbeat and iron pills to get as much heamaglobine out of the FRC and empty lungs training as I know how to. Last week I did an 'easy' 3 minutes RV (residual volume, i.e. empty lungs) static in the pool, which surprised me. I have neglected my CO2 tolerance training a bit and I am not as comfortable with CO2 as a few months ago so the no-warmups did not improve. Today, at the 3rd hold, I did a dry 5:07 FRC static. :-) (mental note to myself: 'don't use smileys when blogging!') SpO2% only down to 70%, crazy!

Heartrate at rest was very low, I think as low as 42 BPM so about 10 less than a few months ago. It was in the lower sixties a few years back when I started freediving.

Tonight in the pool I will have a go at a 7+ static with full lungs. Hopefully I remember how to pack.

In 10 days we will have a small non-aida-ranking dynamics competition in Haarlem. I have not been practicing with my monofin very often lately so that will be like training for me.

Sorry for the discursive post. I suppose it shows the mental state I am in at the moment...

6 comments:

  1. Wow, great training results! Let us know about the 7+ tonight. good luck

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  2. Hi Jorg,

    On my 1st hold tonight I did 5:18 and on the 2nd one I did 7:30.

    I think this is about what is needed to get into the finals of the World Championship.

    If it keeps going this well I suppose I should test myself some day soon and see if I can better my personal best a little.

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  3. Great result! And indeed at a world champion level.
    Why did you stop at 5:18? Was it preplanned or couldn't you hold any longer?

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  4. I always start my first hold with the intention of doing a semi-max performance but during that initial hold something happens that stops the voice that keeps telling nice things to me. I used to need a few more holds to be able to do them with a smile on my face. Now it seems I can do well on the 2nd hold. Hold 1 went similar to hold 2, apart from the inner-voice.

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  5. Hey Eric, i came first in my comp. I'll contact you on email and do put some info up on my blog! Very happy.

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  6. Hi Chris,

    I am stunned and very happy for you.

    cheers

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