The mistake I made back then was to believe that being tolerant to CO2 meant being able to tolerate and endure the contractions caused by its increase… This is a common mistake in freediving that we will try to debunk here.

Let’s get outside of the freediving frame:

Let’s imagine that you have a lactose-intolerant friend who, when he drinks milk, has nausea and uncontrollable spasms.

Then, imagine that this friend explains to you that he wishes to increase his tolerance to lactose. He explains to you that he regularly forces himself to drink several glasses of milk and that thanks to this regular practice, he is more and more comfortable with nausea and spasms induced by lactose ingestion.

I hope we agree to say that this situation is absurd!

If the goal is to improve lactose tolerance, the result must be the ABSENCE of spasms and nausea when ingesting milk.

To return to apnea.

When we have a contraction, our body expresses a rejection. We tend to minimize a contraction but let’s be clear, it doesn’t matter if it’s a “small” one or if we manage to stay calm in its presence, it is anyway an uncontrolled movement of your body, an alert of your nervous system that something is wrong. You are no longer in control of yourself (and let’s be honest, we are not talking about an orgasm !). Being able to get used to it can certainly allow you to get a short-term result, but it is not a sustainable way to progress for most of us!

Freediving training

Generally speaking, the purpose of freediving training should be neurological desensitization to the stimulation that will be induced by your goal (CO2 in this case, but there are obviously other components in a performance). It is the very principle of adaptation. Once the training phase is over, we can enter a performance phase (much shorter) during which, if you wish (but it is not a requirement with a good periodization and a long term vision of your training) you will be able to sacrifice a little bit the quality of your dives to get a result. Nevertheless, these “performance” dives can only constitute a small fraction of your dives at the end of your training cycle.

How to improve your CO2 tolerance in freediving?

If you want to increase your CO2 tolerance, the first thing to do is eliminate stress-related contractions. I recommend that you repeat dives at 50% of your maximum with complete recovery until you consistently have zero contractions. 

Then you must build your training to try to expose yourself as often as possible to the period that PRECEDES the arrival of a contraction while remaining in perfect control and mastery of yourself:

If it is truly CO2-related, a contraction does not come on its own; you should feel heat and tightness in the chest before it arrives. This “pre contraction” feeling is the ideal training zone to increase CO2 tolerance. While in this zone, keep your composure and focus: use them to ensure that the dive experience remains positive. By injecting a small dose of CO2 (stimulation) into a general comfort level, you will be able to progressively reprogram your nervous system and delay the uncontrolled response to an increased CO2 (contraction).

Conclusion :

I hope this article has given you the tools to think about your training better. Wanting to learn to “suck it” to progress may seem tempting for some, but as in all sports, this mentality is mostly proof of impatience associated with intellectual laziness. It will only limit you from realizing your potential. The difference between freediving and other sports is that it is difficult to get badly injured in freediving. Therefore, it is possible to be in permanent over-training: Mood swings, irritability, squeeze, equalization issues, insufficient sleep, anxiety before a session, lack of motivation for training… Take care of yourself and do not ignore those signs; your training is probably too intense.

The article CO2 tolerance and contractions appeared first on Gaspard Freediving.

It is based on the idea that the glottis remains closed by itself past a certain pressure difference level, and we do not need to generate any kind of tension to “hold” the mouthfill.

For those who wish to know more about the logic and theory behind the exercise, I recommend this article :
Mouthfill : Open / Closed ? What is the natural position of the glottis?

General principle :

The exercise aims to minimize the tensions in the glottis, the oral cavity, and the face while holding a mouthfill at depth. The principle here is not to perform but to OBSERVE. Observe what? To observe the minimal amount of energy needed to hold your mouthfill. You will therefore perform several dives with neutral lungs (possibly empty for the more advanced), during which you will observe and test your glottis. To do this, try to take into account the following principles:

1. Keep the line at a “very-easy” depth: The goal is to have 100% of your attention to observe what is happening in your mouth/glottis without worrying about performance. If you are used to diving at 30m in FRC, I recommend setting the line at 20/22m maximum.

2. “Let it leak”: “Let it leak”: as it is not a question of performance but observation, do not hesitate to release the whole of your oral cavity. You will see what happens; worst-case scenario, it will leak. So what? The exercise aims to redefine the level of tension that you feel necessary to keep the mouthfill, and only an exploration attitude can help you.
   
3. The most important is the time “between” equalizations. The deeper you go, the less frequently you will need to equalize, and the longer the time between equalizations will be. Subsequently, do not hesitate to make a slow dive that will allow you to artificially increase this “non-equalizing” time and focus your attention on this part. Concentrate on relaxing your tongue, jaw, cheeks, and face… It is normal to generate a little bit of tension during an equalization to compress the air; you must make all forms of action disappear between two equalizations.
   
4. Forget about “constant pressure.” If you are normally using this strategy, put aside your habits and adopt (at least for this exercise) a sequential pressure to minimize tensions (see point 3).
   
5. Take a comfortable mouthfill of about ⅔ of your maximum capacity. By maximizing comfort, you will increase your attention level where it matters and be better able to extract the benefits of this exercise.

Conclusion

You have now redefined the level of passivity, of relaxation that your mouthfill requires. You still need tYou have now redefined the level of passivity, of relaxation that your mouthfill requires. You most likely still need training and repetition at easy depth to make it “auto-pilot.” but I hope it will improve the quality of your diving experience and, subsequently, your results.

The article Mouthfill : Make peace with your glottis appeared first on Gaspard Freediving.

I always thought the glottis neutral/natural position was “open”. Like many freedivers, when I encountered leaking mouthfill issues, I assumed that one of the causes was that my glottis was not “strong” enough and had to train it specifically.

However, two years ago, I encountered something strange and counter-intuitive about my glottis. It seemed that on a dry exhale breath-hold, my glottis was remaining closed by itself (without me “keeping” it closed).

After several “tests” on myself, I realized that the glottis was also staying closed on full lung breath-hold. On the opposite, on Neutral lungs (FRC), the natural position of my glottis was “open”.

Let’s play

Before going further, let me detail precisely how you can test it on yourself.

• First, you need excellent glottis awareness. To develop it, you can “cough” very gently multiple times. Playing with the “door” will help you better understand it.
• Then, make a forced exhale (it doesn’t have to be RV, anything below FRC should work). Close your glottis, relax your abdominal muscles, relax your tongue and eliminate ALL the tensions. DO NOT TRY TO HOLD YOUR BREATH; just see what happens with your glottis when you do “nothing” and when you are entirely passive.
• You can do the same with FRC and on full lungs.
• Just to be a bit more precise about Full lung and empty lungs tests: I feel that if I do absolutely nothing, the glottis remains closed, and the breath “HOLD” requires zero energy. However, if I produce a tiny bit of energy to re-open it, the air starts to flow in/out, and the glottis stays open.

Experts opinions

To make sure that my “feeling” of the glottis remaining closed on empty/full lungs was not just me being crazy or having a weird body, I selected three freedivers to replicate the experiment :

Nathan Vinski: Nathan is a good friend, we shared many ideas about freediving, and he is the most knowledgeable person I know about the sport. When I asked him to experiment on himself, he didn’t confirm my hypothesis at the moment. However, a few days later (he kept playing with it independently), he agreed with my observations.

Claire Walsh: Claire is the female Irish national record in multiple depth discipline. I asked her to be a guinea pig for the experience because she also happens to be a professional singer. For sure, she would have a better glottis awareness than me! I had a bit of trouble accurately explaining the “experiment” (it was on video conference call during the first covid wave), but once we were on the same page, she also felt her glottis remained closed on exhale and full-lung. I asked her a percentage of confidence, and she was 100% confident.

Max Gardien: I did an equalization workshop with Max, and this guy is a machine in terms of equalization “raw” skills (dry exercises) and, of course, in the water. The same as Claire, I knew he would be a great help for his glottis awareness. After a few tries and observations on himself, he arrived at the same degree of confidence as Claire: The glottis was remaining closed by itself on full and empty lungs, and he was 100% sure of it.

Interpretation :

My interpretation of those observations is that the main factor is the pressure differences between the lungs and ambient (not necessarily the absolute lung volume).

I base this interpretation on another experimentation you can easily replicate :

Make a forced exhale below FRC (and less than RV to keep the exercise accessible). While you close your glottis, keep your abdominal muscles engaged (and stable) and try to release the tensions of your glottis: this time, the glottis reopens itself.

Having the abdominal muscle engage maintains the lung and ambient pressure balance. Under this condition, the “natural position of the glottis” is “Open.”

Application:

if we look at a “normal” dive using mouthfill, after the last recharge, we can divide the dive into two parts:

1. The parts where our diaphragm keeps rising smoothly and the lung pressure matches with the ambient pressure:

We must intentionally keep our glottis closed during this part as its natural position would be “Open.” BUT we only need to keep it closed very gently because the pressure difference between the mouth and lungs is not so large (if we are not overpressurizing the oral cavity).

2. The part of the dive beyond natural mobility of the diaphragm when lung pressure starts to be “late” (inferior) compared to ambient pressure :

During this part of the dive (which constitutes the last part of the descent), the natural position of the glottis becomes “Closed.” Despite an increased difference in pressure between the mouth and lungs, we do not need to generate tension in the glottis to keep the air in our mouth (unless we need a lot of pressure to open the eustachian tubes, a topic we will come back on in a later article).

I suggest that you focus on the second point: remember, the deeper you go, the less often you need to equalize. It means you can be completely PASSIVE. Trying to “strongly” hold the mouthfill will only generate unnecessary tensions and enhance the leak. You can leave your glottis in peace and let it do the job for you.

To go further

If you want to FEEL the application of this article in your dives, there is a straightforward exercise you can do. I have been using it on my students for the last two years, and there is a high chance it will drastically improve the comfort and efficiency of your mouthfill.

Check this article to find out :
Mouthfill : Make peace with your glottis

The article Mouthfill : Open / Closed ? What is the natural position of the glottis? appeared first on Gaspard Freediving.

Freediving is a fast-growing sport but that still remains marginal for obvious reasons: holding our breath and especially underwater is scary. And while many people find the idea of diving without artificial air supply beautiful, they also feel like “it’s not for me”.  As a matter of fact, comfortably going down to 5m meters underwater on 1 breath and hanging there a little bit seems inconceivable to most humans while any certified freediver will know that it can actually be a piece of cake. It is the same for a breath-hold: most “normal” humans can barely conceive comfortably holding their breath for a full minute while it is something easily achieved by a huge majority of beginners during their first class.

So the question remains: how difficult is learning to freedive?

Adaptation

To reply to this question, we must first understand how learning and adaptation works:

The human body, brain, and nervous system are capable of an insane range of skills, our adaptation and learning possibilities are absolutely phenomenal (I’m sure you already spent enough time getting lost on the internet to agree with that). In order to develop those adaptations, we need stimulation and recovery. The challenge is that to avoid any kind of rejection of the learning (or the training), the level of stimulation must be adjusted so it remains 100% manageable.

Choose your difficulty!

Regarding freediving, everybody can already hold their breath, the question is “for how long ?”. The good news is that the answer doesn’t matter much for you to start learning and progressing. Remember all you need is stimulation and recovery. The stimulation can be anything from “just a little bit uncomfortable” to “maximum attempt”, in other words, you do not have to try to hold your breath as long as you can to develop adaptation and progress! In freediving, we can choose the level of stimulation with extreme precision because time, depth, and distance are continuous variables. What does it mean? It means that progressing in freediving can be as easy or difficult as you (or your instructor) want it to be!

Little secret: the easy and enjoyable way goes further 😉

Let’s play !

If you have never tried any kind of freediving before, let’s do a little experimentation together. Sit comfortably and put your phone in timer mode: You are going to do a series of breath-hold of 20 seconds. 

-Set your timer to 20 seconds

-Breath normally and keep your mind calm

-Take a big slow and gentle full inhale

-Start your timer and your breath-hold

-Relax your shoulders and neck

-Relax your jaws and your tongue

-Keep your eyes closed and do not check how much time is left: just stay focused on the present.

-When you hear the timer, resume breathing and relax (do not try to go further !)

Try then to “judge” how easy/difficult this breath-hold was and keep the information in your head

Repeat 3 more times but make sure you take all the necessary time to recover 100% from a breath-hold (both physically and mentally) before starting the next one.

You have now completed 4 breath-hold of the exact same duration: How does it feel? was it becoming easier and easier?

• If you gave up during the first breath hold it means 20 seconds were too strong a stimulation for you. It doesn’t mean freediving is not for you, it just means this specific exercise was not adapted to your level and you can probably try again with 15 seconds (or less).
• If they all felt the same, my guess is that you are already used to some kind of breath-hold activities and the level of stimulation was way too low for you, you can try again with a longer timing. Also make sure you had enough recovery time between the holds
• If it felt easier and easier, congratulations! You just completed your first training and built up confidence in your breath-hold abilities.

Don’t get me wrong, this little exercise is absolutely nothing compared to what you will learn with a professional instructor but I hope it can give you the idea that as long as you remain patient with yourself, learning to freedive and can be a very fun and enjoyable process accessible to anyone comfortable in the water!

The article Is learning freediving difficult? appeared first on Gaspard Freediving.

“Residual volume is the minimum size of the lungs. From the depth of the residual volume, the air in the lungs stops reducing in volume and it is then the blood shift that comes to protect the lungs.”

There are many errors and approximations in this description, consequences of shortcuts taken at face value. If these errors are not obvious to you, I suggest you read the following article.

A “medical” concept first

First of all, it is necessary to specify that the notions of lung volumes (FRC, RV, TLC…) are prior to apnea which of course borrowed them from medicine. They, therefore, represent medical terms corresponding to “normal” pressure and ventilation conditions.

In this context, the medical definition of residual volume is: “the amount of air remaining in the lungs after a forced expiration”.

The muscles that are mobilized in a forced expiration are the abdominal muscles which when contracted push the diaphragm and compress the lungs (producing expiration).

Thus the limit of a forced expiration is notably given by the limit of an abdominal contraction. However, this does not mean that the diaphragm cannot be pushed further and still compress the lungs. It just means that it cannot be pushed further by the action of the abdominal muscles.

Residual volume in freediving

In apnea, we want to avoid unnecessary tension and contraction. The good news is that the external pressure of the water increases constantly during the descent and pushes the diaphragm instead of our abdominal muscles which can (and must !) remain relaxed. Under the effect of the hydrostatic pressure, the diaphragm can therefore be pushed BEYOND its position that corresponds to the residual volume from a medical point of view.

Thus, the purely “medical” definition of residual volume does not really make sense during deep immersion and the only situation in which this concept can be really useful is in the context of those who choose to load/reload their mouthfill by abdominal contraction.

“Freediving Residual volume”

However, many of us have “experienced” the residual volume in terms of Frenzel equalization: personally, I remember that a few weeks after I started freediving, at 27m depth I had no more air in my mouth to equalize and I had to turn around. Compared to my apnea courses, this corresponded well to my “medical” (or theoretical) residual volume. But for some people, this phenomenon occurs as early as 10m while for others, they can continue to Frenzel normally beyond 40m.

The reason for this difference (all things being equal) is the abdominal tension that “holds back” the diaphragm. To realize this, you can perform the following maneuver on dry:

Contract your abdominal muscles (as if you were expecting someone to punch you in the stomach) and perform a series of Frenzel equalization while letting a little air escape through one nostril at each equalization (you should ear a little “pshiit” at each equalization). You will notice quite quickly that there is no more air available in your mouth to equalize. Release the abdominal tension and resume the equalization (still letting air escape): finally, there was air available!

Of course, in the water, abdominal tensions are rarely that big, but they can still significantly affect the passive mobility of your diaphragm and therefore affect what we can call our “freediving residual volume”. Our “freediving residual volume” can be way deeper or way shallower than our medical residual volume: it mostly depends on our freediving adaptation and the quality of our training.

And once the diaphragm can no longer rise then?

Through advanced equalization techniques, it is still possible to dive beyond the “freediving residual volume” (maximum passive mobility point of the diaphragm). Nevertheless, the air in our lungs does not stop shrinking. However, it is the way the air is compressed that will change. This is where the blood shift comes into play (even if it can start earlier) : by inflating the capillaries with blood, the air in the lungs will continue to be compressed and thus decrease in volume. This will have the effect of maintaining the pressure balance between the surrounding water and the air in the lungs and keeping us safe.

In summary

The residual volume as defined medically does not correspond to the minimum air volume of our lungs during apnea. In a trained freediver, the passive mobility of the diaphragm will continue to compress the air as the external pressure increases. Even after the point of maximum diaphragm mobility, our “freediving residual volume”, the volume of air in the lungs will continue to decrease due to blood shift.

What use ?

A better theoretical understanding of freediving can always help us in our training. In my case understanding better this concept gave me the confidence to adopt a non-traditional equalization strategy that includes mouthfill refills deeper than my “medical residual volume” but still shallower than my “freediving residual volume”. However, before you start to play with it make sure you also include some pressure adaptation sessions in your training and that you only do what feels right and comfortable for you so you do not jeopardize your safety.

For those that might need some extra clarifications, there has been some interesting discussions around this article in the “Freediving science” facebook group :

https://www.facebook.com/groups/freedivingscience/permalink/2135721613270215/

To go further

The understanding of residual volume will also help you understand better Frenzel equalization and why it stops working at 10m for some while other people casually use it to 40m : more in this article

The article Residual volume: some clarifications appeared first on Gaspard Freediving.

Always trust your instructor of the moment

While it can be tempting and even healthy to “take advice left and right” to form your own vision, if you go to a particular instructor or coach, it is important that you follow their method and approach in its entirety. This is for at least two reasons:

Keep your training coherent

First, you should assume that your instructor has an approach that is consistent with itself. This means that if you decide to do something different for a certain point and go against his recommendations, you risk jeopardizing the whole (or a good part of) methodology. A methodology is not a sum of “tips and tricks” put end to end but a coherent whole which sometimes takes shape only after several months of training (I think of the periodization of the training for example). By choosing only what interests you at the time, you potentially jeopardize your future progress and lose the sense of the very reason why you decided to trust and pay someone to guide you.

Remove hesitations

Secondly, regardless of the method, remember that relaxation is central to freediving progression. And no matter how you define the term, one thing that is not relaxing is questioning and hesitating. This means that even if the method adopted is sub-optimal (not to say bad) from a theoretical point of view, it is still likely to give better results if you follow it blindly than if you constantly question it. Thus, if a firm answer asserted with charisma and authority contributes to extinguish a hesitation or an internal questioning, it doesn’t matter if this answer is intrinsically “good” or “bad”: accepting it will probably contribute to your progress. At the very least, this is a form of placebo effect that it would be a shame to deprive yourself of. Be careful though, if you feel that a directive goes against what you have learned in terms of safety, it may be time to use your critical mind again and potentially end the collaboration.

Ask for the “reasons” anyway. Most instructors will give you the reasons and logic for what they are telling you on their own. However, if this is not the case at some point and you don’t understand why you are being asked to do certain things, do not hesitate to ask. Be careful, it is not about asking to seek a contradiction: whatever the answer, respect the authority of your instructor. But identifying the reasons for the actions you take will help you later, during your period of questioning (see below).

Allow dedicated time for questioning

If during the training periods with a coach/instructor, your only job is to apply the directives and limit hesitations to optimize progress. However, being able to think critically is of course a quality that would be a shame to go without. So, once a training cycle is over, it’s time to question yourself. In order not to get lost in this process, here are some principles to keep in mind.

Understand the logic and the premises.

As I said above, each method has its own logic, so now it’s time to try to understand it as accurately as possible and to identify its workings. I also recommend that you try to identify the premises of this logic, i.e. the starting points that will seem “obvious” to your instructor/coach but that are not necessarily shared by everyone. An example of a premise might be the definition of relaxation as we have seen in this article. From these premises will flow the rest of the method and identifying them will allow you to better accept or reject an approach.

Play the devil’s advocate.

Choose the approach or advice that seems the most absurd to you and see how you can best defend it. That is, rather than seeking to validate your current beliefs at all costs, make an effort to sincerely understand and defend the benefits of what you naturally tend to reject. Of course, this does not mean that you will finally adopt this approach, but it may allow you to extract aspects (even small) that you can integrate into your personal vision. It will also allow you to leave a little more room for a potential future evolution on your part (perhaps several years from now). By sincerely understanding the reasons and logic of an approach different (or even opposed) to the one you currently have, you will be better able to change your mind if new elements come up against your vision (or in favor of the other) and make adjustments when necessary.

Identify the “real” reasons.

Sometimes when you explore the logic of an instructor/coach, you will realize that it does not make sense: that is to say that the explanations he has given you are simply absurd or scientifically false. Of course, it may be tempting in this case to reject the instruction linked to this absurdity but before doing so, try to go a little further and look for the “real” potential reasons. Your instructor may be relying on his personal experience for which he has given a dubious explanation afterward. This should not prevent you from looking for a better explanation: the instruction may still be valid, but for a different reason than the one you were given. Being able to identify the “real” reason for an instruction (when there is one) will definitely allow you to surpass your mentors and make you grow.

Conclusion

Freediving is an extremely young sport and it is important to be able to grow with it. Following gurus, mentors, coaches, instructors (…) will certainly allow you to get results but if you want to surpass them or at least gain in maturity, having periods of reflection is essential. Try to keep these periods of reflection away from your training to maximize your chances of success and remember that your critical mind is your best weapon: use it!

The article Contradictory advices: how to manage appeared first on Gaspard Freediving.

As we saw in an article published last year, contrary to some popular beliefs, as long as we are relaxed, air travels naturally from the lungs to the mouth, regardless of whether we are head up or head down. The main reason is that the lungs are much more flexible than the head and the oral cavity. Therefore, the external pressure is released first in the lungs, and the air travels in the direction “high pressure to low pressure”. For more details, I invite you to read or re-read this article.

However, this demonstration does not explain a phenomenon that most freedivers have observed: it is easier to equalize when “head up.”

In this article, I will present the two explanations that I believe to be the most relevant to explain this phenomenon for the Frenzel equalization. You may already be familiar with the first of these explanations. The second one is the result of my work on the subject, and I have never heard it formulated by anyone else. However, a hyperbaric doctor (Dr. Heikal) has confirmed its relevance.

A little reminder

Before going any further, let’s look at the mechanics of equalization. An equalization (except BTV) consists of generating pressure at the entrance of the eustachian tubes to open them. Once opened, air naturally comes to lodge in the middle ear. The amount of pressure you have to generate you may know if you have already used an EQ tool (not an otovent). As an indication, we can consider an average of this value at about 30 millibars (this value is not definitive, and there are several ways to decrease it, starting with good hydration). Nevertheless, it is essential to understand that this value is not absolute. It is 30 millibar PLUS the ambient pressure. It means that if I am in a hyperbaric chamber with 2 bars, 3 bars, or 10 bars of ambient pressure, I should always generate 30 millibars of additional pressure to open my tubes.

Explanation 1: more blood pressure head down

Our blood is subject to gravity, and when we are head down, the blood pressure towards our head increases. The eustachian tubes being flexible enough, they accumulate more blood. It makes them “heavier,” and we need more pressure to open them. To better understand this, you can think of the eustachian tubes as swinging doors that you have to push open. The heavier a door is, the more force and pressure you need to generate to open it. This extra pressure to generate makes equalization head down more difficult.

Explanation 2: higher ambient pressure when we are “head up”.

Let’s imagine a head down diver whose head is at precisely 10 m depth and whose abdominal area is 9.5 m. As we explained in the introduction, the head does not deform under pressure and therefore cannot reproduce the external pressure. Thus the “natural” pressure in the oral cavity will be 1.95 bar. If our diver goes head up while keeping his head at a depth of 10m, his abdominal area is now at a depth of 10.5m, and the “natural” pressure in the oral cavity increases to 2.05 bar. It gives us an extra theoretical ambient pressure difference of 0.1 bar. “Theoretical” because two mechanisms that are difficult to quantify and that I will not detail here largely attenuate this value. Nevertheless, we are in order of magnitude comparable to the 0.03 bar (30 millibars, remember) that we need to equalize. So to use the analogy of the swinging door, it’s as if you had a strong wind pushing against this door all the time, so you need to generate less force to open it. 

A little perspective

For those who have trouble picturing all these values and who may not realize how much of an impact a 50 cm (estimated sternum to head) water gap can have (it is REALLY easier to equalize head up), it may be interesting to ask ourselves how many meters this pressure gap represents in the open air, at the surface… 500 meters! In terms of pressure, a 50cm water column is similar to a 500m air column. In terms of pressure again, 1m75 of water (size of a human) represents about 1750m of air. Yes, this is a lot, and it shows us how necessary it is to look at how external pressure is exerted on the different parts of the body if we want to understand equalization.

What applications?

The first and main application is to feed the curiosity of those who like to understand “how things work” and that is by itself lot in my opinion.

However, we can find a pedagogical application: 

Personnally, since few months, once a beginner student is comfortable with the head-up equalization, rather than doing a head-down “test” or adding depth to make him go deeper head-up, I keep the line at the same depth while instructing him to generate more pressure in his equalization, to be a little more “aggressive”. It allows to simulate the subsequent dives the student will have to make in comfort and, it constitutes an intermediate step increasing the chance of success for head down dives.

The article Frenzel : Why is it easier to equalize head up ? appeared first on Gaspard Freediving.

Nevertheless, you may not know that two drastically different visions of the definition of relaxation coexist in the freediving world. The first definition is the most commonly shared and will undoubtedly seem familiar to you. The second one is still not widely used but is, in my opinion, the future of the sport.

Relaxation is stress management.

This first definition is, as I mentioned, the most common one. It consists of starting from the principle that there is or can be a stressful situation, and relaxation happens when you can remain calm, concentrated, and in perfect control of yourself in the face of this situation. Therefore, it is a matter of not letting oneself be overwhelmed by one’s emotions and possible negative stimuli to limit (or even eliminate) the symptoms of stress. In the context of this definition, relaxation can be achieved with the help of different techniques with which you are probably already more or less familiar. These techniques will allow you to put these stressful stimuli in a “little box” to more or less limit their impact during the dives. In this sense, relaxation is a skill that can be developed.

Relaxation is the absence of stress.

This second definition assumes that relaxation “does not exist”. More precisely, being defined by the absence of stress, it is impossible to be “more” relaxed but only “less stressed”. This definition supposes that there is no “relaxation switch”, that it is impossible at a given moment to do anything to be “more” relaxed since, by definition, trying to “do” something is in pure contradiction to the notion of relaxation. The only option is to have previously removed or transformed the negative stimuli and make sure they do not happen (the role of training). Relaxation thus occurs naturally and passively. The supporters of this definition believe that relaxation is above all the result of a context and not an action that can be carried out at a given moment. On the international scene, Nathan Vinski clearly expresses this opinion (it is from him that I borrowed the expression “there is no relaxation switch“). We also find Aharon Solomons, who defends this point of view in an episode of freedive cafe (1h18 and 30seconds). Finally, this is the vision that I support in my Ebook “No, you don’t have equalization issues” still freely available.

Small analogy.

To be a little more explicit, we can put forward a “fictitious” example taken from daily life. Then we will come back to our main subject, freediving.

Let’s imagine that you have insomnia and frequent nightmares. You identify these sleep problems as being caused by a conflicting relationship with your boss.

Option 1: You take up meditation, yoga, and relaxation therapy. Your relationship with your boss is still stressful, but you can handle it better. As you progress in your use of relaxation techniques, your nights improve, and you find your sleep again.

Option 2: You contact the superior of your boss hierarchy and/or undertake to review this relationship during a frank conversation. Tensions subside, and your relationship is normalized. Little by little, your nights improve, and you find sleep again.

In both cases, you find sleep because you are more relaxed. But in option 1, the stress stimuli are still present, and you have learned to “deal with it”. In option 2, the stressful stimuli have disappeared. The definition of relaxation is, therefore, quite different in the two situations.

Life is complicated…

What is complicated in life in a very general way is that we constantly face stressful situations or stimuli that are likely to prevent us from getting sleep. However, it is sometimes difficult to decide what to do with these stressful stimuli: accept them and learn to “deal with them” (option 1) or suppress/transform them (option 2, with all the work, time, patience, or radical decisions that this can sometimes require). Chances are you know someone around you who is “stuck” in a situation because they have made a “choice” to deal with the existing stress (staying in a toxic relationship, for example) when from the outside, it seems evident that the best thing to do is to cut the source of stress. Sometimes cutting the source of stress involves a leap into the unknown that seems even more stressful at first, so we prefer to deal with the existing stress that has the advantage of being familiar. Sometimes removing stress seems simply impossible and completely utopic. Sometimes, managing existing stress is the only thing to do to continue to live/survive properly (inevitable events we have to face). Knowing how to choose what kind of behavior to adopt to find a form of appeasement is not easy, and we probably “make mistakes” in our attitudes. Nevertheless, I hope we agree that when this choice appears to be possible, the second option, removing the stress, is preferable in the long term. At least that is my opinion.

To come back to freediving.

No one is forcing you to practice freediving. Few people live by their freediving performance (and let’s be honest, you are probably not one of the chosen few). Whatever your life, you probably have enough “stress management” situations on your shoulders, and there is absolutely no point in adding one to your leisure time! Consequence? Nothing obliges you to inflict this stress on yourself, and therefore, nothing obliges you to manage it for freediving. In my opinion, the only definition of relaxation that is valid in the context of freediving is the second definition. Your freediving training should aim at eliminating the negative stimuli that can occur during a dive, not at managing them better. To do this, you should strive to make dives with a high level of quality and comfort that will allow you to be mechanically relaxed (definition 2) for the next dive. When you put it that way, things may sound simple but let’s be clear, training with this approach is quite complex. It requires more thought and knowledge to understand all the sources of stress that your dives and training can generate, and the help of a coach who understands this approach is certainly not too much. However, this approach is the only one that will guarantee you a healthy and sustainable progression without the emotional ups and downs that are sometimes difficult to understand when adopting (voluntarily or not) a training approach based on stress management.

To get an idea of what stress reduction training can do, I recommend that you try the static one contraction as I describe it in this article. I will also publish an article later to explain THE basic principle for anyone wishing to apply this approach in training.

To go further

Does this article seem to be in contradiction with what you usually hear about freediving? Learn how to deal with contradictory advice in freediving while optimizing your training.

The article Is relaxation a skill ? appeared first on Gaspard Freediving.

Basic principle:

You will perform a series of static apneas that will each be interrupted at the first contraction and interspersed with 2 minutes of recovery.

General recommendation:

Perform this exercise in the water, equipped with a nose clip (and goggles if you want), a snorkel, and of course, with a buddy. You want to wear an adapted wetsuit that will guarantee you to stay warm for 1 hour. It is essential that your buddy is someone who can stay focused on the task (which will be particularly boring) and that they are equipped with a slate to record your times as well as a stopwatch.

Execution:

1. As far as your breathing and preparation is concerned, I recommend that you keep it simple: breathe completely normally, following your activity level (almost zero) while trying to fall asleep. Avoid those big breaths that are supposed to relax you. I recommend doing this preparation with your head in the water and with the snorkel. Your buddy should not even hear your breathing.

2. When you are ready, take a slow, complete and unique breath (forget packing) and remove your snorkel: your buddy can now start the timer.

3. Since there is no question of hyperventilating and you will remain in the “easy” zone, avoid “safety checks” with your buddy (who will keep a watchful eye on you): nothing should distract you. Just try to maintain this state of sleep.

4. When you feel the first contraction coming, try to gently refuse it: like when you want to resist tickling.

5. When the first contraction finally arrives, take the time to make a clean exit: reach out with one hand to the edge, then the other, place your feet under your eyes, raise your head (without standing up) and do your recovery breathing. You will therefore have about 5/10 seconds of apnea beyond your first contraction and NO MORE.

6. Your buddy should then note your time and start a 2-minute timer. Do not ask for your time to your buddy, and do not let him tell/show you (you should make that point clear before the session)

7. As soon as the recovery breath is done, go back to the water with your snorkel and try to fall asleep again: minimal breathing that your buddy should still not hear

8. At the end of the 2-minute stopwatch, your buddy tells you that the time is up. Take one full breath and start your second breath-hold.

You can repeat the operation to make between 5 and 10 breaths hold each until the first contraction: stop yourself if you start to feel cold or tired. Your buddy can also stop you if your apnea time begins to decrease.

Important: make sure that it is only one and unique exercise. You should remain “in your bubble” throughout the entire session, regardless of whether you are in the breath-hold or the recovery phases. Try to discuss everything beforehand with your buddy and thus avoid communication during the exercise. Regarding your breath holds times, you will have plenty of opportunity to analyse them AFTER the session but better cut yourself from this information during the exercise.

What results to expect?

If you have never practiced this type of exercise, you will see a drastic increase in the time without contraction in the times recorded by your buddy. The buddy will also generally notice a reduction in neck tension.

But is this just a “warm-up” effect?

Some of it is indeed due to a form of warm-up but not only. Do not hesitate to repeat this exercise over three consecutive sessions and compare the times: you will notice real progress while remaining in optimal physical and mental comfort.

Why does it work?

The problem with “classic” CO2 tables is that they prepare us to stay calm in the face of an uncomfortable and stressful situation. But by exposing ourselves to this stress, we are also sending a signal to our nervous system that apnea itself is an unpleasant and stressful activity, which inevitably penalizes relaxation for subsequent dives. By making freediving easy and enjoyable, we can somehow “reprogram” our nervous system to not go on alert as soon as we hold our breath and thus extend the “easy” part of our dives safely.

Conclusion

I love this exercise because it allows us to realize in the short term that easy training that aims to increase the quality of our breath holds can work perfectly. The idea of “training hard” or “suck it up” to improve results is a personal choice that should not be seen as an obligation.

To go further

If you would like to go further in the understanding of the logic behind this type of training, go check my article on CO2 tolerance in freediving

The article Static: significantly delaying contractions appeared first on Gaspard Freediving.

The challenge is to determine at what depth the last equalization of the mask will take place to ensure that the maximum amount of air is available for your ears while excluding the risk of injury at the targeted depth.

To do this, we can perform a simple calculation…
First of all, you will have to make a dive in which you will keep your nose pinched as soon from the surface and never release your fingers (so do not equalize the mask at all). Then stop at the depth at which your mask becomes uncomfortable and remember the depth.

Once at the surface, convert this depth into pressure. For example, if at 10m the mask becomes too oppressive, note 2 bars of pressure. Since the surface pressure is 1 bar, this means that with this mask you can withstand a pressure multiplication by 2 without having to equalize it.

You then need to know the depth you are aiming for in your training cycle and convert this depth into pressure. For example, 5 bars if you are aiming for a depth of 40m.

Then divide these two values. In our case: 5bars / 2 = 2.5 bars
Finally, convert the result into depth: 15m

In our case, this means that if I stop equalizing my mask at 15m, I can continue my descent to 40m without risk of injury while ensuring maximum air supply for my ears.

The interest of doing this exercise at the beginning of the training cycle is to be able to quickly get into a habit and avoid having to make last-minute changes that are likely to penalize you when the goal is getting closer.

The article Until what depth should you equalize your freediving mask? appeared first on Gaspard Freediving.