Team Sharkbait News

This is a post by Jorg Jansen.

Yesterday evening was pool session again. And while it wasn’t as busy as last time, it’s clear that if we want to grow as freedivers, we need dedicated space to practice.

Freediving between recreational swimmers is just not possible anymore. We can’t use the monofin. We can’t train rescue techniques. We can’t film properly and do our thing.

So time has come to find dedicated space again. Tonight I’m going to visit a new diving club, where my son will start his snorkeling lessons. Maybe they have a lane to spare!

Dedicated lane = constructive and scheduled training!

This is a post by Sanne.

Tuesday evening I had planned my goal realization for Section 1 to take place at the pool in Zeist, where I was able to train with Eric van Riet Paap, Danny Martherus and Jouke van Riel.

It is a good pool featuring a small area, shallow depth and 27 degrees water, which made it perfect for static. Danny and Jouke started with their static CO2 tables, almost not getting distracted by my GoPro bottom camera . Eric and I teamed up for a static session, starting out with a small empty lungs of a minute. After that I did my first real static since a long while and it actually felt quite good. I didn’t really give Eric a chance when I aborted my mission and directly surfaced, only to find out I was 35 seconds away of my goal. So, lesson learned and made a deal with Eric that whenever I wanted to know the time I would ask and after that I would hold for at least two additional safety taps. Going into my second attempt, I felt really relaxed and didn’t start having trouble until 4 minutes 15 seconds. After that I heard Eric telling me that 5 minutes was also a good point for me to focus on and I continued to relax. At 5 minutes and 3 seconds I decided that I reached my training goal and that gave me a fantastic overall feeling. As a side note for myself, this is actually the time I should start the real fight phase.

Eric and I swopped places and he started his static session. As he’s adapting a new technique, which includes shallow breathing through the snorkel, Eric does some very impressive empty lung statics. Ranging from 2 minutes to 2 minutes 30 seconds, but he told me 3 minutes 30 seconds is his best in empty lungs. Now it was time for him to test his packing through a snorkel technique and went for a full lungs static. Looking fairly easy and relaxed all the way, somewhere around 5 minutes contractions seem to have kicked in. I reassured him with the time and he totally relaxed, arms of the ledge and on a mission to 6 minutes 4 seconds. Good static!

Next up was my goal in Dynamic No Fins with a goal of 80 meters. I got ready prepared my goggles and neck weight and entered the water, I added an addition weight around my waist of 0,5 kilograms. After a good start, I was nearing the 50 meters and my mind was ready to give up on me. But I felt strong after my good static time, which convinced me to continue. After turning at 50 meters, the urge completely vanished and the goal of 80 meters was easily within reach. Only one good turn at 75 meters a few arm strokes and I’d done it. It has been a long time, but this actually felt liberating and puts me in the position where I had been waiting for almost a year. Ready for more!

Eric did his dynamic with fins schedule with a nice full pocket mono-fin, with the pockets placed under an angle. He started of with a new technique by using an arm-stroke in between the mono-fin kicks. Which actually doesn’t look all that tiring when you look at it, he made it to 136 meters which impressed me yet again . Eric continued with a distance schedule for dynamic and I shot a few underwater videos from it. Jouke was training his technique on the mono-fin and getting a proper balance for his Orca suit. But I can hear him say that he didn’t find the proper weight balance yet.

I would like to thank the people form Freediving Utrecht for having me over in their pool. I had a really good time, freediving, chatting, catching up and of course I reached my goals!

This is a post by Sanne.

The first part of ‘The Number 23′-schedule is progressing the way I planned it. My focus is definitely on bringing back the endurance and fitness of my body. This first section consists of 9 days, which already proved to be a good thing. My metabolism has switched up a gear, due to the higer intensity training. I even felt a little hungry this morning, although I had quite the evening meal.

My body is noticing the raise in activity levels and that’s a positive thing. Also my mind is accepting the fact of competing again, I seem to be able to deal with more contractions and longer distances under water.

Dry tables
On land training is what I started out with in the first section. I set out a goal of 4 minutes breath hold in a dry static. But as it turned out, after the first go, with only neutral lungs, I was already near 3 minute 30 seconds. I decided to do a full lungs try and already got to 4 minutes. So I adjusted the goal for the first section to 4 min. 30 sec. After that I did a dry walk with a somewhat milder pace than usual, but never the less I made it to 1 min. 30 seconds. I also adjusted this goal in my schedule to 1 min. 40sec. From this point I can build further into my dry tables.

DNF Pyramid
Last year after William Trubridge’s clinic at Apnea Team Amsterdam’s head quarters, I converted his pyramid schedule in a way that suites my way of training:

• 6 x 25 meter starting every 1 minute 10 seconds
• 6 x 25 meter starting every 1 minute
• 6 x 25 meter starting every 50 seconds
• 4 x 25 meter starting every 45 seconds

This is what I did on Tuesday in the pool, together with Jorg spotting me over my last 10 runs of 25 meters. Which was kind of grueling, but in the end very satisfying!

Fitness
On the side of all the freediving training I also want my body fitness to be up and running as well, so I planned a few full body workouts throughout the 23 days of training. Maybe I’ll post that schedule in a later post… Here’s the link to my current number 23 – schedule.

This is a post by Jorg Jansen.

Weather wasn’t good, so instead of going outdoor we decided to take into the pool again. Summer vacation is over and the pool is crowded again. Many many kids yelling and screaming around during swimming and diving lessons. Lucky enough we found 1 lane to practice our dynamic without fins technique in.

Sanne decided to go hardcore again and do a pretty intense schedule to start with. He made it anyway, because he’s a monster. I’m really wondering what 23 days of training will bring to him in Wiesbaden. But maybe he’s start to do some work in the 16×50 discipline, which could suit him pretty welll.

Anyway, while Sanne was almost puking in the pool because of the high intensity, I decided to work on my dnf technique and take it easy with the rest periods. So I did around 4 25 meter laps with full lungs, 4 with half full lungs, 4 apnea crawls and some tests with doing static for 15-30 seconds on the side before leaving for the lap.

When Sanne was ready I decided to do one attempt until I could feel the  first contraction coming. Which brought me to 35 meters. At the same time I really have to work on my streamlining and have to look into neck weights and weight belts again. I’m using way to much power by pulling myself down. Oh well, enough to look  at for next time.

On a side note: I already did 2 static sessions this week and it felt pretty good. On Monday 8 times 1 minute with 1 breath in between. Pretty high co2 and a headache afterwards, but a small improvement. Yesterday I did a max static until contraction which brought me to 2:18. If I can work this up to 3 minutes without contractions I’m pretty happy.

This is a post by Sanne.

Not only is ‘the number 23‘ the title to a movie starring Jim Carrey in 2007, it’s also the number of days I have available to prepare myself for the Rhein Mein Cup 2009 in Wiesbaden. This year’s RMC 2009 competition takes place on October 3rd and I’ve inscribed myself for static (STA) and Dynamic No Fins (DNF).

I’ve spent serious time on a good schedule, holding all the right exercises for the preparation to competing in October. I divided the schedule into sections; Basic, Specific & Specialized. Annelie Pompe’s article “The secret of Freediving training” on Sebastian Naslund’s website, perfectly describes of what attention areas the sections exist.

The thought behind her article supports the way Jorg and I plan our training throughout a year. With the difference that we plan more around pool specific schedules, as opposed to the depth preparation described in the article. Also my schedule is not focusing on a year round plan, but I’m now on a 23 day schedule built from the same important blocks. That’s why it lacks certain endurance exercises, which have been replaced by DNF combined endurance exercises.

I’ve posted the schedule onto Google’s Document service and made it public, so you can follow the progress over the 23 days of freediving preparation training. Click here to open it.