Eric van Riet Paap - Just an intermediate step

Focus on relaxation

2009-11-07T20:13:00.003+01:00

Last wednesday I tried to find a relaxed state of mind by doing the kind of visualization that I talk about in my previous post. I have so far not done a real max dive with my monofin. The reason is that I can seldom find a way to pass the hard middle part of the dive. So I stopped the no-warmup, no-breathup preperation with the goal to do a max dive not too long from today. When that is behind me I will first abandon my (short) breathup again and then the empty lung statics I now do as warmup.

Note that I'm not wearing my new BlueSeventy Nero Comp suit because the water is only 26C which is too cold for me to relax in without some neoprene (Orca Apex2 in this case).

The relaxation worked great and I came up when the dive started to become harder. This gave me confidence on which I want to build in the coming weeks. It must have been one of my most relaxed dives over 100 meter. Here's the video, see for yourself..

200 meter static

2009-10-30T10:58:00.009+01:00

I've been working on my monofin technique by swimming >1km underwater almost every training. Also the local finswimmers club is kind enough to show me every friday-evening what stamina real finswimmers are made of.

What I did not train much were longer dives. I should be able at this point to improve my personal best. So last month I promised someone (+myself) that I would go over 158 meters before the end of the month (one day to go, not going to happen) and do 175 before the end of the year. That first part did not work because what I train during all those 50-100 meter training dives is not the same technique I enjoy most with max attempts. During training I try to make many strokes with good technique, during max. attempts I try to make as little strokes as possible without loosing too much speed or relaxation. This means that during longer dives I am fighting a battle between what I think is right and what feels right for me at this time. The end result is lesser technique because I don't keep my legs straight and not feeling relaxed either. The video below is a good example of what might happen... (the microphone of my camera is broken causing a lot a white noise)

After this there were a couple more attempts that were even less successful. pfff... what now? I don't know, perhaps I should have called it a day. I did have the good feeling of seeing Daan swim a personal best of 166 meter so the 1 hour drive both ways was well worth it anyway. But instead I swam a lot of lanes with difference styles... Continues kicks, kick+glide, kick-kick-glide, armstroke-kick-kick-glide and the one I liked most armstroke-3xkick-glide. I know some people will frown upon this but to my surprise more and more people say they think it will suit me very well.

One day later I was doing some drywalks (apnea walks) and realized I could try to visualize my dynamic dives. Because when I visualize something it's easy to play a video of some idyllic peaceful beach with blue water where seagulls fly. It is also possible to visualize my dynamic dive but when I get to the hard part of the dive I have to tell myself that it's going to be hard and that I do a turn, glide, stroke, etc.. It all gets a bit mental and then I don't feel it anymore. But when I vizualize while doing an apnea walk or an empty lung static things get much more realistic and hence a better training. And the great thing is my turns can be perfect, my glides as short or as long as I want, whatever is needed to fit a 200 meter dynamic in the duration of a breathhold.

Later that day I swam 128 meter with one armstroke and three kicks per 25 meter lane, a nice swim!

FreeWC09

2009-09-15T09:08:00.030+02:00

FreeWC09 aka The 5th Individual (indoor) AIDA World Championship 200. Aarhus (Denmark) (mon) August 17th - (sat) August 22nd.

I arrived in Aarhus a week before the official competition and met and trained with New Zealand kiwis Kerian Hibbs and Darrell Cottle. One of these days Darrell told me about Kerian's monofin technique where he includes an armstroke between each kick&glide.
Now - that is interesting, I thought! During training back home I tried that a couple of times and kind of liked it, apart from the fact that people were laughing at me. ;-) But here in Aarhus I played a little more with it, liked it even more (knowing that a 200m+ guy uses it) and decided to use it during my dynamic dive later on. This experimenting worked great for me, it took the tension a bit of and things started to be fun.

The whole experience of such a well organized event is great anway! So many legendary freedivers that I felt really humble. After a while everyone appears to be really nice and I felt myself a bit more nice too. The best thing surely is that my whole perception of what long times or distances are completely gets reset when you are so much part of things. Hearing how and how intense others train gives a great respect for that. It's a bit like new years day where most walk away with good intentions and some might even make changes for the better. Being part of this also gives a greater understanding of the dynamics of a multiday competition. The nerves, expectations, results of teammates, importance of sleep - everything is so much more intense, glowing, even exploding during the finals.

My goals, my perfect competition, would be to get in the b-final with nofins, a-final with static and a dutch national record (>150m) with dynamic. I did not think about the performances I wanted to do in those finals, just getting there was the goal. I achieved two out of three of those goals.

I will write little about my teammates here because they have or will write their own reports. They all did great performances but there was also some foolishness and bad luck going on.

Saturday
Arrival of teammates Nanja, Arjen and Erik.
Team NL: Erik Skoda, Nanja van den Broek, me, Arjen Costerus.
They had a 'long' drive from The Netherlands to Denmark and we were happy to have them over to our rented house to have so good old pasta with salmon.

Sunday
Greena aquarium freediving
Teammate Erik was having the first day of his course to become an international freedive judge. Nanja, Arjen and I had a two our swim with big fish, small sharks and huge eels. The salt-water aquarium was about 5 meters deep and we had not enough weights with us by a long shot. It was fun, relaxed and good training. Most of the session we were doing empty lung swims. :-) The sharks were not at all as impressive as we hoped. There was also another aquarium there with the bigger sharks. This is what we really came for, but we were not allowed in there! I was glad that the man from the aquarium did not bend for Nanja's charmes!

We spend an hour in another pool in Aarhus to train. But not for me, I needed to rest.

Monday
training, fine tuning the weights, etc.

I did a few laps with my monofin, met up with Ulf Dextegen. I also helped Nanja a bit with DNF technique and proper weighting.

Tuesday
Parading through the streets of Aarhus

Wednesday
DNF qualification heats
This was the first time that my family came to watch me. I was a little nervous but most of all I wanted to not have a blackout. Because my family already saw a handful of those the first few minutes they arrived.

My first goal was achieved, 145 meters, on the one hand I was happy and very satisfied with that and on the other hand I knew I could have swum a few more meters. At the end of the video you can hear me say that I held back. It looks a bit arrogant now that I look back at this, a bit to calculated too, maybe. But my first swim at such a major competition was done and I did what I came for - good!

Thursday
STA qualification

I couldn't get a smile on my face this day. At the beginning of the video you can see me trying to smile but what came out was something that only The Joker from the latest Batman movie would have been happy with. I think I had put to much pressure on myself for static this time. After 5:35 I aborted the hold, a far cry from the 8:01 I did earlier this year. It just happened and I was pretty upset about it for a while. A bit angry at myself!

DNF finals
A few minutes before official top, my good friend Danny Martherus arrived with his two children to watch the dutch team and be part of this adventure. This made me very happy and with them in our extended family the next few days were a lot more fun! Thank you Danny!

I was in the b-final but after just 80 meters I stopped swimming because I wanted to surface. I told myself I would not be happy with that. After a few more meters swimming I made a decision (it did not just happen like with static) to surface because I was not having fun. This actually made me satisfied because I did this for myself.

Friday
STA finals
Static finals was exciting to watch. Very close silver and bronze medals (within 5 seconds, at around 8:30) for Alexey Molchanova and Ulf Dextegen. The coach of Alexey was making a bit of a mess of things by first going through the competition zones 30 seconde before official top. She swam over the heels of athletes in full concentration :-(. At the end of Alexeys performance she kept her hand to long on his shoulder when he was surfacing. This resulted in a red card. They protested and won that protest because it was not visible on the official camera. Now at this point Ulf or the current no. 4 could/should have protested with their own video material so Alexey got silver. It's a stupid rule, but as long as it is in existance it should be followed obviously. Guy Brew continued for another 15 seconds, surfaced and did a surface protocol that seemed to be in slow motion but was still in zero seconds flat. The funny thing is that these three guys just did a performance under big pressure that I did never even did when fully relaxed but only the surfacing of Guy impresses me. It's not just the excellent times and distances that got recalibrated in my head, it's the different ways to approach freediving that make for a fresh wind in my mind.

DYN qualifications
Now this was going to be fun! My heart is with static (and DNF) but my focus for the last couple of months has been with dynamic.

I apologize for the quality of the next movie. Photo camera's should have better lenses and a higher resolution when used for filming. (and they should be waterproof to at least 100 meters but that's another story)

This was the third and last dutch pool record that I did not improve (have/own a record sounds strange, doesn't it?). And I really really wanted it. I've tried in a few smaller competitions before but the fact that I new I could made the pressure to big or not fun anymore. Not this time. The evening before I cleaned the slate with training tables symbolically and I wrote 'swim!' instead. Nothing more, nothing less, the dive was great I was fully concentrated on what I was doing or on my next stroke at the most, I was not tensing up when I reached 150. I had no ambition to swim much further to try for a b-final (surfaced at 158 meters). I was not looking forward nor back at the previous day, I was just doing it. Freediving is nice!

Saturday
DYN finals, award ceremony, party time!
Sorry wasn't there. You have to find other reports to read about freedivers getting drunk after one beer like a 16 year old. I did hear Arjen over my carstereo on the way back home. He phoned in exciting realtime reports of the finals. I wished I could have recorded it. The life reports during the competition were great but if we ever need someone else to do that job I would gladly nominate Arjen!

Thank you family
Thank you teammates
Thank you safeties
Thank you organization
Thank you big old body full of lungs
Thank you mind for not going crazy just yet
And thank you all for inspiration!

[P.S. for people with a facebook account - more pictures can be seen here]

Nightdive at Kreidesee (Hemmoor, Germany)

2009-09-03T13:26:00.003+02:00

Before the worldchampionship indoor freediving started my family and I spend our holiday in Germany and Denmark. My daughter and I were snorkeling a lot. One of the hilights surely must have been this nightdive under a full moon.

Briefing while walking
Get Ready...
Set...
Go!

24 hour freediving record attempt with live footage

2009-06-26T17:16:00.002+02:00

Sanne and Jorg of Shark Freediving are in Maribor right now to follow a remarkable record attempt.

From time to time they will show live footage!

Plan or just do it?

2009-06-19T21:22:00.005+02:00

As I wrote before, my FRC depth-diving is going great lately. My improved equalization and relaxation makes that these dives are very pleasurable for me.

Last saturday I went freediving with some dutch freediver friends, we took the 6 meter small boat called 'de sloper', which rouphly translates to 'the demolisher', to a nearby lake that has the deepest dive spot of this flat country (as far as I know). I had plans, hopes and dreams of grabbing some of the mud 50 meters or so below us and bring it back up. It was a perfect day for some personal bests, the weather was great, the company was good and I felt save with a few fellow freedivers around me that had been way deeper than I ever was. But in this case my planning didn't work out. I had put the pressure on too much and was fighting with things during my dive that I thought I had left behind me some time ago. Looking back I could see my doubts in the fact that I started packing, as if that would be equalization easier. Because of this and the fact that I am already quite buoyant I had to work much harder to get down to the freefall phase. Here I was already stressed while I still had to battle my mask. I was afraid for a mask squeeze, I forgot to flex the muscle behind my ears to open the tubes a little. Argh, very frustrating it was! With mixed feelings I went home, overthinking my 'sins'. Mind you! It was a great day but I had things to learn.

Then came today, diving again to max 25 meters so that calls for frc dives. My head still contained some green slimy stuff that luckely went away somewhat after a few dives. After some regular frc dives I removed my mask and put on my noseclip and goggles. I filled the goggles with lake water and went down just for the experience. I had done this last year as well and then only came as far as 12 meter, just below the thermocline. I don't know what it is yet, perhaps I got used to the temperature better or maybe pulling the wetsuithood-top as far down as possible helped but the 7C at the bottom did not bother me much and the freefall from 5 to 25 meters felt long, dreamy and fantastic. At about 10 meters I took a mouthfill, building up positive pressure with my cheeks so as not to move my tongue around when it is not yet needed (thanks Simo! I loose a lot less mouthfills this way!), put the soft palette so that I can blow/push air against the noseclip, flex that muscle near my ears and then just feel the temperature drop, feel my hand glide over the guide rope and hear the pitch of my lanyard brushing the rope get higher and higher as I pick up speed.

This was my most enjoyable freefall so far - loved it!

To finish our day at the lake we went looking near some manmade objects and spotted two Northern Pikes (actually this Snoek), one was really really fat and big, while the other was hanging at a depth for 2 meters for 15 minutes while we could get very close to it (10cm), close enough that we could basically count it's teeth.

What a day to be a freediver!

Stéphane Mifsud Static - 11:35 (WR)

2009-06-08T15:40:00.008+02:00

holy F!#K

Original in French

Translation in English

Stephane mifsud record du monde apnee 11min 35
by vinsdelacrau

OVH Dynamics 2009 results

2009-06-05T16:19:00.006+02:00

Ranking Naam discipline AP RP Penalty Points Remarks

(women)

1 Nanja van den Broek dnf 101 111 55.5 (non-official NR)

2 Natasha dyn 26 70 35

3 Jolanda dyn 0 68 34

4 Anuschka dnf 26 53 26.5

(men)
1 Eric dyn 105 137 68.5

2 Jouke van Riel dnf 75 119 59.5

3 Fred Steegstra dyn 80 108 54

4 Danny Martherus dnf -0,5 (sic) 105 2x5 42.5 (2x surface)

5 Jarno dnf 26 79 39.5

6 Erik Skoda dyn 0 79 39.5

7 Frans dyn 35 88 0 (SP)

Mantra for tonight's dynamic

2009-06-04T14:05:00.004+02:00

"If not now, then when?"

Chaos

2009-05-26T11:54:00.005+02:00

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...

William Trubridge - Freediving World Record no fins 88m (288ft)

2009-05-03T17:01:00.002+02:00

William Trubridge breaks the world record in Unnasisted Freediving with a dive to 88m (288ft) in 3 minutes 30 seconds. The dive was set at the Vertical Blue Invitational Freediving Competition in Dean's Blue Hole, Long Island, Bahamas.
For more information visit http://www.verticalblue.net

video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vF4PN8-2YSk

First small no-warmup frc static success and no-goggles dynamic.

2009-04-29T15:09:00.005+02:00

Yesterday in the pool I did a frc static of 4:02 with no warmup. This was the first time the no-warmup felt like a success. I had a good fight-phase and my safety told me I had no visible hypoxic signs at all.

On one of the other holds I improved my pool personal best to 4:18 where I found the surfacing a bit so-so but again my buddy told me that after one breath I looked fully recovered. During these other frc holds I noticed that I got progressively more relaxed when the contraction came. During the initial hold they were quite violent.

Nice!

After the 2 hour static of which about 1 hour was spend socializing we went to the other area where we do our dynamic training. Here I did my monofin training with short fins and a couple of 50+ meters no-fins, no-noseclip, no-goggles dynamics. These were just to get a feeling for it. I've done dynamics without a noseclip (but with goggles) in the past and in general liked them. The problem was that I lost some relaxation because water enters my nose and I have the urge for blowing out some bubbles. Swimming without goggles I have done very little, but since I do my TLC statics also without goggles I fear the stinging pool water less now. I was afraid for bad turns but that was no problem. Keeping the correct depth was a bigger problem but maybe with some practice that will improve. There is also the problem that at the end of the swim there is one less sensor to indicate hypoxy but that need not be a problem when I keep listening to my body. The dive reflex kicked in early - contractions start early at about 10-20 meters but this will be later once I relax a bit more.

If all goes well I want see how this goes during a small competition beginning of june.

FRC statics and depth training

2009-04-23T15:59:00.003+02:00

Here in The Netherlands there are not many lakes over 30 meters deep. The deepest one I know of is 52 meter deep. My max. depth so far is just 43 meters but with the recent successes in the pool I'm sure I will go deeper not to long from now.

Inspired by Eric Fattah's very impressive FRC dives at the Vertical Blue competition in the Bahamas I decided to practice my equalisation skills a bit more by dives on half full lungs the next period. Last year I did 21 meters on FRC and this year, with more ease, I equalled that plus I did 28 meters where I'm not sure if I took the exact same amount of air with me. Anyway, making progress with equalisation and having much more relaxed abdominal muscles and diaphragm.

I have done some FRC statics to get a feeling of where I stand at the moment. These are some stats...

FRC static dry
1 exhale:
2:56 83% SpO2%
2:52 87%
3:07 83%
2 exhales:
3:13 82%
4:20 74%
1 exhale:
4:05 73%
3 exhales:
4:32 64%
2 exhales:
3:40 75%

FRC static in the pool (SpO2% unknown)
2 exhales:
2:30
3:45
4:11

So 4:32 dry, 4:11 wet.

Yet another day at the factory

2009-04-17T15:28:00.002+02:00

Yesterday I did a couple of alltime low FRC statics. I think the best one was about 2:30. At least better than if I would not have done any.

8:01 - the movie

2009-04-15T11:44:00.003+02:00

My daughter made me this 8:01 drawing

2009-04-09T10:14:00.004+02:00

Better than any trophy! :-)

8:01

2009-04-02T10:31:00.006+02:00

So there you have it, I did an 8 minute static in competition for the first time last sunday. For me it did not totally come as a surprise because I did my first one in training about 6 months ago. But recent training did not go according to plan during the last few weeks before the competition. For this reason I took a week of from pool sessions. I did a little dry CO2 and O2 training but not much.

I was standing on the shoulders of giants because of all the tips and help I got from people around me and on the internet. Even so, for me personally this is a milestone I am very happy with. So I would like to put some more info on this blog that might be useful for other freedivers.

Some people asked what my preperation was and how the static went, so I will write about that here.

good night sleep
9:00: breakfast - two bananas and one bowl of yoghurt with honey
10:00: 2.5h car ride to Belgium, was drinking lots, mostly tea and water.
13:00: settled in the pool, relaxed a bit, chatting with fellow freedivers
13:30: be safety for Erik
13:45: be safety for Daan
14:00: kept drinking spa/water
14:09: start pack stretches
14:19: put my suit with 4kg weights on
14:24: deep breathing about 4 breaths per minute by the side of the pool
14:34: enter water (27C) empty lung (RV) static ~1:30
14:38: another empty lung static ~1:45 (about 50% of max)
14:40: 2x30s statics to find good amount of packs (tried 15 and 19 packs)
14:42: go to competition zone, normal breathing
14:43: 6 deep breaths during one minute (yes I know: hyperventilating)
14:44: tidal breathing, put noseclip on (no mask for me)
14:45: Official top (exhales, inhale, exhale, inhale, pack 15x)

Room for improvement here would be threefold.

1. stop hyperventilating for OT-2 till OT-1
2. don't do the empty static warmups anymore
3. one less exhale before OT

The static went pretty much as usual except that because of the lack of food in my system contractions came a little late at 3:45. My focus, determination and intend were better than in training. The first 30-60 seconds I was forcing myself to not influence my muscles. Trying to relax and see what my body would do, not identifying myself with either my body nor my thoughts. Usually I try to wait for thoughts and emotions to come, when they come mark them as 'thinking' without judgement and wait for the next event. The 'problem' I found with that is that at some point the words thinking, thinking, thinking quickly after each other start becoming heavy, like a hammer on a nail. This adds another layer. I then have to notice my noticing thoughts and let that pass. Maybe this is where true mindfulness starts but lately I found it works better to use some self-hypnoses instead of just the word 'thinking'. So what I did is tell myself in a way similar to talking to a little kid (I don't know the english term for it so that's why I describe it). I say (in dutch) "think slowly... slowly... and quiet...' Of course I say this slowly, firmly, matter-of-factish and as much as possible without stress. After doing this many times I arrived near 7 minutes, at that point deciding to better my n.r. of 7:33 and after that one (15 seconds) tap at a time. 8:01 was just about doable. I've been told that only at 7:30 contractions were visible which I find good because it also means that I was not mentally trying to influence them. At 7:45 I was aware I let out a few little streams of airbubbles. Since I was aware and clear-minded enough I allowed myself to pass 8 minutes.

For the first time in competition I did hook-breathing during recovery and I had the feeling that this did not yet automatically go as good as should be. More max attempts in training are needed for that. So two hook-breaths, two recovery breath, noseclip of, ok-sign, 'I am okay!' and wait for the result. I did not see a white card being shown to me, my safety (Daan, thank you!) told me and he was even happier than I was. My mind was not ready to let the outside world in just yet, that took another 5 minutes. (good times)

A movie of the last part will be on youtube soon.

Results of AIDA Belgium competition in Namur

2009-03-31T23:43:00.003+02:00

Competition in Namur (Belgium)

2009-03-28T11:46:00.005+01:00

On March 29th 2009 a small and friendly competition will be attended by about 8 Dutchmen. I will try to give updates here during the competition.

Some of us feel our bodies fight upcoming cold and other nasty stuff. Let's just hope we win at least that battle!

Going great here. Most faces look happy. Mine for sure because I did a great 8:01 nr static. I was looking up to dynamic but even though it went okay at first I could not find the motivation to resist the first big urge to service. Because I announced high I got massive penalties and now have to fight for third place. Nanja ranks first right now and she should be able to keep that.

The competition is over now.

Igor Migunov came first with the men and Nanja van den Broek with the women!

Many personal bests were improved, many happy faces all around for all kind of different reasons. Laura and Pauline did especially well!

I messed up both my dynamic and my no-fins. I should have done better there, but I didn't, and that's okay too! My mental and physical limits were reached that day.

Thank you Daan Verhoeven for being my safety yesterday and it's an honour to be the first one you coached over eight minutes.

I will do another post later with details about the static.

Freediving on dutch television

2009-03-11T14:57:00.003+01:00

Freediving was features on dutch television twice recently.

A nice ~45 minutes show with a popular dutch artist can be seen on this site (or here if you only want to see the movie). This was actually the first time on dutch tv that I think they properly explained why people freedive and they gave a good explanation about the risks involved without any of the usual hype-talk.

And then there is the following clip of new kid on the block 101.tv

Mental training

2009-03-02T10:32:00.003+01:00

I've been too busy to post here with doing as little as possible, so now it's time for an update.

I already wrote I went to a Tsa Lung workshop to pick up some relaxation and breathing techniques. Well, I did... and I didn't... I really don't know if I picked up anything useful. It was good to sit there and focus on the teachers sometimes incomprehensible english. I guess I expected more exercises and some more explanation about them. Anyway, it was the beginning of more mental training which is now slowly taking over from my days in the fitness factory.

Some days later Jouke, a training buddy, and I visited a local meditation afternoon crash course that was teached by Annet Polman at YogaMoves. This was one afternoon well spent I would say. Not too heavy material, quite useful, very down to earth (mostly :-)) It felt like a refreshment course which I apparently needed. A funny incident was that there was this beautiful brown eyed girl sitting next to me. During the break she told us that she was in love with the water. This started with her seeing The Big Blue where she also fell in love (big theme with her perhaps?) with the main actor. So I asked her - "the macho or the softy?" - the softy she told us. Mr. macho (soon to be married) Jouke, former european grappling champion was very very quiet after that :-). Thank you, whatever your name is!

Ehhmmm, I think I got distracted there for a minute. Where was I? Right! Mental... I did some more yoga sessions where I could stay in the moment better each time. I've not done any (near) personal bests lately but the fun and excitement is definitely back!

(picture by don.mihai)

Monofin footpocket angle

2009-03-01T10:03:00.003+01:00

Over the last two years I've tried or owned a few monofins. They are all nice fins but steady improvements over time. The Hyper Pro was my favorite (where I did 150 meters with once) until I received my new Waterway Glide last week. The Triton fin was nice for it's footpocket fit and better angle (compared to the Hyper Pro) but way to hard for me.

I've made some pictures of a little experiment. I would be sitting on the floor with my legs and ankles as straight as possible. Then I'd put as many dvd covers underneath the end of the fin until the top of stack would touch the fin. Now, the Waterway scores best but I have to redo the test with a friend's (WW) monofin because I think I remember that his fin would almost touch the floor. Anyway, these are the results...

Leaderfins Hyper Pro (23 dvd covers)

Triton (17 dvd covers)

Waterway Glide (10 dvd covers)

BTW I've added 0.5kg between the footpockets to make the fin neutral at 1 meter.

Faith - the opposite of fear

2009-02-27T11:36:00.006+01:00

faith

[feyth]

–noun

1.	confidence or trust in a person or thing: faith in another's ability.

2.	belief that is not based on proof: He had faith that the hypothesis would be substantiated by fact.

3.	belief in God or in the doctrines or teachings of religion: the firm faith of the Pilgrims.

4.	belief in anything, as a code of ethics, standards of merit, etc.:to be of the same faith with someone concerning honesty.

5.	a system of religious belief: the Christian faith; the Jewish faith.

6.	the obligation of loyalty or fidelity to a person, promise, engagement, etc.: Failure to appear would be breaking faith.

7.	the observance of this obligation; fidelity to one's promise, oath, allegiance, etc.: He was the only one who proved his faith during our recent troubles.

8.	Christian Theology. the trust in God and in His promises as made through Christ and the Scriptures by which humans are justified or saved.

—Idiom

9.	in faith, in truth; indeed: In faith, he is a fine lad.

Origin:
1200–50; ME feith < class="ital-inline" style="font-family: verdana; font-size: 100%; color: rgb(77, 78, 81); line-height: 1.25em; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; font-style: italic; ">fed, OF feid, feit < class="ital-inline" style="font-family: verdana; font-size: 100%; color: rgb(77, 78, 81); line-height: 1.25em; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; font-style: italic; ">fidem, acc. of fidēstrust, akin to fīdere to trust.

fear

[feer]

–noun

1.	a distressing emotion aroused by impending danger, evil, pain, etc., whether the threat is real or imagined; the feeling or condition of being afraid.

2.	a specific instance of or propensity for such a feeling: an abnormal fear of heights.

3.	concern or anxiety; solicitude: a fear for someone's safety.

4.	reverential awe, esp. toward God.

5.	that which causes a feeling of being afraid; that of which a person is afraid: Cancer is a common fear.

–verb (used with object)

6.	to regard with fear; be afraid of.

7.	to have reverential awe of.

8.	Archaic. to experience fear in (oneself).

–verb (used without object)

9.	to have fear; be afraid.

Origin:

bef. 900; ME fere, OE fær sudden attack or danger; c. OS fārambush, D gevaar, G Gefahr danger, ON fār disaster

(source: dictionary.com)

"Son of a mermaid" Free diving under water song

2009-02-24T09:58:00.002+01:00

(More clips by Jeroen Elout can be seen here and here)

Tsa lung by Tulku Lama Lobsang

2009-02-23T11:46:00.003+01:00

By change I came across a guy that told me about Tsa Lung which is " a technique that combines movements with holding the breath". It's not every day that I get a change to do a workshop which features holding my breath so I decided to just do it and see what it will bring me.

Reading the Wikipedia article does not make it very clear to me, it sounds a bit fuzzy and thus scary. In the past the combination of the words fuzzy and religion made me do a step back. Over the years I have learned that these type of things are often fuzzy because words are not the right tool to explain these things. And anyway - I'm a big boy now :-) so let's go...

The man giving the workshop next wednesday is called Tulku Lama Lobsang. I will let you know how it went...