Freediving masterclass in London, day 3.

Back to the third and last part of this Training Course. What follows is a subject that has always excited me and motivated me to gain more and more insight ever since I started. Static apnea had been my strong asset for many years.

Thus, I was given the opportunity to collect all the information that led to my breaking the 8 minute barrier and present it to all the members of Apnea Revolution!

Equipment, training, relaxation techniques, as well as practical training from all the members of the club, made the penultimate day of the course extremely impressive.

THEORETICAL PART

• Equipment

• Training cycles

• Over-training and symptoms

• Warm up

• Breathing techniques before the attempt

• Mental activity during an apnea attempt.

The theoretical part lasted for 90 minutes and the participants seemed satisfied with the overwhelming information and knowledge they gained from the topics covered.

In my opinion, some of the most important subjects presented were those of over-training and its symptoms, the training cycles and the mental activity during a static apnea.

I would like to start by detailing the subject of over-training exactly as it was discussed and presented to the audience of the free diving club, Apnea Revolution!

OVER TRAINING SYMPTOMS

The over-training synmtom is something that can appear during the competition period when we add high intensity apnea attempts.

The over-training symptoms appear after a long training period, characterized by irregular and careless training volume and intensity.

Some of the over-training symptoms during static training period may include:

• Increased heart rate at rest

• Unexplained fatigue and sleepiness

• Sleep disturbance ( trouble falling asleep)

• Trouble waking up

• Decreased mood for training

• Decreased performance

• Increased feeling of discomfort during static apnea

An easy way to prevent the over-training syndrome is to regularly check the progress of our training and right planning of our training cycles. A good idea is to include one week of low intensity training (deload phase) every three weeks.

In what follows I attach a personal hierarchy as far as the manifestation of the over-training symptoms is concerned.

After mentioning the symptoms that you have read, the ways in which we can avoid the over-training symptoms were also analyzed.

Finally, we closed the theoretical part with a burning issue. The way to relax during a static apnea. There was a presentation of the routine I have been following since 2013 and has helped me overcome the serious issues I had with my relaxation.

This exercise keeps the brain in passive function. In a few words, this approach disorientates brain activity into something neutral and it keeps the brain idle, making it less vulnerable to stress!

I would really like to share this particular routine with you, but it wouldn’t be fair to the members of the club…

After the theory had finished, we moved on to practice, when all the members of the club carried out a static apnea training, putting into practice the techniques of relaxation and breathing while entering and exiting the water.

Some wished to put these techniques into practice while making a maximum attempt. Some of them were impressed, and even achieved a new personal record.

In the fourth and last part of this training course, the official promo-video will be published, which will include scenes from the practical parts of the seminar!