National champs video

So, if this uploads correctly this should provide the video footage of my NR dive there. A couple of comments on the video:

• The technique is surprisingly good, taking into account that I had used that mono and 2-kick and glide - style for only 4 times ...
• I still do the knee-kick, but with this kick-glide technique it is not anymore that critical
• Upper body is quite stable and balanced.
  
• I'll manage to maintain surprisingly steady and relaxed pace throughout the dive, which is extremely good!
  
• The mono is slightly too hard, as my knees keep opening on every kick, but this could only be due to the lack of training with this fin. I have trained lower abs quite much, so I should be able to manage this strength better from now on.
  
• The mono blade is very well done and bends very evenly
• I have to work more on my ankle flexibility, as that is the weakest link preventing more hydrodynamic gliding position
• The surface protocol looks as easy as it felt back then. Some more experience on 175+ dives, and then shooting for the 200m mark... :)

For the coming summer the main emphasis will though be on another freediving project: www.dive4aid.net (English pages should be up and running after weekend). Long story short: two training friends and I are planning to collect money for charity (MS-disease and Leukemia) by attempting to break all the Finnish men's depth diving national records in Menorca this July-August. We're planning to update the training diary almost daily, so keep postes over there. And feel free to contribute :).

-EeroS

Recap - Pool national champs 2008

Ok… One job requiring overly intensive time allocation could be interpreted as bad luck or something similar and innocent, but two in a row is a sign of some unconscious masochistic perversion. Then again, I have some seriously ambitious goals also (or should I say ESPECIALLY) in working, so some extra efforts are required there as well in order to earn the privilege to play with the big boys. So training remains a tight balancing act between working and other commitments for the foreseeable future, but enough of that. Just understand that setting up my computer after working day is often not the first thing on my mind, so updates can occasionally be few and far in between… Anyway

By the time of my last entry I was approaching the final build-up stages in my build-up to national championships with at monofin that was falling apart with every kick I made. We were supposed to have a training camp with the national team with plenty of dedicated pool time. The problem was that the make-shift patches I had made did not hold, and I did not dare dive at all in the training camp with it. And to make things worse I had some annoying pain in my shoulder that prevented any DNF attempts. So, weekend of recreational diving and pizza for me. Bad luck but I managed to live through the disappointments. The other finalization trainings went to hell also: hypothermia, colliding with a scuba diver on max attempt, bailing out prematurely due to lack of concentration… Not exactly the kind of stuff to boost confidence and motivation prior to a big comp.

Then I FINALLY received the monofin I had ordered from Polyorg. 13 months after ordering. Yes, THIRTEEN. ONE-THREE. Additionally the monofin I finally received was not the one I had ordered: I had ordered a Russian Hyperfin with a clear extension that comes below the heel that gives a free upper kick, but instead I got a regular Waterway replica (?). No heel-extension, and the quality is not exactly top-notch, since some glue connections are already ripping apart… But, even though it was at least a temporary improvement to my previous monofin: The new monofin did not feel comfortable in constant kicking (too hard blade) or in kick-and-glide (too steep angle in foot pocket causing inefficient start position for the kick), but for 2-kick-and-glide style similar to Dave Mullins’s technique it was the best mono I had ever tried: first small kick to get the position right and then the second slightly harder kick to truly capitalize the extremely well-fitting foot pocket connected to a hard blade followed by a long glide where the steep angle keeps the mono in a hydrodynamic position. After getting the first feel of the mono I started to understand how Stig is able to do 50m with fewer than 10 kicks, and that it is not even all that hard a goal for me either!!! I knew it would be a big risk to use a new and fundamentally different mono in a big competition with less than 5 times using it in water, but the benefits were just so clear that I was ready to take that risk.

The last week before the comp I had trouble arranging any quality water time, but all of a sudden I got the perfect chance when the safety organization was doing their finalization training in the official 50m comp pool a few days before the comp. Long story short: I did comp-like preparations (concentration, stretching etc.), warm-up dives and had a go for it. I dove about 160m without any problems whatsoever. I have had several 50m dives that have felt more challenging than that one. I stopped at that point because I had no recent experience in long dives, and because it was enough to outdo Jyri Vehmaskoski’s unofficial national season best of 155m ;). So, some confidence was regained just in time for the Comp.

The actual preparations for the competition went without any incidents: spotting Antero and Aleksi for their statics, stretching, concentrating, hydrating etc. along the day. Then came my turn to do the DNF I had signed up months ago. I hadn’t done ANY DNF trainings for almost a year, and I was totally focused on DYN, so I had no urge to do the DNF in the first place. But I did start it even though I still don’t know why I did it. At the first contractions at 50m I started wondering what the hell I was doing there, and since I was not able to come up with a reason I ended the dive in 66m to save my strength for the main course. I was happy to see that the newer guys who have been training very hard on DNF were generally able to perform well in the comp: Atte and Jone got their first national medals and Mikko Pöntynen took the title with a new national record of about 130m. There was no way I would have had the guts to go that far without any routine on longer dives, so retrospectively thinking I had no chance to renew my title and record in DNF that time.

Then off to the main course, DYN. I kept myself warm, hydrated, focused and positive for the entire time before the dive. At 20min before OT I put the mono on, did 2x60m training dives to test the technique, and then sat on the side of the pool with the mono on until my OT. The waiting time was easy to arrange since I’m back to using my wet suit (minor inconvenience during diving is more than offset by the assurance that hypothermia will not kill my dive), and because the foot pocket is comfortable for up to 30min even though it fits like a glove. The start went well, no packing dizziness or problems with the timing of the start to OT-window. Instantly at the start I felt total relaxation during the long glide phases and I just kept enjoying the Flow through liquid :). At 80m I started to anticipate the uncomfortable zone, and it came at 90m but since I was so well focused I was able to shake it off already during the next glide phase, so at 95m point I was again totally in the comfort zone. As nothing unexpected happened until 110m I was sure that I would be making it to 150m. I did not feel any need to accelerate as the gliding was feeling so relaxing, but I think that out of some bad habit I was not able to glide quite as much towards the end of the dive. So, the main focus for the dive from 125m point on was to ensure glide position, relax and enjoy the glide, and before each kick pair to do a quick status check on lactic acids and O2-warnings. I felt the first lactic acids at 145m, but for the remainder of the dive I was able to shake them off completely during the glides. For what came to the O2-warnings that I had been so cautiously been preparing for, they never appeared!!! I just kept on kicking and gliding from 150m looking for some signs of O2-warnings, but nothing happened! Instead, I came to the point where the pool depth dropped once again from about 2m to about 1,2m, and I had beforehand decided that no matter what I felt at that point I would end the dive there since it would be a safe place to do SP as I would be able to stand firmly on the bottom. So, in the last few meters I aimed more for the bottom profile than for going forward that I almost lost my way to the next lane, but apparently it didn’t matter since I was able to perform the SP without any problems, and felt instantly after that I could have gone much, much further: Mild lactic acids and STILL no O2-warnings!!! The final distance was 184m, which was a new NR, and was enough to renew my national title with almost 30m margin. The dive was filmed, and it has been processed into a DVD that should be available any time now, so I’m looking to attach that video here as well, but remembering that computers hate me as much as I hate them I wouldn’t hold my breath while waiting for it.

So, after a big comp the first objective is to counter the unavoidable training hung-over, but since I had seriously been preparing for the competition only a few days the back-lash was short as well. I started training again within a week, still focusing on relaxation and fun rather than distance. Now my aim is to do multiple reps to 175m to gain routine and confidence for that distance and not go for 200m before I have had at least 5 successful and strong 175m dives. Looking back last summer I had performed only a few strong 150+ dives and then went straight for the 200m mark, and I don’t want to make that mistake again.

Unfortunately our indoor pool sessions end now for some weeks, so I’m forced to do more of other trainings for some time now. But luckily after that the Olympic outdoor swimming pool opens, and I’ll be having a chance to dive in a 50m constant depth pool once a week, so something good to look forward to.

Additionally some friends and I have planned another quite different diving project for this summer, but more on that when we have structured our thoughts better regarding it…

PS. THANX for your comments and encouragements!!! They have been a great source of confidence and motivation when I have been having some bad luck or other mentally challenging periods. Hopefully I can repay part of that by giving some possibly useful ideas / insights to the things that I have found useful in freediving.

Long time no see

It’s been a while since my last entry. The break from updating this blog began because I was out of contact with my computer for the remainder of the summer. After that I’ve intentionally refrained myself from updating this blog since it could have led to misunderstandings while I was applying for a new job. After all, freediving is only a hobby for me, but while analyzing my development as a diver and obstacles for training the work-imposed issues keep coming up quite frequently, and I have the bad habit of using harsh language to describe it that could be interpreted negatively from the part of potential employers. Anyway, I’m starting in my new job next week, so I can write more freely about my training once more.

So, I’ve been training consistently all this time but I’ve also made some fundamental changes in my training routines and weightings.

The first impulse to change my current practices came from a course that Martin Stepanek gave to a bunch of Finnish freedivers in the beginning of fall. The main take-aways that I got were the

1. Systematic and disciplined training focus that had strong resemblances to other competitive sports training.
2. Identifying and working on more clearly separated dimensions of diving (CO2-tolerance, adaptation, technique…).
3. Focusing on providing the body the prerequisites for reacting to the training in a way that is beneficial to freediving i.e. by recovery nutrition and hydration.

These may seem like self-evident observations, but Martin had developed the first two into a completely new level that I want to pursue myself as well. The third had been embarrassingly neglected aspect in my training until then: basically I had just typically gone to bed after training without ANY nutrition that the body could have used to rebuild itself after training! No wonder my development had been so slow!

The second impulse came when Susanna Saari organized the Finnish national team the possibility to take part in a comprehensive and professionally organized physical condition and body structure test. The results were for me quite devastating and disappointing. Although I had been training relatively hard, and I thought that I would have been in a comparable shape to that of my navy year the results indicated that I was almost on an average level compared to normal recreational athletes. My relative O2 intake was 52,8 ml/kg/min, and my lactate was 14,58 which is not much compared to my training amount. This got me recalling a course that Sebastien Murat gave us a year back when he told us that at his peak condition his max O2 intake was similar to a 12-year old girl: So low max O2 intake can be a sign of a body that is well adapted to perform under low blood pO2-conditions, so nothing to be worried yet. Then came the aerobic and anaerobic thresholds, 121 and 171 bpm respectively. So, when I stand up, my aerobic threshold is exceeded, and basically ALL my endurance training (interval running, spinning etc. had been well above my anaerobic threshold. That is, I have no base condition to speak of, which is a poor ground to build other training routines. Finally there was the body composition analysis. There the effects of my vegetarian (occasional fish and eggs) diet and poor emphasis on post-training nutrition intake were clear as day: the composition was healthy in general, but I had absolutely no muscle mass to speak of: 36kg of muscle out of 73kg total weight, which is only slightly above the normal population’s average although I honestly claim that I train more that the average guy… In comparison, Lauri Lilja, who is about 5-10cm taller had 12kg more absolute muscle, and even Mikko Pöntinen who confessed that he trained very little strength exercises had more muscle than I did. Otherwise I wouldn’t have been bothered by these results, since excess muscle mass only consumes unnecessarily much oxygen, that should be reserved for the brains, right? Then I recalled, that some of the world’s best divers are currently not shying away from building up muscles (Herbert, Martin, Stig). I figure this has to do with developed dive reflexes that restrains blood circulation to muscles, so that muscle mass is not, if well prepared, counterproductive to freediving, and can even be advantageous repository of energy needed for long dives.

So, what should I do with these new insights on my training’s impact? At first I was stunned and demoralized for a while after it occurred to me just how much unproductive work I had done, how much unnecessary pain I had endured and how much development I had missed. Then, slowly I began taking into effect the revised training practices:

1. Nutrition drink before and after training composing mostly of carbon hydrates and some protein to enable my body to develop after the training. The results have been amazing: I feel very energetic during training, and I have swiftly reached some milestones of physical strength that have eluded me for years although I haven’t been training on strength as much as before.
2. Technique training with small training fins to focus training effect on the most wanted muscle groups. The other reason for this emphasis is that my monofin is falling apart, and the replacement I ordered from Polyorg 19.2.2007 (yes, more than a year ago) is nowhere to be found and the guy responsible does not even bother answering my emails anymore… Let’s just hope that the patched monofin holds together for a few more weeks.
3. O2 tolerance and dive reflex training. I began this by doing empty-lung statics, but progressed in doing empty-lung static at the bottom of a pool followed by a dynamic apnea, usually 45sec static and 30-50m dynamic with small fins. This is an excellent exercise to develop dive reflex (hr drops below 40 during static, and does not rise above 50 during dynamic), to teach the body to operate under low O2-levels, and to increase awareness to what it feels like when a DYNAMIC dive goes near LMC/BO-limits (very different from a static dive’s warnings, as I unfortunately found out during my last competition DNF dive…). A strong word of warning however: DO NOT DO THIS ALONE! NOT ONCE! EVER! These dives end up systematically very close to LMC-limits, and personally I trust only a handful of dive buddies so much that I am willing to do these trainings at all: I’ve been training with these guys for several years and without exception all of them are competitive divers themselves as well. Basically these exercises are THE most dangerous things I have ever done in water, and I strongly recommend avoiding them unless you have trained freediving consistently for at least 5 years. A safer variant of the same exercise can be done out of water as well: empty-lung crouch jumps: 4x25 + 5x20 = 200 jumps. Trust me, you know when you have done this set of exercises…
4. Additionally I’ve been including some base endurance training to my weekly program as well: 1x hour+ jogging session at average hr of 145 and some relaxed swimming as well. I have tried to take the intensity down in spinning and squash as well, but but with little success so far.

So, now I need to see how well this all is coming together to aid my overall freediving abilities. The next real test should be our national championships on 23.3. Before that we’ll be having national team’s diving camp this weekend, which I'll devote to training my competition readiness. Let’s see how things are coming together. My expectations are very high, assuming that I can overcome the psychological barriers related to long dives that I haven’t been working on at all for several months now.

Never change a winning game, always change a losing game

The problems I’ve been having with my prevailing approach to diving appear to be even more fundamental than I had assumed after the DYN disaster.

The static competition regained some of my lost self confidence, as I managed to improve my competition record from 5:33 to 6:04 with a dive that felt like a 3min static. I quit my dive static right after 6min mark because I hadn’t done any over 4min statics in 3 years, and I was not sure of my static routines. I had told my coach/safety diver Timo that he would drag me up after 6min mark whether or not I wanted to come up voluntarily. After that I felt that I could have done 7min easily. And looking at the low qualification limits for static’s A- and B- finals, and the less than impressive results in both those finals I felt slightly disappointed that I hadn’t trained static more for these competitions.

So, I started to prepare myself for the DNF qualification heats. The main points I focused on were basically the points that I assumed were accountable for the DYN disaster:

• Over-doing the concentration: This time I took the approach that this is just one dive among many similar dives
• Range-philosophy: I dove 1 hand stroke at a time trying to listen to my body’s signals on remaining time
• Hyperventilation: No extraordinary breathing before 30sec to OT (this gave me time to ventilate the lungs 3-4 times before packing
• Dehydration: This time I drank the water constantly
• Acceleration: I constantly counted the hand strokes and was prepared to bail out if my pace got over 4 strokes per 25m.

Even though I succeeded in correcting all these mistakes I made in DYN I still managed to go beyond my capabilities, and the dive ended at BO at around 130m mark. The most puzzling thing was, that I felt good and in control the entire dive, and everything went as planned. Thinking with hindsight I had some O2-warnings going on at 125m mark, but in the empty-lung warm-ups I had managed to tolerate exactly the same kind of warnings for over 30sec with no problems at surfacing. And still I managed to BO. Apparently empty-lung statics are much more different than dynamic performances than I had expected.

Now I need to take some break from diving for a couple of weeks or so to gain some perspective into what the hell is going on with my diving. After that I need to discuss with other divers who have encountered similar problems to learn how they managed to deal with this kind of situation. Anyway, here are some preliminary ideas that I’ll be changing in my diving, in addition to all the other ones learned from the DYN disaster:

Paradigm change #1: No warm-ups

Out of the all DYN A-finalists only a few did anything that could be classified as warm-ups. Alexey did one 100m DYN with 1^st attempt and exited the pool for around 30min and didn’t re-enter the pool until less than 2min to OT. Stig did a couple of 80m DYNs, and remained in the pool to breathe for 5-10min before OT. Basically all the other divers in both men’s and women's A-finals only went into the pool at around 1:30 before OT.

Comparing this to my warm-up routine of doing 1-2 full-lung statics, 2-4 50% dynamics and 3-5 empty-lung dives brings up a hugely differing pattern. I’m basically doing a semi-hard exercise before the actual max-attempt!

Paradigm change #2: Stay warm before the dive

I have intentionally sought to cool my body down before the dive, even if it means letting some water into the wetsuit. The rationale behind this is to strengthen the vasoconstriction and increase dive reflex, but it is possible that these advantages are more than offset by the facts that cool body requires more energy (oxygen) to stay warm and that O2 is more strongly bounded to cooler blood than warmer blood (which leads to BOs at higher pO2-levels). This should be easy to arrange as I plan to drop the warm-ups that usually causes the hypothermia.

Paradigm change #3: Quit instantly at O2-warnings

The ability to cope with O2-warnings in STA has nothing to do with the ability to tolerate them during DYN and DNF. When I notice O2-warnings in the future, I’ll abort the dive instantly. No matter how close some ‘milestone’ might be. No ‘milestone’ is worth risking yet another BO.

Paradigm change #4: Announce 1m

I found myself setting some milestones based on the speculations of A- and B-final limits. In the future I want my dives to be based on my own abilities instead of external requirements. One way to promote this approach is to announce so little, that you have no information on other diver’s performances.

Paradigm change #5: Less gear

In DYN finals no-one used pool suits. Most likely because they didn’t need them to cope with hypothermia because they did no warm-ups. In DNF I saw only Stig using a pool suit. All others dove in swimsuits or some extremely light suits made for competitive swimmers. Additionally some top divers, such as Natalia and Alexey dove without goggles, wearing only a small nose clip.

So, from now on I’ll be trying to dive max dives without pool suit and without goggles, and possibly even without a nose clip. If I find that some of these pieces of equipment are critically
required I’ll re-add them to my equipment category. Otherwise less is more.

But, anyway now off to a break from pool diving. I am pretty sure that I won’t be quitting pool diving, even at competitive level, but I have a lot of mind work to do regarding some fundamental questions related to it before I can go on with it.

Over and out.

What the fuck just happened?

Yesterday everything was perfect. 160+m perfectly controlled and easy training dive. And today total disaster at around 160m mark requiring safety diver intervention. What the fuck went wrong between those dives?

Summary of today’s events

Slept late, as planned since my OT was not due until 19:00. Did some stretching in the morning, and everything was good. I’ve never been as flexible in the morning. Ate some bananas (for HH) and rye bread (for fiber) throughout the day. No decent meal at any point.

Kept on visualizing the upcoming dive’s presumably difficult parts i.e. what happens after 100m turn. I had planned to utilize my previously successful ‘range’ philosophy for today’s dive as well. Yesterday I had set the range for 20-40 kicks past 100m mark, and surfaced at the upper limit of 40 kicks, which was about 160m. I surfaced because I had promised myself that even though I had no problems whatsoever. For today’s dive I set myself the range of 40-60 kicks past 100m mark, and I seriously thought that I would reach the 200m mark today.

Pre-warm-up preparations went well. I have never been so flexible during training, and I was able to maintain good positive mood throughout my mental visualization trainings. But after all was supposed to have been good to go, things took a turn for the worse.

I tried some packing to check for my susceptibility for packing blackouts, and almost lost consciousness on the inhale alone. Nothing dramatic: just quickly drinking more mineral water to increase blood pressure. I drank almost 1,5l of mineral water before I was able to pack at all, and by this time all my pre-acquired self confidence had disappeared: I was afraid of failing the dive before I even reached 10m mark! Anyway, off to water for warm-up dives.

The warm-up dives went completely as planned and as they had gone yesterday. The only cause for doubt s was the fact that all the 1,5l of mineral water ‘stayed in’ and I had no urge to go to toilet at all. Most likely my dehydration level was far more than 1,5l… Technically the warm-ups went completely as planned, but I still noticed myself thinking about the upcoming dive in an anxious way. I was not convinced of my abilities to reach my goals. This anxiety must have been a major cause for my excessive (hyper)ventilation that started already 4min before OT.

The start of the dive was not perfect. The packing dizziness came back, moderately, and I was forced to abort my packing at about 80% point and start the dive prematurely. After that I managed to get into a good rhythm for the 50m mark. The 50m turn was OK, and I started to anticipate the upcoming uncomfortable CO2-warnings. The warnings came and went as planned (70-90m) and I started to prepare for the 100m turn, where the ‘real’ dive and the counting of the kicks was supposed to begin. At the 100m mark all hell broke loose. My fin collided with the fin of the guy in the next lane and all my concentration, planning and self control crumbled down like a house of cards. I went into panic. I started sprinting already from 100m point on and was not able to slow myself down. I just kept counting the kicks to reach the lower limit of my ‘range’ and bail out as soon as possible. I reached the 150m turn with 30 kicks, continued for the extra 10 kicks to complete the 40 kick quota, reached for the rope and, according to team mate’s description, blacked out. At around 160m mark. With no lactic acids to speak of. A distance that should have been reachable under every disaster scenario. Apparently it wasn’t.

So, here is the post-mortem of the major fuck-ups I made:

Fuck-up #1: Range philosophy

This works well under controlled circumstances, such as training dives. The benefit of the ‘range’ philosophy is the fact that you can ignore the unpleasant feelings completely and focus on reaching the lower limit of the ‘range’ before opening up to listen to your body’s ability to operate within the ‘range’. This philosophy does not account for the fact that the premises under which the range has been set can change during the dive (such as due to panicking, for instance).

If you cannot control your mind without totally blocking the messages your body sends to you, you are not supposed to dive any further.

Fuck-up #2: Dehydration

Drink the goddamned mineral water, moron.

Fuck-up #3: Hyperventilation

Don’t start deep ventilation until 30sec before OT.

If you cannot handle the CO2-load without hyperventilation, you are not supposed to dive any further.

Fuck-up #4: Pushing the limits

In the beginning of this blog I stated that I was willing to push my limits. Now that I have gone beyond my limits once I can say that that is not the way to go. I‘ll need to develop mental strength instead to better judge my ability to proceed instead of having foolish admirations of some kamikaze-like boundary hunting (exaggerating a bit to make my point).

I don’t blame the other guy with whom I collided with least bit for my failure. Such panicking should not be triggered by any interference. If some truly important and unforeseen obstacle occurs, I should abort the dive, not just kick away panicing. The collision, or more likely the slight touch of fins, only unleashed the demons that were only barely under control at that delicate turning point, and it would have been a miracle if I had been able to perform a good dive even if I had dove in an empty pool. If I had not encountered the problems related to my diving philosophy today, I would surely have encountered them later, most likely under less secure conditions.

No shortage of lessons to be learned. Actually ‘lesson’ is too light a word to describe what needs to be modified. So, here are the major fundamental diving paradigms that need to be altered. Starting first thing tomorrow.

Paradigm change #1: Kick-and glide, one at a time

The less kicks needed, the less total work needed to cover a distance, the less energy required. And some dive-reflex stuff to promote that approach as well.

But the most important reason for changing into this approach is to regain the control to what is happening in my body throughout the dive. In every glide phase I have a lot of time to listen to myself and determine whether or not I’m capable of doing the next kick safely. This is likely to set me back for months in my pursuit for the 200m mark, but I don’t want to risk another black-out EVER in my life.

Quite interestingly all the top names, Severinsen, Molchanov and Larsen used extremely slow, but fluent kick-and-glide technique, although at least Stig and Alexey have demonstrated that they master the continuous kicking style as well. I did not count accurately, but Stig must have done less than 10 kicks per 50m, and it looked so fluent and easy that I couldn’t help myself just admiring the fluency with which he flew through the water.

Paradigm change #2: Hyperventilation is a cause for aborting the dive

If I find myself hyperventilating before the dive, I know that I am aiming higher than I believe I am capable of. If hyperventilation is detected, and OT is too soon to eradicate it’s effect, I will abort the start.

Paradigm change #3: Limits to endurance’s omnipotence

There is only so much that you can do with increased endurance. There is a reason why world’s top marathon runners, cyclists or full distance triathletes don’t have a past time hobby for breaking freediving world records. Today I did not feel physically exhausted at legs, like I do in interval running and cycling, but still I managed to black out. Judging my remaining ability to continue diving cannot be based on the feeling from my legs.

Game plan for DNF (and future DYN attempts)

One hand stroke at a time with loooong glides in between. If I find myself (1) accelerating or (2) shortening the glide phase or (3) having doubts about the next hand stroke’s safety I will abort the dive instantaneously.

Gladiator in arena consilium capit

i.e. 'The gladiator is making his plan in the arena.' A fancy way of saying 'too late'.

One critical prerequisite for pulling off a performance that meets your true capabilities in a competition is knowing well beforehand what you are going to do, when and why. This helps you to free your mind from thinking about irrelevant and mundane practicalities and allows you to focus on concentrating on the actual performance even under uncertain, complex and occasionally chaotic conditions. This is an especially acute problem in freediving competitions where you have only a couple of seconds' time window to start your performance, you only get one shot to leverage the fruits of perhaps several years' of training and it only takes a split second loss of concentration and determination to bail out due to some lame excuse.

So, here's roughly the plan I'll be following for DYN qualifying heats:

• Day before competition
  
• No physically exhausting activities, only some stretching
• Possibly light technique dives if pool option is available
  
• Using warm clothes to lower the risk of getting cold
  
• Normal, balanced diet containing all major food groups (protein, carbs, fiber)
• Open big mineral water bottle to get rid of bubbles overnight
  
• Early to bed
• Competition morning
  
• Get up early, around 4:30, to ensure completely awakened state during dive
• Warm/hot shower to warm up muscles without physical work and to reduce the risk of hurting yourself while stretching
• Long stretching routine covering every major muscle group twice wearing warm clothes
  
• Balanced, normal and thoroughly chewed breakfast at around 08:00 (assuming OT at 12:00)
• Competition site
  
• Arrive early, absolutely no later than 09:30
• Drink mineral water moderately but frequently
  
• Finish registration etc. routines asap
• Check OT, lane, pool profile and judge's position
  
• Visualize the dive phase by phase at least 3-4 times trying to associate certain stages of the dive to visible landmarks in the bottom (if any); focus on familiarizing and overcoming early-possible-bail-out-areas
• Easy stretching and relaxing; avoiding staying on feet and walking around to minimize exhaustion
• Use selected music to remind yourself of the Flow
  
• Warm-up
• Suit-up early to be ready to jump to pool at least 5min before warm-up time begins
• 2-3 full-lung statics (2-3min) at the bottom of the pool trying to relax and enjoy the feel of water
• 2-3 45-60sec negative packing dives to trigger O2 dive reflex
• Put mono on
• 2x 55m warm-up dives focusing on non-explosive kicks
• Take mono off
• Easy 1min e-dives to maintain dive reflex (last e-dive ends no later than 6min before OT)
  
• Control body temperature by letting water into the suit if needed
• Check susceptibility for packing-BO by occasional max-packings
  
• Put mono on
• Intentionally try to come up excuses for explaining bad performance. Counter every one by reminding yourself how you performed well in training even when this excuse was far better founded than it is today.
  
• Preparations in competition lane
• Check lane rope tensions and choose preferred surfacing rope
  
• Relax
• Visualize start
• Ensure ventilation while avoiding hyperventilation
• Ignore distractions; they have no effect on your dive
• OT-15sec max inhale, max exhale calmly
• OT-10sec max inhale, 10 big packs quickly, lower down so only head is above water, 5-7 normal packs (slow breaks if experiencing dizziness), stop packing when limit is reached, start dive
• Dive
• 0-25m - Start: alert for compensating for packing dizziness otherwise hands together and relaxed slow-paced kicks
• 25-50m - Relaxation: relaxed, slow-paced and low-amplitude fluent motion
• 50-75m - Focus: maintain relaxed technique prepare for CO2-alarms
• 75-100m - Patience: Accept first CO2-alarms as a sign of body going into O2-conserving mode. No acceleration required.
  
• 100-125m - Acceleration: accelerate if needed, prepare to feel lactic acids
• 125-150m - Endurance: Notice and accept lactic acids. Accelerate. Wait for the Flow.
  
• 150-200m - The Flow: Be all you can be.
  
• SP
• Grab rope with preferred (left) hand, don't let go whatever happens
  
• Ventilate maximally regardless of feeling at the end of the dive
• Take facial equipment off during 2-3 first breaths using only the other hand (right)
• Throw facial equipment somewhere and use that motion to complete OK-sign
• Say 'I'm OK' with 4th exhale
• Continue ventilating maximally and holding the rope
• Relax ventilation, hold rope with both hands, wait for the card
• Allow yourself to begin enjoying the awesome post-dive feeling
• Recovery
• Easy swimming, jogging or walking instantly after the dive. Don't let the lactic acids stay immobile in your muscles.
• Long stretching of major, exhausted muscle groups
• Eating a couple of bananas
• Resting lying on the back, keeping legs relaxed and elevated
  

Pay day

Finally, the long and determined basic endurance training is starting to pay off. Big time. The final build-up to the Maribor WC has been focused on long DYN/DNF attempts on every opportunity I've had.
First on 11.6. I dove 111m DNF extremely easily and was able to conserve my technique throughout the entire dive. Then we had our national team's 'dress rehearsal' diving camp at a local sport institution on 16.-17.6. where I pulled off easy 154 DYN twice and easy 105m DNF despite the fact that our coach Jyri intentionally built us some inconveniences to simulate competition stress. Finally I managed to overcome the long-lasting anxiety to perform well in a 50m pool last Wednesday as I dove easy 157m DYN even though I had done perhaps the hardest running exercise of the spring only the day before.
I've been completely OK after each and every one of these dives, and this has given me enormous confidence to know that I can do 150+ DYN and 100+ DNF whenever I want even with poor preparation, insufficient recovery, non-existent concentration and with little pushing. I've felt some lactic acids starting to build up after 140m DYN, and I've accelerated to 4-5 hand strokes per 25m after 75m in DNF, but I've been completely in control of all these actions: after the dive reflex kicks in the additional work only builds muscle lactic acids, and the levels generated by these dives is far below the levels I'm used to in my endurance exercises.

Now, off to slowly cool down the training rhythm and begin concentrating for the Maribor WC. Looks like I'll be able to convince myself to aim for the next wall in both dynamic disciplines...