Tag: safety

Covid-19 and the Freediving season so far

~ @S2WFreediving ~ 2 Comments

My buddy and I were just gathering momentum in our pool training, when Covid-19, a.k.a. the Corona virus, started to wreak havoc all around the world.

This winter has been all about Dynamic No-Fins (DNF). We were halfway the last lane building up to a full 100 meters – the goal before the winter season would end – when pretty much everything went on lockdown.

A huge bummer, since the water outside hadn’t warmed up enough… yet. But even when spring arrived and the weather got better and better, there was some hesitance to be noticed among our regular freediving colleagues. Which is probably only logical since both diver and buddy need to ventilate near each other when surfacing. And all measures to keep distance are at the expense of safety.

For buddies who are roommates or lovers this is a non-issue. But for all other freedivers it definitely is. Do you dive with different people? How do you decide who you trust with you on the buoy? Health-wise and/or safety wise.

In the end I decided to just trust Peter, who has been my buddy all winter and values his lungs as much as I do 🙂 That makes me believe he pays attention in his contacts with others the way I do. In addition to that, I decided to trust my own body in the worst case scenario: contracting the Corona virus. God forbid and knock on wood!

Fortunately I’m also not one of the potential high risk cases and suppose William Trubridge’s exercises should help: https://www.deeperblue.com/william-trubridge-offers-deep-breathing-tips-for-covid-19-sufferers/

These considerations gave me the mindset that allowed me to dive regularly these last weeks and I’ve been enjoying it so, so, so much! I truly almost kicked the addiction. Luckily I didn’t. I’m as hooked as I ever was!

I hope you found a way to get back in the water as well. So cheers to that my freediving friends. I’ll be back next week with another post about equalization for freediving. A great teacher has used his Corona time off to give us some great pointers for improving our equalization and I’ll be discussing his videos.

Stay tuned!

Goals set, Goals met (NYE-post)

~ @S2WFreediving ~ 1 Comment

December 31st, 2018.

No better day to look back and contemplate a year of freediving.

In October 2017 I started on a journey to learn freediving and took you by the hand as much as possible. It hasn’t all been smooth sailing, mainly because equalization of the middle ear didn’t come naturally for me. I had to grab every possible opportunity to learn about it and practice quite a bit. You can read about the whole process on this blog and hopefully it will help or has helped some of you out there.

When I first tried for my level 1 freediving certification I couldn’t equalize upside down at all. So I failed miserably. The bottom of the Dive4Life dive tower seemed very far away, reaching it so unattainable. However… in the back of my mind two primary goals formed: getting my level 1 certification one way or the other, and touching the bottom of the 20 meters deep pool in Germany.

After quite a bit of practice in between, in March of this year I went back to Dive4Life to do the re-examination for my SSI level 1 freediver certification. Luck was not on my side. I was having a proper nose cold that, together with the pressure to finally meet the requirements, had taken away all relaxation I so sorely needed. But all’s well that ends well. And so it did. Goal number one reached!

Unfortunately I wasn’t able to kill two birds with one stone. I’d have to return one day to truly conquer the pool by reaching the bottom.

In the meanwhile I have written about my summer practice in the Vinkeveense Plassen (one and two) and reaching new PB’s, but in my last post I left the readers at a Paris overlay ahead of a holiday in Spain, ending with a post scriptum hint that my luggage (full of freediving gear) did arrive at Malaga airport. Behold below the result of two good days of diving with my girlfriend’s brother who knew to find all nooks and crannies (watch in HD):

You can see the visibility was great and most beauty is to be found in shadowy places 🙂

I was really looking out for some encounters with octopuses. Which are a lot harder to spot than you might think. Especially if you don’t have that spear-fisherman’s eye… Unfortunately I got an ear infection soon after above images were shot and had to stop diving for a couple of days 😦 That was a huuuuge bummer.

The last couple of days I was able to enter the water again and I still kept on the lookout for octopuses. Sadly without having my camera with me, it was only on the last day of the holiday I had an encounter, but a long one that lasted maybe fifteen minutes. A small octopus in shallow water, constantly changing his colours, moving and settling, squirting ink when I came too close for his liking. What fascinating creatures.

After this holiday, going into autumn, regular diving had quickly stagnated. The outdoor waters of the Netherlands were still okay for a while, but the weather out of the water became too harsh to truly keep enjoying dives outside. Hoisting oneself in and out the wetsuit on the water’s edge became too cold a undertaking to keep it an enjoyable experience.

So what better to do than go back to Dive4Life and finally touch summit (read: bottom) there? Exactly: nothing… So when I was invited to come with some buddies I met at the Vinkeveense Plassen last summer, I took a day off work on the 7th of December and joined them for a day of diving in the pool in Siegburg, Germany.

What can I say… both goals were reached this year that day 🙂 I filmed it all (except for the shot of me freefalling) so best to join me in this predominantly POV-video and see for yourself:

And… you might ask, what about new goals? Any new years resolutions? Well… Next year I plan to get comfortable between 25-30 meters and possibly get my level 2 certification. I’ll keep you guys posted and I’ll keep the video’s coming. Oh yeah, and also, as a last but not least: I’m planning a couple of gear reviews for you guys!

Till next year! Best wishes, keep diving and keep safe!

Freediving @ Vinkeveense Plassen #1

~ @S2WFreediving ~ 3 Comments

In the Netherlands we have water. A lot of it. We have the North Sea to the west. We have canals, lakes, rivers, swamps and whatever else more that consists of water. And whether you believe it or not: this country is actually below sea level at some spots.

To the south of Amsterdam we have the Vinkeveense Plassen (equals/= the lakes of Vinkeveen). From the sky it looks something like this:

VInkeveen

I came here a lot growing up, because my grandfather used to rent a small patch of land with a caravan in Vinkeveen. He also had a small sailing boat which we took out on the lake quite regularly.

Now I (re)discovered this place as an pretty awesome (free)dive spot. It has pretty clear water for Dutch standards and there is a dedicated spot for scuba divers (no boats allowed). They sank some interesting stuff there. Most notably an old bus.

Of course, as most lakes do, it has a thermocline. And it does get cold. But, as you pass this thermocline you also enter a space where the visibility gets even better. It’s definitely worth the while.

In short: this will be a great spot to practice this summer! Here is some first footage: