Training day

Much has happened since change of the year. I made quick fix for my D3 interface (which I broke at Dahab) and got my profiles from the deep dives. It's funny how you can vividly re-live your dive through simple pixel graph through screen.

I got message that I was selected for the national team training ring. I originally did not intend to apply, but I was persuaded by my teammate who had also participated in it few years back. They selected twenty members to the ring and from it, the national team will be selected. I really had to consider my options. On the other hand the possibility to train with the best is tempting to say at least. Pressure and expectations to train hard weights in the other end of the scale. Pressure is not set by the team but by comparing myself to my peers at the training ring. My journey to freediving has been short but intense. I think my first training session at the pool was around 6-7 months ago.

I also set myself training targets for this spring. I've set monthly goals so, that I am targeting the national comp this spring. Most important goal is to get successful dives from it. Another challenge is DNF, which I haven't done at all yet. I've just started to practice it and getting my kicks and relaxation in order is going to need lot's of repetitions. At the first weekend of February I will be participating to first training course lead by Goran Colak. As much as I expect to learn from him, I expect as much to talk and meet people in the national team and to learn from them.

Last friday I did flow exercise (Kars' frog flow from youtube / deeperblue) at the 4m pool and managed to do easy 1m 54s dive, which is the longest non-static dive for me. 

Today was another training day. I had previously decided that it would be time to do first long dive of the year with mono. I prepared, stretched and relaxed. I had already started to feel pressure when I started packing my stuff at home. I had set monthly target for dynamic for January and I don't have any other free weekends to do it. I did not set it to this dive, but I did set a dive time target for 1m45s. I fixed my D3 to alarm it. Setting target for new distance in dynamic is difficult. You're pushing for unknown territory and the first dive to new distance is usually the hardest. Your mind starts making excuses why you should not do the dive. Maybe you could do a easy 75m instead. Maybe no safeties will show up. Well, a safety showed up and I had no excuses. I get strong confidence from the training which cancels the doubts. This is why I have trained. I relax by the pool, breath-up, descent the the end of the pool, fill the lungs and go. Soon as I am in the water the doubts disappear.  Instead of concentrating on the distance, I concentrate on the kicks. I keep counting the kicks for each 25m, relaxed turns and I avoid tensing up. Lactics kick in between 50m and 75m. There's no urgency I just wait for the alarm and keep diving. After 100m the lactics get really strong but it does not bother me. I come up at 130m after the turn. I concentrate on the breathing and protocol. I feel fine. I felt that there was still lot's left in the tank, but I wanted to leave something for the next month too...

Almost all of my dives have been successful in depth and dynamic. Only discipline where I haven't been able to exceed and improve constantly has been static. In dynamic and cwt there will be failure eventually. I am not being negative about it, just thinking realistically. I think it would be possible to prepare a recovery plan which you can review when it might happen. This would include something in the lines of positive reinforcement, taking a break and lowering the expectations and while giving the body more time to adapt.