FDD News

Yoga and Meditation with Sara Campbell during Triple Depth!!

2012-10-19T16:23:00.002+02:00

Triple Depth yoga and meditation

with Sara campbell

Easy, relaxing yoga and meditation to prepare you for depth. Stretch, breathe, relax and learn to manage stress.

· Suitable for EVERYONE, no experience necessary

· Easy, fun and really helpful during competition

· MATS PROVIDED, bring water

· WHERE: CORAL COAST HOTEL Yoga room

· WHEN: Every day 4.30 pm 25-28th (before event meeting)

· PRICE: le 100 for one class; le 400 for 5 (vouchers can be used in my regular classes too)

Please speak to an FDD member of staff for more information. Private meditation and yoga sessions available.

FDD Master Program

2012-10-13T15:50:00.002+02:00

We are happy to announce that after receiving many requests we finally offer a Master Program!

The Program duration is up to 4 weeks; during this time you will have the chance to dive minimum 5 days a week. During the diving sessions you will join the other freedivers during their training sessions, assist the instructors while they teach courses, and dive with the FDD instructors when the do their own training.

Not only you will naturally become a much better freediver due to all the in-water practice; you will also become a better buddy and coach, you will learn how to prepare different set-ups for different kind of diving, and assist and help during competitions if we have any running during your stay (unless you want to compete, of course:).
Also, if you plan of becoming a freediving instructor at some point, you will get plenty of experience by assisting our instructors during courses: you will see all the students mistakes and how they get corrected; you will witness different teaching styles and you will get the chance to practice your own teaching while supervised by the instructors.
You will also get more static and dynamic experience since we regularly go to the pool to run our courses.

Furthermore you will be able to assist as much as you want during the courses’ theory lessons, and there will be plenty of occasions to learn much about freediving physiology and other practical and theoretical facts by just hanging out with us, since we are all training and compete, and when we are in our center we talk about little else than freediving!
During the same period of time there is also the chance for you to complete your SSI level 3 or AIDA 4* at a special package price.This program is available from April to June and from August to January. If you want to come during a different time, we cannot guarantee that you will be able to dive as much, since during low season we don’t have courses running every day.

Note: this is not a course, there will be no teaching materials, no certification and no fixed schedule/program.
The requirement to participate to this program is to be at least a SSI level 2 or AIDA 3* freediver.
Duration of the Program: up to 4 weeks.
Price: 350 euro
If during this time you wish to do your SSI level 3 or AIDA 4*, the total price is 590 euro instead of 670!

TRIPLE DEPTH 2012

2012-10-06T18:33:00.001+02:00

For the 8th time in 8 years we organize the Triple Depth Freediving Challenge!
TD has a AIDA ranking and WR status!
We will of course use our “Pyramid” setup as usual. Depth limit: 90 meters.

TD is also a team competiton!
Who will be the best male and female Freediver in all 3 depth disciplines in 3 days? Like the last 2 year, you will also be able to enroll as a team and compete ...for the BEST TEAM title! Three athletes in each team and at least one athlete in each team has to be a woman.
Schedule:
21st Opening and registration (in the afternoon at FDD)
22nd Training in Blue hole in the morning
23th Training in Blue hole in the morning
24st Training in Blue hole in the morning
25nd Static comp in the morning
26rd FIM comp day
27th CWT comp day
28th CNF comp day and Closing dinner party (…until late at Rush as usual…)

PRICES:
FULL TD program 21-28/10: 175€ for returning athletes and 205€ for first timers.
TD COMP DAYS ONLY 26-28/10: 100€ for returning athletes! 130€ for first timers.
NOTE! The competition fee is non-refundable! Before you pay be sure you will be there!

PRIZES:
-2 Neptune’s Freediving Wetsuits
-2 Neptune’s Freediving Buoys
-4 Netune’s Godzilla Freediving Bags
-4 Neptune’s Lanyards
-5 Jakas Noseclips

TO REGISTER CONTACT: info@freedivedahab.com

SSI Instructor Course November 2012

2012-10-01T07:54:00.002+02:00

SSI level 1 and 2 Instructor Course, November 16-23, OR join the FDD Internship if you have at least one month available...at the same price!! (more info on the Internship here).
Only for Level 3 freedivers (or equivalent)

The freediving ITC is aimed to those who want to start working as professional freediving instructor. During your course you will receive a series of practical and theoretical sessions under the guidance of our Freediving Instructor Trainer.

The aim of this course is:

-Getting to know the material to present according to the SSI standards.

-Learning the theoretical and in water teaching skills you need in order to be a confident and competent freediving instructor.

-Understand and recognize the main mistakes and problems you will encounter when teaching beginners and intermediate freediving courses and help your students to overcome them.

-Learning and getting comfortable with the level 1 and level 2 freediving programs which you will teach to your students.

-Get a deep knowledge of other aspect related to teaching Freediving, like legal aspects, marketing, business policies and other side activities you can offer in your business.

Course duration: min. 8 days.

At the end of the course you will be certified as Level 1 or 2 Freediving Instructor.

Prerequisites: be a level 3 freediver (or equivalent), First Aid/CPR and O2 provider certificate, professional insurance certificate, 18 years of age, medical certificate signed by a doctor.

Price: 810 euro (+ Instructor Kit, 148 euro. Included: Active Fee, SSI Registration Fee and Certification).

for info contact info@freedivedahab.com

www.freedivedahab.com

photo courtesy Jacques de Vos

FDD Instructor Internship Program

2012-06-12T11:43:00.000+02:00

Duration: 1-6 months

Come to Dahab and become SSI or AIDA instructor at Freedive Dahab during a long internship period.

You will learn and become a good teacher and a better freediver by assisting our instructors during courses and have the chance to work on your own diving at the same time!

The price for the whole internship period is the same as the regular ITC price!

-SSI ITC = 810 euro (+ instructor kit)

-AIDA IC= 850 euro

GET A SUPER DISCOUNT IF YOU COMBINE THE ITC WITH SSI LEVEL 3 OR AIDA 4*!

-SSI 3 + SSI ITC= 1130 – 20% = 904 euro!!! (+ instructor kit)

-AIDA 4*+ AIDA IC= 1170 – 20% = 936 euro!!!

For shorter stays (1 month) it is recommended to come only during high season (March until May and September until January) to get the chance to assist more courses in a short period.

For more info contact us: info@freedivedahab.com

For more info on regular instructor courses: http://freedivedahab.com/allcourses/instructorcourses.htm

photo courtesy Jacques de Vos

FDD LAST CHANCE WC QUALIFYING COMP

2012-04-22T14:59:00.000+02:00

30th May to 4th June

This is a 3 day CWT/FIM/CNF/DYN/STA competition, designed for those who want to qualify for AIDA Team World Championships 2012. Two competitions days will be for depth disciplines (you choose between CWT/FIM/CNF) and one day will be at the pool (you can do both STA and DYN).The 3 training days will be held at the Blue Hole and dedicated to depth disciplines, but if you want you are free to go to the pool and train there (as long as you have a buddy!!). The Canyon Estate Resort is located next to the Canyon dive site area (where the competition pool is) and it’s a beautiful new hotel right on the beach front. It’s half way between Dahab and the Blue Hole, so in the mornings we will pick you up directly from the hotel:) Program: 30-31-1: Training days at the Blue Hole 2: STA-DYN Competition 3-4: Depth Competition

The package includes: - 7 nights accommodation in double rooms at Canyon Estate Resort or equivalent. Breakfast is not included. - 3 training days in Blue Hole (2 sessions each day). - 3 competition days - Transportation between the hotel and Freedive Dahab. - Transports to and from Blue Hole every day. - Buoys, ropes and weights. - Lotta, Linda or one from the FDD team as training coaches. - Counter ballast, surface camera, safety divers, doctor and oxygen for dives below 60m on the competition days

Price: 310€ (If you are alone, add 45 Euro to the price for the single room). If you only want to participate during one competition day the price is 50 euro. If you only want to participate during the 3 competition days the price is 120€.

FDD Dahab Festival Competition

2012-04-02T16:43:00.003+02:00

15-20 April
This is a 2 days CWT/CNF/FIM competition, where you can decide which discipline you want to do and when. For example you can do only one of the three disciplines during all competition days. As usual, we want to keep it small and cosy, and therefore the maximum number of athletes will be 20. Maximum depth is 90m. We will use our funky underwater counter ballast system! This competition is an AIDA International Competition with AIDA RANKING STATUS,and WR STATUS, but it will be up to the athlete to cover the WR procedures and doping test expenses.
Bottom camera footage available for AIDA nationals that require it for national records.

Price: 310€ .(If you want to stay in single room, add 45 Euro to the price). If you only want to participate during the competition days the price is 100€

Included in the price:
- 7 nights accommodation in double rooms (at Canyon Resort Hotel)
- 4 training days in Blue Hole (2 sessions each day)
- 2 competition days
- Transportation between the hotel and Freedive Dahab.
- Transports to and from Blue Hole every day.
- Buoys, ropes and weights.
- Lotta, Linda or one from the FDD team as training coaches.
- Counter ballast, surface camera, safety divers, doctor and oxygen for dives below 60m on the competition days.

Sailing trip in Turkey with Freedive Dahab

2012-02-13T20:02:00.010+02:00

Info:
Dates:
1st to 7th of August 2012.
For the moment the dates are still changeable, depending on the wishes of our guests.
In case of more bookings we can also reserve the boat for the following week (8th to 14th).

Where:

We leave from Marmaris’ marina and we sail around the Datca peninsula. To get to Marmaris you can fly to either Bodrum (70 km away) or Dalaman (50 km away). We can arrange your airport pick up for 60 euro.We will sail to a new destination for
1 to 3 hours every day.

Crew:
Linda as Freediving instructor/ coach/ safety/ deckhand (boat slave).
Sigi as skipper. Sigi lives in Dahab but bought the boat in Turkey to escape the heat during the Egyptian summers, and we think it was a very good idea! She has been sailing since 2008 and of course she has a sailing license.

Boat:
The sailing boat is 10.5m long and the max number of freedivers we can take onboard with us is 4.

Meals:
Meals are not included in the package price. However, we will all contribute to fill the cupboards with food before leaving the marina and we can cook breakfast and lunch onboard. For dinners we can go to local restaurants since most of the evenings we will moor on a jetty in secluded bays.
Expected price for a meal in such restaurants is 10/20 euro.

Freediving:
Max depth available - around 60 meters.
We will be able to do 2 freediving sessions per day.
We can either do training in the morning and fun diving in the afternoon or just concentrate on line diving all day.
We take freedivers at all levels as long as they have done at least a beginner course in the past or they have a good Freediving background.

Equipment:
Guests must have their own equipment. We will however provide buoys, ropes and bottom weights.

Prices:
If 2 people join: 650 euro/person
If 3 people join: 600 euro/person
If 4 people join: 500 euro/person
Minimum number of freedivers required is 2.

for info contact us at info@freedivedahab.com

Satisfaction Guarantee Policy!!!!

2012-02-01T11:15:00.005+02:00

We are happy to announce that from now on FDD will have a Satisfaction Guarantee Policy on our Mouthfill Courses!!!
In fact, if you didn't succeed in learning the Mouthfill during one of our courses, you will get back up to 65% of the price!

How does it work? Sign up for a Mouthfill Course and if at the end you feel you didn't get what you were expecting you only pay our regular training fee (between 32 and 60 euro per day depending on the dive location and the number of people participating).

Keep in mind that in order to participate to a Mouthfill Course you need to be at the very least a VERY comfortable 30 m freediver.
If you already have experience in deep diving and mouthfill practice, but make the usual mistakes (losing air, bad control of air, diaphragm tension, run out too early and so on) then you can book a single day tuition (100 euro/day/person). OUR REFUND POLICY IS APPLICABLE ALSO TO THIS!

More info on the Mouthfill Course HERE

So, what are you waiting for?

photo: Jacques De Vos

Teaching Hyperventilation

2012-01-21T13:44:00.008+02:00

Hyperventilation is science, but it’s not.
If we could measure our arterial CO2 levels as we breathe up it would be science, but since we can’t then it’s not. You can't say for sure if someone is hyperventilating or not, you can only guess.
Hyperventilation can be one of the worst subjects to teach. However you approach it it’s so easy to contradict yourself.

For example, let’s take one of the scientific approaches, the volumetric one.

The average person has a tidal volume of 500ml, and breathes between 10 and 20 times per minute.
Good, so you take 500 and multiply if for 15 (which is in between 10 and 20) and you get 7.5 liters.
According to the standard definition, hyperventilation is breathing more than needed.
So if you breathe in more than 7.5 liters of air per minute, you are hyperventilating.
If this is true, all freedivers are hyperventilating.
Now consider than the standard Freediver will inhale between 50 and 75% of his VC during his breathe-up, that a standard breathe-up is 3-4 minutes, and that the breathing rhythm is 4 seconds in and 8 seconds out.
So let’s be conservative and take the lowest values.
The average male has a VC of 4.8 liters, half of which is 2.4 (breathe up volume per each single breath).
4 plus 8 equal 12 seconds, which means that in one minute our guy breathes 5 times.
Now, 2.4 times 5 = 12 liters breathed per minute (which is 62% more than the 7.5 needed) and he does that 3 whole minutes, which means a total of 36 liters of air instead than the regular 22.5.
That is surely to be considered hyperventilation. Or not?
Now go tell your students that hyperventilation is dangerous and is a big no-no in Freediving, and then you teach them to breathe like that.

So if we want to be consistent then we should teach the Tidal Volume approach.
The instructor tells his/her students that they must breathe their TV during the breathe up. This is the only way not to hyperventilate, according to volumetry.
Haha, who does it, really? Surely not many.

Then there is the confused approach: Hyperventilation is bad, but you can’t breathe normal before a dive or you won’t get anywhere and therefore a bit of over breathing is the right thing to do in order to lower down the co2 and get later contractions. But not too much, just go by feeling.
Uh-uh, now you just told your student that hyperventilation is bad, and that he should hyperventilate, and don’t clarify how much.
That’s of course what most of us do as freedivers, but can we really say it to students?

Then we have the down to earth approach.
If you don’t feel any of the symptoms of hyperventilation then you are not hyperventilating. Bit simplistic, but very easy to explain.
But can you really have noticeable symptoms even for slight hyperventilation? Just because you don’t feel anything does it really mean that you didn’t hyperventilate? It seems a little dangerous to use this with beginners, because they don’t even know how they feel, let alone how they are supposed not to feel.

So, in conclusion:
The Volumetric approach: waste 1 hour of classroom, and leaves people more confused than before.
The Tidal volume approach: unrealistic; don’t preach what you don’t practice!
The Confused approach: the most realistic, but dangerous and confusing when teaching.
The Down to earth approach: too vague and potentially dangerous.

So what do we do?
What I tell my instructors is not to make things too complicated, and not to be too theoretical.
During the breathing sessions we let them practice hyperventilation and we ask them to describe what they feel. We then let them practice proper breathing while watching out for even the lightest symptoms.
In the pool/sea I breathe with them following their own rhythm, and if after a few breaths I feel a bit funny then I assume they are hyperventilating and I ask them to slow down.
We tell students we don’t hyperventilate.
Technically it is a lie...but it's a good lie, that saves trouble and confusion. At a beginner level people don't have enough understanding to handle the complicated truth!

I can see how this subject can raise questions and disagreements, and can feed a strong debate. So feel free to leave a comment to let us know what you think and how you handle the subject with your own students :)

photo: Jacques de Vos

Freediving Diseases: The Chicken Syndrome

2011-09-23T14:12:00.011+02:00

The chicken syndrome is a condition which affects freedivers during training and competitions.
It was never thought of being contagious until yesterday, during the aida CWT world champs.
In fact, most athletes seemed to have been exposed to the virus overnight, since the next morning, during their dives, most of the deep freedivers turned way earlier than the announced depth. If the virus has spread accidentally and coincidentally or if instead it was carefully planted by the French team we don’t know yet.

Scientists all around the world are on their way to Kalamata, to study the phenomenon, find its causes and hopefully find a cure for this horrible condition. I tend to believe the French did it, but of course at the moment I can’t base it on any other certainty than their proved dodginess when it comes to sport.

The freedivers infected by the chicken syndrome will have their own prize ceremony, and they will be rewarded with gold, silver and bronze eggs:
The gold egg to Sara Cambell who turned an impressive 80 meters before the plate.
The silver egg to Rune Hallum, who turned a mere 68 meters earlier.
And the bronze for Jens Berger, who turn 64 meters too early.

However, very surprisingly, instead of being happy about their achievements, these champions go around denying their contagion to the syndrome, and blame instead their early turns to the trauma of having assisted to a fellow freediver’s black out, which personally I find a very lame excuse.
Ok, the guy wasn’t breathing for like 4 minutes and there was a river of blood running, and everybody freaked out and thought he was dead, but come on, what is one little insignificant life compared to the glory and fame of a gold medal?
That’s why Natalia, who is a real champion, came to me while it was all happening and asked me if the guy was dead and which line she was supposed to do her dive, and five minutes later she set a new world record. That’s how you do it.
And on the other hand, if someone decides to kill himself that should be his own business and it shouldn’t affect other people’s lives.

However, enough with philosophy, let’s see the statistics.

36 women competed:
22 white cards (65%)
3 black outs (10%)
9 early turns (25%)

56 men competed:
24 white cards (40%)
8 black outs (15%)
23 (twenty three!) early turns (40%)
13 announcements below 100m (22%)

So, which conclusions can one draw from this?

First, it’s clear that 15% more men are more susceptible to the Chicken Syndrome than women.
Second, it’s also clear that 55% of the men think that they are better than they are.
Third, that 55% of the men have a bigger ego, which is also shown by the bigger percentage of black outs.
Fourth, that most men have smaller brains than women (proven by their ability to dive deeper).

Here below you can see the cwt official results:
(double click on the pictures to enlarge)

Sorry for the lack of pictures: too much drama and no happy pictures, so i put my camera away because i didn't feel like documenting the drama; enough people had to see that against their will.
I got 2 happy faces, Giorgos and Anna and you can see their smiles here below.

Depth WC 2011 - Thoughts on Freediving Athletes

2011-09-18T12:01:00.019+02:00

Being an athlete is a hard, hard job.
Every day, during competitions athletes get exposed to environments such as this:

And this:

And this:

After the hard training sessions, athletes are forced to days and days of mentally and physically challenging periods called “rest”, or “recoveries”.

During these periods, they are not allowed to do anything else than stare out at the horizon, and being exposed to frustrating views such as this:

And this:

Elite freedivers are exposed to 2 different forms of BO.
The first, also known as SWBO affect the Freediver toward the end if his dive, caused by lack of oxygenation to the brain (Shallow Water Black Out).
The other, even more dangerous form of BO (Body Odor), affects athletes mainly during tedious and uneventful event committees, bus rides to the opening ceremonies and every situation where a substantial number of athletes share small and possibly enclosed spaces.

It takes lot of training and perseverance to train tolerance to this last kind of BO. You can contact ms. Hansson (member of the Swedish team) a specialist in this field, who offers 4 days intensive training programs aimed at decreasing the susceptibility to BO.

In order to become more connected with their inner self and gain better mind control, Freediving athletes practice a great amount of yoga.

Practicing Yoga has the non-negligible side effect of attracting the attention of the athlete of opposite sex.
For this is reason, Yoga is mostly practiced by the slutty freedivers.

In the evenings, athletes eat their healthy, and alas, highly unexciting dinners.

Then, usually at night, they practice meditation, an oriental discipline that puts them more in touch with their spirituality.
That’s why freedivers are loving and sensitive human beings, and they walk around exchanging signs of peace and love.

In fact, during a recent interview, mr. Tranfield (senior member of the British team) declared that freediving will save the gays.
He is a great believer in this, and he wasn't ashamed of saying it while pinching mr. Lemarc's (french male freediving groupie) nipple.(If someone has a photo of that, please give it to me).

On a final note, I’d like to point out that being a jugde at a Freediving World Champioship is even a harder job.
Every single athlete is kissing your ass and trying to bribe you with cookies (mr. King, USA), coffees (mr. Vermeulem, NL, who’s not even competing), ice creams (ms. Prinsloo, RSA), and by doing immoral things like stealing your noseclip and then returning it and implying that you should give them a white card for that. Yes, Czech guy, i’m talking about you; I don’t know your name, I but I know who you are.
Ms. Carlsson (FIN) even begged me to allow her to kneel next to me and fan me to relieve me from the discomfort of the midday heat.

Really, how dare they think they can buy me with a cookie! This is utterly outrageous. As written on the info board at the reception of the Messinian Bay hotel, it's at least 200 euro for a white card (I have to split 50/50 with the other judge and pay a 10% cut to the JIL for his silence).
So as you can see being a judge is not that profitable an activity.

July FDD Competition, 20th and 22nd

2011-07-20T21:47:00.019+02:00

20th of july, day 1

OFFICIAL RESULTS

Linda, 65m cwt, Yellow card (grab)
Ali, 25m cwt, white card,NR
Lotta, 50m cwt, white card
Wendy, 50m cnf, white card, NR
Le Marc, 65m fim, white card
Stefan, 73m cwt, white card, NR

PREFACE

For almost the first time since 2007 I decided to compete again.
Almost, because I actually competed last week in Sharm, in a mini competition arranged by Marco for some Danish guys. Since Marco needed more (good looking and graceful) peeps for the cameras and since I’m currently (happily) unemployed with not much to do, I thought it would be fun, and announced 55 meters in FIM, which I thought it would have felt like a joke.

Well, it didn’t, and it wasn’t fun at all. All because of me Potta.

PROLOGUE

Of course me Potta and I are attached at the hip, so if im going to sharm to compete sure enough me Potta will do the same. (Btw, if somebody is still confused about the identity of this me Potta person, first they must be slightly retarded, and secondly it’s time they know that me Potta is my Swedish alter ego, Lotta Ericson, former world record holder and owner of half of FDD (the messy half)).

Anyhow, that one day in Sharm Potta tried to get the full FDD ownership by attempting to murder me through poisoning.
Knowing that the smell of her truly toxic sunscreen is making me sick, she smeared half a kilo of it on her mouth, and then drank from our common water bottle, AND THEN she offered it to me. Of course I felt immediately sick and the doctors on the boat almost had to intervene. I tried to explain that me Potta was trying to kill me but nobody took it seriously because me Potta always looks so nice and innocent when she wants to.
Then of course since I was in my suit for over an hour, in the middle of the salty sea with 50 degrees Celsius outside and no drinking water available, I almost died or dehydration, which was of course part of Potta’s evil plan to have me dead in case the poisoning wouldn’t work.
However, I actually managed to survive, and made my dive, which of course made Potta get even wilder and determined to kill me at the very next occasion.

CHAPTER 1
The next occasion presented itself just a few days later when she encouraged me to participate to this new comp, which was organized by us for a bunch of the Dahab freedivers, plus Le Marc, who no matter what you do to avoid him, he’s always in your way.
I didn’t know what Potta would be up to this time, other than she was also competing, so I had to spend the whole time watching my back just in case she came behind me with a knife or something. That didn’t make my warm-up very relaxing, let me tell you.

Then, since she obviously didn’t succeed and was very pissed off about that, threatened judge Jacques that she would fire him if he would give me a white card, so the poor thing had to come up with this absurd story that I grabbed the buoy before surfacing and gave me a yellow card.
Here the incriminated exit. It would be obvious even to a child that there is nothing wrong with it.

Here below me Potta in the act of threatening Jacques. She can be very scary indeed, so I don’t blame him.

Second judge Paola, who doesn’t know anything about Potta evilness and Jacques chicken-ness, was having a little nap during my dive, so she didn’t even see my exit and couldn’t do anything about it.
Here me in the act of politely protesting to the judges, while Potta is very pleased with her evil deed.

Judge Jacques even fucked up my count down because Potta told him so. You should see how terrified he was, and every time she was close to him he would start shaking. His hands were shaking so furiously that he even dropped an 8 kilo bottom weight.
Here below you can see Jacques defending himself against me Potta when she wanted to beat him up after he dropped the bottom weight.

We even had to ask Sara to borrow her bottom weight, and of course that little greedy witch wanted money for it.

CHAPTER 2
Since one of the FDD staff was competing, one was judging and the other one was at home busy dying of dehydration and yalla yalla (probably caused for some obscure reasons by evil me Potta) we were short of safety divers, so me Potta forced me to do safety after my extremely deep dive to 65 meters, probably in the hope I would get DCS and die.
The other safety diver was rasta Marco who is also currently (happily) unemployed (god bless the revolution!!).

Anyhow, back to the point, after me it was Ali’s turn, and he did a dive to 25 meters CWT. Which was very cool, since he just finished his level 1 course with Jacques; furthermore, because Kuwait doesn’t have any other active Freediver, Ali happened to set the first Kuwaiti national record.
Here Ali during his breathe-up.

After him, it was me Potta’s turn. She did 50 meters without crying, which is like, the second time it happened since 2003.
Actually she looked quite happy when she came up, which for a moment even lead me to hope that she would drop her evil purposes.
Then it was the turn of Wendy and her bionic eye. See below.

With a 50 meter CNF dive, she made a new Dutch record.
After her it was Le Marc, who showed no respect for other people personal belongings and sat on my noodle as if it was his.
Le Marc, who never got a white card in his life despite having attended way more competitions than me, had Sara coaching him. As I previously mentioned, Sara is a witch and a black magic practitioner, and she sold Le Marc soul to the devil in exchange for a white card. Which worked.
Here Le Marc soon after Sara told him he has to give up his soul. He was unhappy for about 5 seconds, but then he changed his mind.

If I didn’t know for sure that the devil and Sara were involved, I would have thought that he got the white card because finally he announced 65 instead than 70 meters.
And here Potta thinking she can even be eviler than the devil, and tried to touch Le Marc so that he would get a red card.

The devil paralyzed Potta for about 15 seconds, just in time for Le Marc to be given his white card. I was hoping that he would keep Potta paralyzed and quiet for longer, but not even the devil is capable of that much.
Then it was our superhero Stefan, who, after having got his first national record during TD, by doing a beautiful 60m CNF dive, today he got his second national record with a 73m CWT dive! We are so happy for him that we even forgave him for being German.

Here Stefan smiling after his dive.

EPILOGUE

The day ended successfully with all white cards except mine, and the best thing is that all Potta further attempts to my life failed and I made it back to tell the tale of this fantastic, hot day.
Stay tuned for the next competition day, on Friday the 22nd.

Weather forecast say scorching hot also tomorrow, and the next day, and the next, and so on until mid October, but that’s ok, because I have a 6 horsepower air conditioning unit, and a big iron gate with rusty spikes and a high wall to protect myself from Potta.

TD 2011 - RESULTS

2011-06-26T13:43:00.013+02:00

CNF results:

Individual results:

First places, Miguel and Sara won 2 Meridiens (the Scubapro freediving computer with the incorporated heart monitor) AND Smoothskin Neptune wetsuits!!
Second places, Michael and Wendy won Nylon Neptune wetsuits and awesome Neptune dive bags.
Third places, Jakas and Olga, won Neptune buoys.

Team results:

Team SSI Canarias won 3 Neptune buoys!
Team Nasha Russia won 3 Neptune lanyards!
And the luckiest ones, team Chichichaestli, won 3 awesome FDD t-shirts.

Thanks to SSI for sponsoring our competition!
And thanks to SCUBAPRO and NEPTUNE for the most awesome prizes!

TD 2011 - DAY TWO

2011-06-24T21:08:00.010+02:00

Day two, constant weight. Here the result list:

And here is the total points so far:

Remarkable things of the day.

Miguel has a cousin, his name is Alex. Alex speaks no English and the only sentence he can utter in English is: “he’s my cousin!!” referring to Miguel, every time Miguel does something remarkable. Now, today he must have got tired of being known only because of his role as Miguel cousin and came up with something more original: he showed up late. Which is not so original, because Miguel does it all the time. However, 10 minutes before his top he was nowhere to be seen, and he confessed later that he ran to the toilet (nobody asked to do what) and since he didn’t have much time to do a breathe up he used all of his 29 seconds after official top, and while I was already holding my red card to show him, he managed to take a breath and dive before I could say 30.

Now someone must teach him how to say in English “I’m the one who dived at -29 seconds!”

After him came Greg. Greg announced 40, and because im retarded I set the rope down to 42. So he does his dive, turns early (at exactly 40), comes up, does the SP shaking his head, and gets a white card. You should have seen the confused look on his face. Poor Greg. On the other hand this is what happens when you go to a comp organized by a bunch of grannies.

Fanny and Carolina today stayed a bit more conservative and both got white cards. However, they are both looking at me with the evil eye. Fanny, who’s in the “when we’re 30 you’re dead” team, may not have appreciated the subtle sarcasm i used towards her team, and Carolina was obviously unaware that Santi was being bigamous (what do you expect from someone called Jakas??)(and how is that supposed to be my fault anyways??).

The Russians all did well today, lots of white cards for them, except that they scare the shit out of me when they hiss at me after their dives. Especially Irina, who is such a sweet a pretty looking girl, you would never think she would be capable of making such an evil sound. Why can’t they do the recovery breathing like anybody else?

Le Marc obviously wanted to prove me wrong, so today he announced 65, and he actually made it! this is the first time he ever comes up with a tag. Too bad he got the discipline wrong and he dived FIM instead than CWT, so he got a red card anyways. Le Marc needs to focus a bit more, just like our bottom camera.
Talking of which, today it fucked up again, and only got half of the footage right, and the rest is still blurry. For heaven’s sakes, how difficult is for a camera to focus? This is all it has to do.

We had a few 70 m dives, with Evgeny, Max and Trevor and they all got whites, and after them came the Jakas, who announced 75 and made it nice and easy.
Then was Yuri turn with 77.

here you see him while he's sucking on the oxygen, after hissing at Lotta.
Yuri should challenge Trevor into an ascent race and see who goes faster. Me and Remy were dying to keep up with them.

Michael, who now think he’s unbreakable because of the rusty carabiner, became too careless and forgot to let go of the rope before dipping his face and got a yellow card, just like a proper beginner. The bad thing is that because of that he missed the swiss national record. Michael, maybe the rusty carabiner is cursed and you will need to buy a new stainless un-cursed one in my shop!

Sara did her 80 m dive and came up yawning, so I guess that it didn’t feel too challenging.
And then it was the turn of Miguel the trouble maker, who announced 90 m again.
Since he’s too lazy to read the rules, he probably didn’t know you can’t have the lanyard on the same hand of the official watch (for some mysterious reason that nobody could ever explained to me), so we had to move his computer just before his dive. Then as I safety him I realized his lanyard was disconnected from the rope and was just hanging on his side. He had it on when he started and he had it on when he turned and then he claims that he didn’t do anything to it and that the holy mary must have intervened with s miracle. Which was a bit of a pointless miracle, since you are supposed to get a red card if you don’t dive with your lanyard. Judges discussed briefly and in a moment of confusion gave him a yellow card. I think that also the holy mary didn’t read the rules very well.

see the evil look he gave at the camera? it wasn't because of the yellow card, but because hiss cousin wasn't there to brag.

In the breaks, Jacques is whoring to get a new free pair of fins, let's see how that works out. So far he got 5 le and a bedouin bracelet.

CNF starting list for tomorrow

TD 2011 - DAY ONE

2011-06-23T21:07:00.003+02:00

day one, free immersion
result list:

the day started early; the alarm went off at 6.30. and i wasn't even in the first shift. lotta and mr. peter left to the blue hole at 6.15 am. they like to watch the surnrise while holding hands.

i judged the first hour together with kostya, while lotta was safety diving together with remy. not much happened then, everybody did their dives and got white cards. shame.

during the first break we put down the bottom camera to film the deeper dives, and we were all happy thinking about the awesome footage we were going to get. we were even blessed with 2 black outs, which of course i missed because by then i was on land uploading pics on the facebook.
i feel cheated. facebook took a piece of real life away from me.
those were the only 2 black outs of the day, both on 55mt dives, starring fanny from
sweden and carolina from spain (who was going to a national record).

before them alana did an australian national record dive with 50m. she hit her head hard on the plate and we were all excited with anticipation about seeing it later on the bottom footage.
so, during the next break the slaves pulled up the rope and we stripped the bottom camera our of the plate. jacques swam all the cameras to shore to replace batteries, and this is when he found out that the bottom camera got blind. sorry, i meant visually impaired.
well, it worked, but couldn't focus, just like lotta when she drinks too much vodka.
however, at the end of the day (after we missed all the deep dives bottom footage),
the camera sobered up and started working again. at least we can hope in some footage for tomorrow.

there was a few 60 meters dives (yuri, andrej, wendy, trevor), and a couple of 65 (tomaz, and max from the team "when we are 30 you are dead". the rest of us think they should have called themselves "when we are 30 we will have some brains, hopefully" but it doesn't matter really, they are very cute with their acne and their braces.

sara and "le marc" both announced 70, and surprisingly enough, while sara made it, le
marc turned early. ever since i met le marc, a few years ago, he announced 70 at every comp he turned up to, and he never made it once.

here's sara after her dive, getting high on oxygen and taking bets about which depth le marc would turn today.

miguel's girlfriend santiago, known as santi, did 75 meters. the remarkable thing
about santi (other than being miguel girlfriend and being affected by an acute form of autism), is that his surname is jakas. i think it's the best surname ever, and everybody has a great time calling him like that.

michael and his rusty carabiner made it to 76 and back. back on the surface michael
was as fresh as a rose, and his carabiner was 200 grams heavier with rust. according
to him, people offer new stainless free carabiners to him, but he won't change his
beloved rusty carabiner for anything in the world.

me mike did wells (haha!) today. first he didn't turn early like usual, and he plummeted down to 83 meters (which would be an australian record) for once not listening to the voices in his head telling him to stop and stare into the arch looking for the yummy looking tuna living there.

after mike, was miguel turn, who being a typical lazy spaniard thought he was on his 2pm siesta time and spent his whole warm up time hanging out with his friends and his gf santi. since his dive to 100 meters he's even more relaxed about the comp, so he forgot he was even supposed to show up at the official line and the staff had to call him in. he looked at us, and said, "me? it's my turn already?" while the judge started his 2 minutes countdown.
so he comes in, still chilled out, and when it's less than 1 minute before his official top, he puts on his noseclip, which just breaks in his hands. ha! now he's
getting a bit nervous, and everybody starts screaming "give him a noseclip, give him a noseclip" but nobody is paying attention, until santi saves the day by ripping his own noseclip out ot his neck and places it on to his beloved miguel's nose. miguel has just the time to take a couple of breaths and go.
and he makes it, coming up all fresh, doing the protocol while looking at santi with sweet cheesy eyes.

here you see everybody applauding him after his dive. the applause is for his nerves, not for his organizational skills.

jacques, who filmed every single descent and ascent, did 64 dives with his brand new broken-in-half funky C4.

there was no accident or collision with reef, snorkellers or any kind of marine life. it just happened. i don't think he's very impressed with their quality. but since everything was breaking today, he didn't even get too upset about it. the next thing that broke was a piece of the pyramid; it snapped free and floated away until trevor's coach charlie retrieved it.

julia added a fashion touch to the day and showed up posing on the pyramid like a concentrated version of a mermaid, wearing her neoprene socks on top of her orca suit.

for that she'll get a red card on the CNF day.

here's tomorrow starting list:

TD 2011 - Schedule

2011-06-20T17:12:00.001+02:00

19th
Training at the Blue hole
Leaving from FDD at 9.00
Optional sled diving in the afternoon (by booking)

20th
Training at the Blue hole
Leaving from FDD at 9.00
Optional sled diving in the afternoon (by booking)

21st
Training at the Blue hole
Leaving from FDD at 9.00
Optional sled diving in the afternoon (by booking)
ANNOUNCEMENT for STATIC at FDD 14.30-16.30.
Start list on FREEDIVE INTERNATIONAL’s FB page
& outside FDD at 18.30

22nd
STATIC comp at Yasmina Hotel
First OT at 10.00
Static result list and protest time at Yasmina after the last OT.
ANNOUNCEMENT for FIM at FDD 8.00- 16.30
Competition Meeting at FDD 18.00 (with start lists)

23rd FIM comp
First OT at 9.00
ANNOUNCEMENT for CWT at FDD 8.00- 16.30
Competition Meeting at FDD 18.00 (with result and start lists)

24th CWT comp
First OT at 9.00
ANNOUNCEMENT for CNF at FDD 8.00- 16.30
Competition Meeting at FDD 18.00 (with result and start lists)

25th CNF comp
First OT at 9.00
Final results posted at FDD 16.30 (for Protests)
Closing Ceremony & dinner party at Rush 19.30
(don’t forget your ticket!)

Pictures and gossip on Freedive International Facebook page!

TD 2011- Registration Info

2011-06-18T13:40:00.004+02:00

Hi all :-)

TRIPLE DEPTH starts!
REGISTRATION will be at FREEDIVE DAHAB on the 18th 17.00-18.00

BRING
1. Passport copy (we do not have a copy machine)
2. Original Medical Statement from a doctor, saying that you are fit for FREEDIVING
3. Any outstanding payments (training, competition, hotel, transfers etc)

See you ALL there!!!!!!

Here is a short schedule for the event:

18th Opening and registration (in the afternoon at FDD)
19th Training at the Blue hole in the morning (optional sled diving in the afternoon)
20th Training at the Blue hole in the morning (optional sled diving in the afternoon)
21st Training at the Blue hole in the morning (optional sled diving in the afternoon)
22nd Static comp in the morning (optional sled diving in the afternoon)
23rd FIM comp day
24th CWT comp day
25th CNF comp day and Closing dinner party (…until late at Rush as usual…)
27-29th SLED DIVING EVENT

The FDD TEAM.

Diary of an Exile

2011-03-16T17:56:00.016+02:00

This is day number 95 (or something like that) of my exile in South Africa.
It started as a holiday, and it turned into exile.
Well, at least I’m not being held in Robben Island, which is the place where Morgan Freeman was kept during his long free of charge holiday.

It seems like it’s a lovely island (bit flat though), but they don’t really like it if you want to leave, so you need to swim your way to main land if you want to have an aperitif in camps bay or shop for biltong, and the water is a bit too chilly. That’s apparently why Morgan Freeman never left the island for the whole of the 18 years he lived there. (Lazy ass!)

This is the story of how I came to be an exile:
I planned to get back to Egypt on the 1st of March, which didn’t work out because Ze Germanz wanted me to do an instructor course in Ze Germany, and so I went.
And then I was supposed to go back to Egypt after that, on the 8th of March.
But it turns out we got this awesome job in Cape Town, so that I have to change my ticket and go back to South Africa. And as soon as I step out of the plane I get to know that the job has been moved to May, and that I got back to Cape Town for nothing.

Not that I don’t like it here, but after 3 months I’m ready to move on, plus auntie Lotta and uncle mr. Peter have done enough babysitting for me Lua. Plus, seems like after the heavy rain my house needs some restoration, since the paint if flaking off the walls. (Which says a lot about the Egyptian craftsmanship, since the house is 6 months old and already in need of maintenance).

However, no big surprise there.
What I’m very sad about is having missed the whole revolution.
How unlucky is that? Missing a revolution first because of Ze Germanz and then because of the exile.
Living in the third (and sometimes second) world is not an easy business, let me tell you.

So, even though here things look like they are rolling and it looks like the apartheid is over, and it also looks like people are living together in harmony (well, ok, you might think so only if you are missing one eye and you are blind in the other one) in reality they are not very different than Egypt when it comes to PAPERWORK!
And paperwork is exactly the reason why I’m stuck here and unable to get back home.
Paperwork is my nightmare, I must have a paperwork curse or something: last year Lotta and I almost got to the Dahab prison because we didn’t have the right papers for our shop (see what happened to Mubarak just recently because he didn’t have the right papers to open a Freediving center?) .
So, long story short: Lotta, Jacques and I decide to do things properly and open a legal company for Freedive Cape Town.
Funny how you can open a company in South Africa even if one or more partners are not in the country (Lotta), but when you try to open a bank account for this company it turns out that THAT is a no-no. And without a company bank account is kinda useless to have a company in the first place, and you can as well decide to be a beach instructor and set your office in the Nirvana restaurant, with the exception that there is no Nirvana restaurant in Cape Town. But did the lawyer who made your company papers tell you about that?
Of course not.

So the only 2 possible solutions at this point are: either fly Lotta in the country to put a signature in the bank, which seems like a little bit of a waste or money, or have Lotta’s name removed from the company which supposedly is the easiest and fastest solution. Since it took 2 working days to get her in, you would think it shouldn’t take that much longer to have her out. And of course the lawyer agreed and guaranteed a fast resolution of the matter.
The one who didn’t agree so much was Lotta, because I would then own all the millions of her 33% share and she would be left with only the millions of her FDD share (which by the way are now being transferred all in my Italian account because of the revolution…) (next thing you know I’ll be on a flight to Brazil with all our millions hidden in the secret compartment of my monofin bag, and never to be seen around the middle east even again)

But.
Of course this paperwork is taking ages to pass through wherever it is supposed to pass through (I hope somebody’s rear bottom, and I hope the paper is crisp enough to cause some injury) and until it’s done I can’t put my signature in the bank to open a bank account, and therefore I can’t leave the country.

Ah, South Africa is a very interesting place. Certainly full of contradictions.
This is the place where if you leave your car window open, the chance of a baboon jumping inside and landing on your laptop crashing the display are dangerously great. Especially when some dumbass 31 times world record holder Freediver (no names will be mentioned here) is leaving fruit juices and bananas spread all over the back seat.

It is also the place where you cannot replace a laptop display unless you are willing to pay more than you paid for your whole computer in the first place.

But then again, it is the place where you can walk out the door in the morning saying “bye darling, I’m going diving with seals (or sharks), see you at lunch!”

And the place you can dive (well, not you as in YOU, but I can!) in the Cape Town 6m deep Aquarium with all sorts of giant beasts.

Oh, and the place where you can go and shoot most fish including some species of sharks (not that I’ve done it, but I considered the idea at least once), and the place where you can buy real red wine with 5 euros. And look at the funky names they call it!

Then when you are sick of hunting and eating and drinking, you can just walk 10 minutes up the hill and there is this beautiful vertical rock climbing wall.

Oh, and the shopping… Access Park is awesome, I wish I would be exiled there, but instead I have to drive as long as 25 minutes to get there.
Oh, and the drive along the west side of the cape, towards Cape Point, how amazing is that? That’s where my favorite place in the world is.

It’s called Scarbo-Rough (to be pronounced with the final f, even though the ignorant locals here mispronounce it very badly, but what can you do?, the illiteracy rate here is still very high and they don’t know any better)

Oh gosh, now I am being a bit confused as to why exactly I am sitting here bitching about being stuck in this country and so keen to get back to donkeyland?
Maybe is has to do with the fact that I’m now on my third glass or wine? Or was it the fourth?

Photo credit:
For the beautiful pictures: Jacques De Vos
The other pics are mine, except a couple which are stolen from Google.

If you are luckier than me and you have the chance to go to Dahab, check out our Calendar

Boat show, almost the end!

2011-01-28T15:56:00.011+02:00

Almost over!
Lotta is so looking forward to go back to Egypt and see the revolution!
Shame that I’ll go back to safe South Africa. Funny how the funky stuff always happens when I’m away: every year I miss either the rain, or the dolphins, or the Egyptians burning themselves. When I’m in dahab nothing ever happens (ok, now that i think of it, i did have a bit of excitement that time when the bombs exploded).

In order to get ready to the chance of being at war we are doing some training to increase our mental tolerance to dangerous situations, and to improve our physical resistance to stressful situation.
So, yesterday we decided to go cage diving with sharks ON A BREATH HOLD!
In order to get some courage we had to drink a bottle (or maybe it was more) of wine.

Here you can see how the scuba diver and I get ready to be dropped in the shark infested area. That would be hall 3, somewhere around area H or G (it’s always after 6pm when I go there and never pay too much attention).

Then Lotta is also getting in the cage and the party starts.

Then something happened. I had a black out.
A very recent research has proven that alcohol is bonding with haemoglobin 25 times more efficiently than O2, so it happened that because of the high alcohol concentration in my blood, after only 15 minutes we were submerged and while Lotta was still happily lap dancing in the cage, I had a black out.
Lotta was a bit annoyed, because at that very same time she was flirting with the scuba diver (see how sexily she’s grabbing his package), but being the queen of the rescue breath of course she readily dropped the scuba diver package and she came to my rescue.

Poor Ellie, who is one of our FDD students, was so shocked by the whole thing that she also had a black out. So Lotta had to rescue her too.

We should never ever let students witness these kind of accidents. Now I don’t know if she will want to Freedive ever again.
Here a picture of Ellie when she was still a happy girl before her innocence had been taken away forever.

CALENDAR 2011

2011-01-27T11:07:00.000+02:00

FDD calendar until September 2011

JANUARY:
-Aida****, 4th to 7th
-Mouthfill Workshop, 19th
-Micro Comp, 21st

From the 22nd to 30th there is the Boat show in Dusseldorf, and Linda and Lotta will be there drinking wine and talking shit; come and say hi if you are around!

FEBRUARY:
-Aida IC, 3rd to 9th

The rest of the month Lotta and Linda might be in Cayman to breed lots of new SSI instructors, but Julia our crazy Argentinean instructor will be in Dahab happily waiting for students to dive with her…
In the meanwhile Jacques will be back to Cape Town and we'll start the shark diving there.

MARCH:
No diving on the 1st, since there will be a massive welcome home party for Linda who is back from Cape Town with some proper red wine.
No diving on the 2nd, since we’ll all be hangover.

-SSI FITC, 4th to 9th
-Mouthfill Course, 13th to 15th
-SSICombo Week, 18th to 23rd
-Training week, 18th to 23rd

APRIL:
-SSI FITC, 4th to 9th
-Easter SSI Combo Week, 21st to 26th
-Easter Training Week, 21st to 26th
-Minicomp Week, 28th to 3rd (of May)

MAY:
-Minicomp Week, until the 3rd
-SSI Combo Week, 20th to 25th
-Combo Week, 20th to 25th
-SSI FITC, 30th to 4th (of June)

JUNE:
-SSI FITC, until the 4th
-SSI Combo Week, 9th to 14th
-Training Week, 9th to 14th
-Triple Depth, 19th to 25th
-Sled Event, 27th to 29th

JULY:
-SSI Combo Week, 11th to 16th
-Training Week, 11th to 16th

AUGUST:
-SSI Combo Week, 1st to 6th
-Training week, 1st to 6th
-SSI FITC, 15th to 20th

INFO ABOUT THE EVENTS:

TRAINING WEEK:
You are freediving already or you just finished a course, and what you need now is refining your skills and technique. We will be your trainers/coaches, giving you suggestions and tips during the diving sessions.
A training week includes 6 days of training, with 2 dive sessions at Blue Hole or Light House every day.

Price: 300€
If you want to stay in single room, add 40 Euro to the price.
The price includes:
- 7 nights accommodation in double rooms (at Yasmina Hotel, Octopus Hotel or equivalent)
- 6 Training days.
- Transportation between the hotel and Freedive Dahab.
- Transportation to and from the Blue Hole or Light House.
- Buoys, ropes and weights.
- Lotta, Linda or one of the FDD team as training coaches.

If you want to stay in single room, add 40 Euro to the price.

SSI COMBO WEEK:
A Combo Week is a package deal including accommodation offering a combination of courses and training, where you can choose the option that suits you better. These are the options:
- option 1: SSI level 1 + 4 days training, 365 euro
- option 2: 3 days training + SSI level 2, 380 euro
- option 3: SSI level 1+ 1training day+ SSI level 2 , 465 euro

The prices include:
- 7 nights accommodation in double rooms (Yasmina Hotel, Octopus Hotel or equivalent)
- Transportation between the hotel and Freedive Dahab
- Transportation to and from the Blue Hole or Light House
- Buoys, ropes and weights
- Lotta, Linda or one of the FDD team as instructors and training coaches
- SSI certification card for the courses and student manual
- Equipment

If you want to stay in single room, add 40 Euro to the price.

MOUTHFILL COURSE
This is a 3 days course aiming to teach how to do a mouthfill and using it efficiently to perform deep dives.
This course is suitable for freedivers who are mentally and physically ready for depth but are missing the deep equalization knowledge and practice.

The course includes:

6 dive sessions during which the freediver will master the following skills:
-Exhale diving
-Mouthfill practiced in combination with exhale and inhale diving

3 theory sessions during which you will be explained in details:
-Mechanics of the main equalization techniques
-Theory behind the mouthfill mechanics and how to perform a full efficient mouthfill
-Main problems freedivers encounter during the first approach with this technique and what to do to overcome each of them

Requirement to participate to the course: being able to dive comfortably to depth of 35/40m.
Price: 300 euro

NOTE: this course is about learning new techniques and not about deep diving; the student will be allowed to perform deep dives only during the last day and only if he has mastered the required skills. Most of the teaching will be performed at relatively shallow depth.
The student will need to provide his own equipment, and he will use bifins. No monofin or FIM is allowed until the last day.

AIDA**** Freediver:
This is an advanced course for freedivers who want to go beyond recreational level. You will learn more advanced equalization techniques and more about how to stay fit for freediving.

The course includes:
-3 theory sessions during which we go deep into all the theory regarding deep diving and deep equalization techniques. We speak about cross training and nutrition for freediving.
-1 stretching session led by a professional Yoga Teacher, covering full body stretching and lung stretching.
-2 pool sessions where you train packing, stretching, coaching and how to put together an individual pool training session.
-5 dive sessions where the main focus is exhale-diving and mouth-fill equalizing. You will also do some Variable Weight diving during the course.
At the end of the course you will be able to dive comfortably to the depth of 35-40 meters.

Course duration: 4 days
Prerequisites: AIDA *** (or equivalent), First Aid/CPR course, 18 years (16 with guardian’s signature).
Price: 320€ (if single student 400€)

FDD ANNUAL MINI COMP:
28 April-3 May
This is a 2 days CWT/CNF/FIM competition, where you can decide which discipline you want to do and when. For example you can do only one of the three disciplines during all competition days.
As usual, we want to keep it small and cosy, and therefore the maximum amount of athletes will be 20.

Maximum depth is 90m since the Blue Hole still didn’t get any deeper, and we will use our funky underwater counter ballast system!
NOTE! We will not provide bottom camera.

This competition is an AIDA International Competition with AIDA RANKING STATUS, and WR STATUS, but it will be up to the athlete to cover the WR procedures and doping test expenses.

Included in the price is:
- 7 nights accommodation in double rooms (at Yasmina Hotel, Octopus Hotel or equivalent)
- 4 training days in Blue Hole (2 sessions each day)
- 2 competition days
- Transportation between the hotel and Freedive Dahab.
- Transports to and from Blue Hole every day.
- Buoys, ropes and weights.
- Lotta, Linda or one from the FDD team as training coaches.
- Counter ballast, surface camera, safety divers, doctor and oxygen for dives below 60m on the competition days

Price: 300€
If you want to stay in single room, add 40 Euro to the price.
If you only want to participate during the competition days the price is 80€

TRIPLE DEPTH
19-25 June
For the 7th time in 7 years we are organizing the Triple Depth Freediving Challenge!
Who will be the best male and female Freediver in all 3 depth disciplines in 3 days?

Like last year you will be able enroll also as a team and compete for the BEST TEAM title!
At least one athlete in each team has to be a woman.
We will of course use our “Pyramid” setup as usual.

Schedule:
18th Opening and registration (in the afternoon at FDD)
19th Training in Blue hole in the morning (optional sled diving in the afternoon)
20th Training in Blue hole in the morning (optional sled diving in the afternoon)
21st Training in Blue hole in the morning (optional sled diving in the afternoon)
22nd Static comp in the morning (optional sled diving in the afternoon)
23rd FIM comp day
24th CWT comp day
25th CNF comp day and Closing dinner party (…until late at Rush as usual…)

We keep the same prices as last year!
TRAINING + STATIC + COMP: 165€
TD COMP DAYS ONLY: 120€
SLED PER DAY: 20€ if you do the full TD program. 40€ for any other freediver who wants to give it a try (no transportation included)

SLED RECORD EVENT
27-29 June
This year we are offering the opportunity to do National Records attempts in VWT and NL.
Maximum depth will be 90m since this is still the bottom of the Blue Hole
You can do VWT and/or NL and you can choose to participate during one or both days.

We provide:
-Transportation to and from Blue Hole
-Safety freedivers
-AIDA Judges
-Doctor
-Counter ballast system and sled of course!
-Air tanks for NL
-Oxygen
-Surface camera

NOTE! We do NOT provide BOTTOM camera! If your National AIDA requires it to recognize the attempt, you will have to provide the camera with housing yourself. We can mount it on the sled or bottom plate as your National AIDA requires.

We provide Sled Diving training during 4 afternoons prior to the Record Event (23-26/9).

SLED DIVING training (20-22 and 27 June): 160€ including transfer
SLED RECORD EVENT (28-29 June): 1 day 120€, 2 days 200€ (min 3 athletes max 6)
Too keep these price, we need minimum 3 participants each record day.

Photos by Jacques de Vos

BOAT SHOW, day ??

2011-01-25T11:15:00.018+02:00

Boat Show, day ??

Mhh, I lost the count of the days, and I have no clue which day of the week it is anymore.
Here is the same every day, grey outside and boring inside. That is until 5.59pm of course, because at 6 the parties start and in some stands something magical happens: the boring brochures disappear and booze is suddenly everywhere all over the counters and a hundred people appear from nowhere and everybody is pushing around to get hold of as much spirit as possible.

Then after 5 minutes you get bored and go see the magic happening in the next stand and so on until you find the exit and luckily Cristian the SSI odin boy is always there to bring you home safely.

Finally I figured out what I was doing wrong. I was looking for husbands in the wrong place! I was hanging out where the small boats are parked, which was such a beginner's mistake. Now I found the right place. The boats they sell are so big that they don’t fit in the buildings, so they display their miniatures models.

This is the place where the right husbands are to be found. I have picked a bunch of candidates. Their average age is 82, and the average number of hair left in their head way lower than 82. Average life expectancy is between 6 and 12 months, which is their best feature, except the bank statement figures of course.

Then I found out about the kite and wind surfing hall. This is where I’m looking for husbands to marry in 2012, after the funeral of beloved husband number 1.

By the way, some people might have heard around that I’m already married, and will be wondering what happened to that one husband. Well, not only he didn’t buy me a diamond yet, but when recently I demanded the right to drive his new car he had reminded me that “we aren’t officially married and therefore I cannot claim any rights”. I have to admit that I was sad for about 5 minutes, but now I’m very thankful to him for reminding me.

Now, enough about me. Let’s talk about Lotta. She is really enjoying the partying bit. See for yourself.

SSI is investing big bucks in their Freediving project.
They have Scubapro making a new Freediving computer (by the way, a little bird told me that we will have them as first prizes for the triple depth winners!).

They also have Sub Gear making very nice entry level fins (little bird also heard that they will also be prizes and soon for sale in our shop).

Now they are working on this super hi-tech buoy. It will have a solar power engine inside and it will swim out and set up itself, and even pull up the rope at the end of the session. A video camera is mounted on the top and set with the current aida rules, and a card (either while, yellow or red) will be automatically ejected after the athlete has performed the surface protocol.
Here you see Guido proudly presenting the first prototype.

Disturbing facts:

Somebody proposed to me but unfortunately he’s neither a boat owner nor a kite surfer, so I had to decline. (Plus he proposed in front of the show's public toilets...bubble makers are such posh people, aren't they?)

Lotta found the new Sphera at the aqualung stand. It is PINK. And of course Lotta is superexcited about it, so I’m afraid that soon you will be able to find pink spheras in our shop.

BOAT SHOW, day 2

2011-01-23T14:19:00.019+02:00

Day 2

Sunday, and still freezing outside.
Inside lot of action!
by the way, we just got hold of 70 sphera masks, so those who were in the sphera waiting list can pass by the shop from the 1st of February and get their mask. DO NOT forget to take cash with you!
(funnily enough lots of people show up, shop for gear and say, oh, I have no money, can I just take the stuff home and pay next time I pop by? The answer is NO!)

However, what’s different today is that Lotta is here and now our desk looks a little bit more full and happy.

So, my plan for the day was the following: I put on my husband hunting shoes, instructed Lotta to try sell Freediving courses to the bubble makers passing by (yeah, good luck with that) and ditched her there while I went husband shopping in the husband shopping area which is in the stands with the gargantuan boats with gargantuan engines (where for obvious reasons all the rich men with small penises like to hang out).

Unfortunately my husband hunting shoes give me only 45 minutes of action, after which my feet run out of blood, so I had to retreat before I had the time to do some proper market research.

Now I’m planning my next incursion in the big boat-small penis area while Lotta is massaging my feet.

Here some interesting things I have seen today.

Just to give you an idea about the weather. It is so cold that everything in frozen.

Bubble makers trying to look graceful (and never succeding)

German champion Anna interviewed by a meatball

Ai, the cutest japanese freediver and videographer. I think she has a crush on Cristian Redl because she's sitting the whole day at the Mares stand where Redl is treated like a superstar.

The funkiest swimming fins. I'm going to steal 1 pair when nobody is looking.

Stoss the superboss, with Lotta, Maike and me.

FDD goes to the BOAT SHOW

2011-01-22T11:13:00.004+02:00

Hey everybody, if you are in Dusseldorf and you are depressed (how can you not be?) before considering suicide pop by to the boat show and come and say hi to us!
We might sell you some freediving courses, or at most we might be able to talk you out of suicide.

We are in the SSI Stand, Hall 03 C16.
We are here representing the SSI freediving system and trying to sell as many courses as possible and make as much money as we can (since we are both getting old and soon need to retire and take up a proper hobby, like knitting).

Our stand is the one with nothing on it, no flyers nor brochures, no posters. Just Linda looking miserable and trying to hide it by looking very busy at her computer.

But no worries, seems like lotta, after having been forbidden access to her air berlin flight yesterday for looking like a terrorist, was finally let today on a egyptair flight. She still looked like a terrorist, but they cunningly figured that she was gonna bomb the show in dusseldorf anyways, and they were cool with that.

Which is a very good news, since lotta is the one having all the info stuff, brochures, papers and all the stuff that we need to look like professional sellers. Plus she is the social worker and the one who will possibly talk you out of suicide.
Which makes me realize...what am i doing here? Lotta could do all the work by herself and i could be in Cape Town having some fun.
So my presence here is completely useless. I think i'll go shopping the whole week.

Now, let’s get to the important stuff.
The weather. There is something seriously wrong with it. I wasn’t aware that there was such a thing as minus temperature. And it’s all grey and the trees are all looking dead.
My alarm went off in the middle of the night, but then I realized it was indeed 7am, and it was totally dark outside.
Yesterday I went out for a walk, and now I know why people have long jackets and tops that cover their bellies. Cold is like evil, it insinuates everywhere it can find the tiniest gap and makes you miserable.
I’m really not equipped for this.
I might actually end up considering suicide myself, and hopefully Lotta will arrive soon and save me.

Now, what’s happening here.
No idea really, everybody around me speakz germanz, zo whatever they zay is a mystery. They probably talk about suicide, since they all look sad and pale enough.
I’m taking german lessons via facebook. So far I have learnt:
Ich bin in Deutschland and Bitte nicht schiessen.
I need somebody to teach me urgently how to say: “leave me alone”, and “piss off”.

Calendar 2011

2010-12-14T11:18:00.026+02:00