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Competitive Freediving

Competitive free-diving is currently governed by two world associations: AIDA International and CMAS. Most types of competitive free-diving have in common that it is an individual sport based on the best individual achievement. An exception to this rule is the bi-annual World Championship for Teams, held by AIDA International, where the combined score of the team members makes up the teams total points. There are currently nine disciplines used by official governing bodies and a dozen disciplines that are only practiced locally. In this article, the recognized disciplines of AIDA International and CMAS will be described. All disciplines can be done by both men and women and, while done outdoors, no differences in the environment between records are recognized any longer. The disciplines of AIDA International can be done both in competition and as a record attempt, with the exception of Variable Weight and No limits, which are both only done as record attempts. The following official disciplines are recognized by (AIDA), (CMAS), or both.

Pool Disciplines/ Free-Diving

• Static Apnea is timed breath holding and is usually attempted in a pool. (AIDA)
• Dynamic Apnea with fins. This is underwater swimming in a pool for distance. For this discipline the athlete can choose whether to use bi-fins or the monofin. (AIDA), (CMAS)
• Dynamic Apnea without fins. This is underwater swimming in a pool for distance without any swimming aids like fins. (AIDA)

Depth Disciplines/ Free-Diving

The depth of the athlete is for all AIDA disciplines announced before the dive. This is accepted practice for both competitions as record attempts.

• Constant Weight with fins. The athlete has to dive to the depth following a guideline he or she is not allowed to actively use during the dive. The ‘constant weight’ ("poids constant") refers to the fact that the athlete is not allowed to drop the weights during the dive. Both bi-fins and mono-fin can be used during this discipline (AIDA).
• Constant Weight without fins follows the identical rules as Constant Weight with fins, except no swimming aids such as fins are allowed. This discipline is the youngest discipline within competitive free-diving and is recognized by AIDA International since 2003.(AIDA)
• Free Immersion is the discipline in which the athlete uses the guideline to pull him or herself down to depth and back to the surface. It is known for its ease compared with the Constant Weight disciplines, while the athlete is still not allowed to release weights (AIDA).
• Variable Weight is a record discipline that uses a weighted sled for descent. Athletes return to the surface by pulling themselves up along a line or swimming while using their fins (AIDA).
• No Limits is a record discipline that allows the athlete to use any means of breath-hold diving to depth and return to the surface as long as a guideline is used to measure the distance. Most divers use a weighted sled to dive down and use an air-filled bag to return to the surface (AIDA).
• "The Cube" is also known as "Jump Blue" and is a discipline in which an athlete has to descend to 15 meters and have to swim as far as possible in a cubic form of 15 x 15 meters. (CMAS)

Each organization has its own rules on recognizing an attempt. These can be found on the website from the respective organizations.

Physiology of Free-diving

The human body has several adaptations under diving conditions, which stem from the mammalian diving reflex. These adaptations enable the human body to endure depth and lack of oxygen far beyond normal.

The adaptations made by the human body while underwater and at high pressure include:

• Bradycardia: Drop in heart pulse rate.
• Vasoconstriction: Blood vessels shrink. Blood stream directed away from limbs for the benefit of heart, lungs and brain.
• Splenic contraction: Releasing red blood cells carrying oxygen.
• Blood shift: Blood plasma fills up blood vessels in the lung and reduces residual volume. Without this adaptation, the human lung would shrink and wrap into its walls, causing permanent damage, at depths greater than 30 meters.

Training/ Free-Diving

Training for free diving can take many forms, many of them out of water.  One example is the apnea walk. This consists of a preparation "breathe-up", followed by a short (typically 1 minute) breath hold taken at rest. Without breaking the hold, the participant then initiates a walk for as far as they can, until it becomes necessary to breathe again. Athletes can do close to 400 meters in training this way.  This form of training is good for accustoming muscles to work under anaerobic conditions, and for tolerance to CO₂ build-up in the circulation. It is also easy to gauge progress, as increasing distance can be measured.  Before diving, untrained free divers may hyperventilate, resulting in a lower level of CO₂ in their lungs and bloodstream. This postpones the start of stimulation to the breathing centre of the brain, and thus delays the warning signals of running out of air. As the oxygen level of the blood is not increased by hyperventilation, this is very dangerous and may result in drowning. (For more detail refer to the articles shallow water blackout and deep water blackout.) Trained free-divers are well aware of this and will limit their immediate pre-dive breathing, typically to a maximum of two or three breaths taken slowly and deeply so as to maximize oxygen saturation whilst not depressing blood CO₂ levels. However this does not, of itself, eliminate the risk of deep or shallow water blackout and diving with a 'buddy' who remains observing at the surface is the standard practice.

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Reference material for this scuba diving related informational article: wikipedia – the free online encyclopedia, scuba diving category

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