What people tried or did to extend the length of their breath holds
Warm up STA dives
The philosophy behind warm-ups is that it puts your body in a freediving mode. As previously described this freediving mode refers to the dive response, which forces your body to activate its reflexes. By being in a relaxed state and having the extra red blood cells released by the spleen in your system, you have more stored O2 bonded with them, which translates into an increased oxygen reserve for your dive.
Timing well the lengths of the warm-up dives and time in between, as well as keeping in mind the total time you spend in the pool to avoid getting cold, takes a bit of trial and error. Optimal lengths for breaks and warm-up dives vary from individual to individual, as well as the temperature of the pool, the wetsuit you are using and how much adaptation to freediving you have. Some people also prefer no warmup STA1.
Meditation and visualization
Most likely, the majority of the freedivers you have heard of or will hear about have been exploring these two fields. By practicing meditation, they aim to achieve potentially lower heart rates2 and the ability to keep focus during long dives. It could be categorized as mental training.
Regarding visualization, it could potentially be a positive mental exercise, and to some extent, substitute for pool training or times when pools are not accessible. There is one freediver who mentions that in his case the technique was borrowed from other sport3.
CO2 and O2 Tables
As a beginner, your threshold for CO2 tolerance is likely quite average, but that is something that you can improve. The purpose of the tables is to get your body used to high CO2 levels and, over time, increase the threshold to prolong the comfortable phases of a breath-hold (Second phase described in the previous article). Several applications can be used, either for a limited time or with a subscription, which automatically build different kinds of table variations for you. You can download two of the most common ones under here. They have as a starting point your current personal best, your longest static breath hold
Not eating before a STA training or a max attempt
By allowing you last meal to have been fully digested your body won’t spend energy on processing food and at the same time, by having an empty stomach and guts, there will be more space for a bigger belly breath. In other words, more space for your lungs and no energy used on digestion. This time is of course depending on each individual metabolism. From what could be gathered from the internet and podcasts it is not clear if 12 to 48 hours of fasting also slows down the metabolism, but should you prioritize comfort and an uninterrupted by bathroom trips training session perhaps it’s worth considering.
Giving up face gear
When submerged in water, sensory receptors for wetness and temperature send information to the brain, which further communicates it, triggering the corresponding reflexes. In theory, the more receptors you trigger, the stronger your diving response will be, resulting in longer dives. With the risk of repeating, such responses are individual and choosing whether to wear a piece of gear or not is a personal choice.
According to the theory, at least4, a diving mask will cover most of the places where receptor are and is therefore a poor choice for STA.
The next best option is swimming goggles and a nose clip. This will allow most of your skin receptors to be exposed and allows you to see if you wish to see if you like to have your eyes pen now and then.
Removing the goggles engages even more receptors and forces you to keep your eyes closed. As your dominant way of interacting with the world is not active other sensations can keep you busy during a dive: tension in the body, water creeping into your wetsuit, air shifting through your wetsuit, feeling your heart rate, trying to keep the water out of your eyes, sounds in the pool, the voice of your coach, etc
Giving up the nose clip, the last piece of gear, leads to having water inundating the nostrils, which contains one of the endings of an important nerve (trigeminal nerve which innervates the face). Cooling the nose cavity down provides extra stimulation. STA with no face gear provides a theoretical maximum stimulation for triggering your dive response. Though it is something one can explore, having water with chlorine in your nose and eyes is not something most of us look forward to. Comfort, familiarity, and keeping yourself relaxed are perhaps the things that you’ll find most satisfying in the beginning of your journey with STA.
Diet
A nitrate-rich diet has come up several times, both in funny contexts5 and in a more scientific ones, in a study on beetroot juice improving static and dry breath hold lengths6.
The suspicion, for many years, was that nitrate rich vegetables (beetroot juice, spinach, rhubarb, coriander, and generally green leaves usually used in salads) lower the body’s oxygen consumption, making one more efficient at using the limited amount of oxygen available during a dive. The aim, of course, is longer dive times. Though the conclusions of the study support the assumptions many divers have acted upon over the years regarding the diet, it was conducted on a small number of experienced freedivers.
There was even a Swedish TV show with a small breath-hold challenge before and after drinking red beetroot juice.
Weight loss
For competitions with high stakes and people pushing their limits for various reasons (David Blaine TED Talk7), going through a weight loss process or a water fasting period seems to have paved the way to longer breath holds. Caloric restriction for long periods of time, based on the publicly available statements, seems to reduce metabolism, creating benefits for longer breath-hold performances. Some athletes and STA coaches8 put themselves through extreme weight loss procedures before max attempts.
NOTE! that these performances are also close to the current world records and between double or triple the amount of time any freediving course requires at beginner and even advanced levels.
Stretching and flexibility
In an interview for the French television, after a world record STA attempt, the athlete talks about his flexible rib cage9 and demonstrates it. The gains seem to be marginal and the amount of those who find it beneficial for their performances is limited to a handful of elite athletes.
Cardio training
Most of us do some kind of cardio already ex: cycling, running, swimming. The benefit related to STA and freediving is that over time one’s resting heart BPM gets lower. A lower heart rate helps during a breath hold by slowing down burning oxygen. If you’ve listened to some of the resources in the footnotes, one of them mentions a correlation between cross-country skiers (which is a cardio activity) and longer breath holds.
Safety for STA
Always practice freediving with a buddy that can safety you should anything occurs. Always say what you will dive and dive what you said! Freediving competitions are the safest place to attempt personal bests, as there are always one or two safety divers in the pool with you and a specialized doctor prepared for any incidents.
Bottom line
Like our fingerprints, each human body seems to behave in a unique way regarding breath-holding. This gives each of us different starting points and places us on individual paths forward. It takes time to try different techniques, understand your reactions, and figure out your path, but there are certainly training methods you can try. Some will be suitable for you, others may not.
Taking a course, joining a club, or training with a buddy can be a great first step, but for more tailored approaches, one should consider a coach or a few coaches to find the best path and safely navigate longer breath-holds.
Footnote resources:
- Marcin Baranowski interview (9) Episode 90 – Physiology of Freediving ↩︎
- Marcin Baranowski interview (9) Episode 90 – Physiology of Freediving ↩︎
- Rami Bladlav interview (5) Episode 133 – Static Warior ↩︎
- Marcin Baranowski interview (9) Episode 90 – Physiology of Freediving ↩︎
- Stig Severinsen interview (6) Episode 129 – Breatheology ↩︎
- Beetroot juice study (13) Nitrate supplementation vs dry static apnea ↩︎
- TED Talk David Blaine (12) From minute 8:15 ↩︎
- Florian Dagoury & Fatima Korok interview (10) Modern Training Methods ↩︎
- Stephane Mifsud interview (17) French TV interview ↩︎
