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the underwater fly
This week-end, 14th & 15th of January 2012, I will be at the Salon de la Plongée, in Paris.
Come to join me on the AIDA booth.
A special poster signing session will be organised with all the AIDA 2011 french national team.
Constant Weight Day.
After some discussion with my coach, Cyril Paulet, I decided to announce 101m in CWT... I have been to 100 & 101m 4 times in training, and think that I can do it again, even with the competition stress...
On the start list I am the 7th announcement. No stress. My start is early in the morning. Coldness from the previous days storm is still here, and water is fresher than usual. With a no warm-up dive, I decide to take an option that will ensure not to get cold before my dive. Some waves are unusually moving the water surface at this time.
Stress is easy to capture among the present competitors. Just before my dive, one does a black-out in front of me, I stay calm and focused...
I go, and after 3'17'' come back at the surface with the white tag. 101m done !!!!!!! So Happyyyyy !
Coming back on shore I begin to realize that some athletes have missed their dives and that I might get closer to the podium... After a full day of waiting for the final results. It comes officially :
I take the bronze medal of the world championships in the Constant Weight Disciplin !
On the french team side, Guillaume takes the gold medal after a dive at 117m, Morgan does a nice 92m dive and finishes 7th.
Aurore does a new national record with 75m and finishes 5th, Solenn with 58m is 12th and Alice with 57m finishes 14th.
Congratulations to all my teammates for these amazing results, and a big thank to the coach Cyril, and to Florent for his coaching on the dives !
The french team is on fire, 3 medals in 2 disciplins runned, these are unexpected very good results !
Next Disciplin coming is the Free Immersion, that will close the world championships... Stay Tuned !
Here we are, the World championships are now open
On the 19th of September the first competition day was for the No Fins specialist : Constant No Fins -CNF- Disciplin.
In my particular case, I had decided, this year, not to participate to focus my trainings on depth with CWT and FIM.
Within the french team, Brigitte and Morgan were participating.
Brigitte announced 52m a new French National Record, and stressed by a broken nose-clip some seconds before the top, was unable to reach the bottom-plate. She turned early and missed her dive.
Morgan with 80m announced was 4th on the start list. He successfully did his dive, and with one athlete in front of him missing his dive, took the 3rd place and then the bronze medal in this disciplin. Congratulations for this fantastic result Morgan !
Next events will be the Constant Weight -CWT- on the 22nd of Septembre followed by Free Immersion -FIM- on the 24th. Stay Tuned !
Before the official start of the world championships, we were training within the organization of the mediterranean world cup. After 10 days of training days we had the opportunity to perform 'official' dives. 3 days of competition in a row to test ourselves.
It is really a good opportunity to check if our training is on the right way, and if we are on schedule for our objectives.
We were a significative amount of athletes competing within this competition having test targets more than a real final result for the World cup.
For this reason, a lot of dives were failed due to different reasons.
On my side, after 2 successful dives at 100m in mixed disciplins (CWT and FIM together) in training, I felt that it was the right time to check myself in the Constant Weight disciplin at this depth of 100m.
Going to 100m in CWT
I failed after a hard mental dive. I went there, got the tag, and struggled mentally the all way up. I inverted then the surface protocol and got a merited red card for this dive. I was very close to do it, but felt unhappy about the way I had to struggle the way up.
The next day, I decided to try 98m in FIM, but failed too, early turn at 86m, too tired...
Back from 100m - unfortunately, I failed the surface protocol
These 2 dives were coming after 14 days of training. Too much, for sure, to go for a 'clean' and appreciable dive. I then decided to take a serious break !
On the competition side, many athletes turned earlier and missed their dives, probably for the same reason. A few of them succesfully completed their dives.
Within the french team Morgan did a very nice 80m in CNF, Brigitte too with 51m in CNF and Aurore with 73m in CWT. The three secured a new National Record in these disciplins.
The final results of the med comp are below. One can notice that our corsican friend Philippe Taglioferri takes the 3rd place of the competition. A merited place for is regularity, well done dude !
After these first days of acclimatation, it is time to try to dive deeper and increase performance.
Increasing depth performances is an important challenge. It is highly demanding in terms of physical and mental ressources. If you are physically fit and think that your apnea is strong, then you will need to have a strong mental to be able to cross you own barriers and go one step further than what you were able to do before.
Patrick focusing before a dive
In this atmosphere, friendship is an important help that provides you support and confidence while you try to build your mental strength.
Morgan, Florent and I, after a dive
These last days I was able to go one step further and get really closer to my depth objectives.
I also took time to work and improve my Free Immersion technique.
I add and work, each parameter of my dives, one after another to be able to agglomerate them in one single successful dive in the end...
Start of a deep CWT dive
And here is the part 2 of the French National team in Kalamata :
Next post will be dedicated to the Med world cup, the world championships pre-competition, that will take place in 2days... Stay tuned !
The Messinian bay is a wide bay, protected from most winds, where Kalamata takes place. The freediving dive spot is only a few 100 meters offshore from the hotel. A boat comes to pick us up at
the hotel pier, and brings us in 5 minutes at the spot.
Conditions here, are very good : 27°c water temperature, good water visibility and impressive organisation for all logistic and safety provided by Stavros Kastrinakis and his team.
I am happy to be together with some members of the French national team that are also already on site : Guillaume, Florent, Morgan and Patrick.
3 first days of training, to take the pace of the training and the 'freediver's life'. Feeling the atmosphere surrounding us, taking my marks on the lines and in the deep blue here...
These 3 first days of succeeded dives, provides me more confidence for the next days that will be dedicated to increasing depth on the line...
For those who still did not see this video on Facebook, here is the first part of The french National team in Kalamata, and appreciate the high level training :-)
Stay Tuned !
FDD Competition -Egypt - 3...4 may 2011
Coupe des Calanques - Marseille - 4...5 June 2011
AIDA depth world championships - Greece - 10...25 September 2011
