These 2 last days were full of informations and very nice dives...

after a day of rest I decided to go back to training.
I headed for a 84m dive in CWT. Unfortunately I had to turn earlier because of poor equalization.Finally, my gauge will show 79.3m. Not so far from the bottom plate. I feel very easy about apnea time, but still to focus on my mouthfill technique.
The same day, Natalia did a 94m dive in CWT. Her dive was succesful, but she apparently suffered of embolism while reaching the surface. People said that she was doing strange uncoordinated movements.
It looks like that it is not the first time she is having this kind of severe trauma. A recent IRM showed spots on her brain due to these 'bad' dives.
The future will tell us if she keeps on diving like that or not.
Endangering her health for sport.
 
Julie did an easy 57m dive following her improvment, and Bérangère is working more and more on her depth technique, taking time to go deeper.

Yesterday, 2 freedivers were on the focus : Stavros and William.
Stavros did a succesful new National Greek record in No limits to 126m.
William failed to reach 120m in Variable, he had to stop to 111m due to bad timing on equalization. his goal was to set-up a new canadian record in VWT

Herbert is training each day, spearfishing the evening. No day rest. But he is experiencing some equalization problems. he then does not go as deep as he would like to. Incredible how he can afford spending so much time in water doing so much efforts, without being tired...

Anna is doing an new National record attempt in VWT today.

What comes next :
Carlos Coste just arrived and is apparently here for a new WR (world record) in FIM.Guillaume is also motivated by FIM (coming tonight) , as well as Herbert :-) !

Yesterday, after training i went back to spearfishing with Alexis. We had the chance to find a nice Dentex spot.
A 20-30 school of 6 kg dentex were waiting for us at 30m. I unfortunately missed a shot on one of them. Alexis missed also a big grouper.We will come back later...

As for the dentex, resting the day and fishing at dusk and dawn, I am resting today
Tomorrow will be a training attempt day

The 21st and 22nd of June, AIDA France was organizing the AIDA French National selection for the next Team World Championship.

This selection were taking place in Nice, and were organized by Gregory Piazzola with the help of the CIPA.

We were a bunch of freedivers that came for these selections. The weather was perfect.
The selections were based on a CWT performance to be made during the 2 days.

on this picture (courtesy Greg. Piazzola), you can recognize (from right lo left 1st rank first) : Morgan Bourch'is, Gregory Piazzola, Cyril Paulet, christian Maldamé, Patrick Poggi, then Francine Kreiss, Berangère Duclos, Guillaume Nery, Julie Gautier.
Missing on the picture : William Winram.

After the bad weather conditions of May and June, a few of us were not so well trained. But, the level was here.
For these selections, the more important was to be clean and safe. So everybody played it safe






Here are the official performances realized :

Name	Perf. announced	Perf realized	Points
Morgan	72m	68m	63
William	80m	76m	71
Patrick	75m	DQ	0
Christian	70m	70m	70
Francine	44m?	44m	44
Berangère	38m	38m	38
Julie	55m?	55m	55

We had good time and fun all together.
During the 'fête de la musique', we went in a restaurant in the Old Nice, and enjoyed some good icecreams.

And here are the final results of the selection :
for the women:
Berangere Duclos, Julie Gautier, Francine Kreiss, Solenn Launay

for the men :
Christian Maldame, Guillaume Nery, Morgan Bourc'His, William Winram

Due to their nowadays results (season 2008), Berangere Duclos and Guillaume Nery are now the "alternate athlete". The final alternate athletes will de designated in Sharm El sheik.

We are a good team, almost the same as in 2006 (bronze medal in Hurghada)...And Now ... Let's go to Sharm el sheik !

This 1st may week-end I decided to take a break and have some fun diving in the south of France.

I headed to Hyères with Bérangère Duclos (member of French National team) to meet Cyril Paulet (coach of the french national team) to have some fun freediving, spearfishing and why not some deep dives on the famous shipwrecks 'Donator' and 'Grec', if the weather was nice...

Finally, the conditions were exceptionnal. no wind or almost, no current, and perfect sun. The water was slightly cold (15°C), and visibility was limited to 15m... But nothing really bad.

After a first day of training, back to depth (40m).
We decided to go on the Donator shipwreck ...

From 37m to 51m depth

in french the full description of the wreck :
link

After some training dives to find it... We had a lot of fun diving down and having fun visiting it ... freediving.

We sometimes used an underwater scooter.

And the scuba divers, in the place were really astonished to see us there ;-) !


Unfortunately, my video cam was out of order... And I can only show you a picture taken fron a web site.

The vision of such a wreck... freediving deep is incredible !

In a quiet time, I also had the pleasure to see the huge schools of fishes living there... Sars, Dorades grises, Dentex, Serioles...
Enormous ones and beautiful views...

Diving here is a bit like landing on mars... You know that almost nobody has been here like that. The feeling is incredible !

The next day, we did both the Donator AND the Grec ...

The Grec is another shipwreck some 100m far from The donator.
link (in french)




Another beautiful day freediving and discovering the treasures of our Mediterranée...

Thanks to Cyril for the Coaching and safeties on these deep dives... Staying 1 minute at 40m needs to be secured in a good way...
Thanks to Bérangère for her help on the boat  and.. on land !

See you soon for new adventures !!