"EXPAND-A-LUNG" EXERCISER ???

[beachdivequeenbelam]

Tips to improve underwater air use.

1) Do not go under until breathing is under control. Many people swim out to a location, or are nervous and breathing fast when they start to descend. You'll burn up tons of air doing this.

2) Do not over exert yourself. This will only increase your breathing rate and you'll waste air. There's rarely a need to kick fast or zoom around.

3) Move slowly and deliberatly. Ties into number 2. When you are slow and deliberate, you need to use very little air, and you are calm.

4) Stay streamlined and horizontal. Again, part of number 2. Less water resistence means less work, which means less air. Stuff hanging and dangling everywhere means less bottom time.

5) Breathly slowly and deeply. This doesn't mean suck as much air in your lungs as you can, that's dangerous, simply take slow deep breaths, as if you are trying to calm yourself down. This does keep you calm, which means less air use, and the breathing itself is efficient for air comsumption.

I don't have many dives yet, 19, but I already hit NDL limits long before my air is up. Most of my dives now end with me having over 1000 psi left. My first dives, I'd be at 2000 psi by the time I got to the depth I wanted, because of fast breathing.

Avoid fast breathing and your air use will automatically decrease.

Aerobic excercise will also help, by allowing you to do more excerise without increasing your breathing rate. That's still my biggest hurdle. If I have to work hard against a current, my breathing rate shots up too much.

Xanthro

Practice, Relax, and Practice , Relax, and get the picture. He just told you everything you need to know basically. After swimingout somewhere stop breath think and then when taht is all under control ACT

 

[^*^BATMAN^*^]

just to reiterate, to alot of aerobic and anaerobic exercises, like swiming, biking, running, nordic skiing, rowing. except for running, they are all really good low impact exercises, your best bet would be to look on the net and find a workout to follow, or buy a book with the same thing. Also if you smoke, quit, smoking increases your bodys need for oxygen, so you will breth more, so if you do....quit.

then there is all the little tricks int he water, i do the resting thing on surface, and as well at like 10-15ft. you can slow down your brething a bit, and fix you bouyency, both good tricks for better air consumption, and dont say that becaeu you are big you will use lots of air, i am 6'5" 220lbs, and i can do a dive to 100ft, for a total of 40 minutes, and still have 1000-1200 psi left, thats also in 40f water, so its colder.......


to reiterate, exercise, dont smoke, relax before going under...

 

[jbisjim]

I got an email for a Pe.. enlarger is that the same kind of deal? ;-)

 

[Iruka]

One thing to add to Xanthro's excellent advice....proper buoyancy. Too much weight means unnecessary air added to BCD, which causes poor swimming position (legs down) which increases air use. Too little weight, and the diver is forced to take shallow, quick breaths in order to avoid floating away...again increasing air consumption. (I've had plenty of experience with this when I'm forced to give all my weights away during the dive to underweighted divers, ha ha.)

 

[freediver]

I looked at the trainer you referred to. Pretty interesting. Similar to all others as an inspiratory trainer but has a mouthpiece as well. I think the price is a bit steep esp being on ebay.
They also make a pretty bold claim that the competitive freedivers that tested it increased their breath hold u/w by average of 20%!! I still feel you can accomplish what you wish by using simpler, less expensive means and by getting in the water and diving more (funny how that seems to decrease air consumption ).

 

[ekiledjian]

Thank you all for your answers.