A guideline to planning your training for the season

If your anything like me, the new year brings with it a new wave of motivation and energy for the season a head! It is important to have a plan to help channel this energy and turn it into results! Taking the time to sit down and mark out your calendar is the best way to do this. Knowing what your working towards keeps motivation levels high and helps you reach peak performance at the right time!

Planning your Season

Key points

• Write down your goals and objectives for the season. Aim high but also be realistic. Anything is possible, but the higher(or deeper!) you aim, the harder you have to work! Having two sets of goals, an 'Ultimate' goal and a 'Satisfactory' goal can help you stay motivated and prevent you from hitting the ground to hard if you didn't quite make the ultimate goal you were dreaming of.

• Look at your competition calendar, or for those that don't compete, when do you want to be in peak condition. For the majority of people this will be based around the summer season and when the water is the warmest.
  
  
• How many times are you looking at 'peaking' in the season? Many freedivers have full time jobs and live away from the ocean. If you fit into this category, you will also be combining your holidays with your training cycles. For the intermediate level and recreational divers, you may be able to 'peak' up to 3 times in a season with shorter training cycles. For the more serious divers, longer training cycles make it harder to peak more than twice in a season.
  
  
• If your training Depth.. Look at-"How long can you spend training at depth?" For the majority of divers, just having the time to train at depth will make a huge difference. Many people arrive with only a week up their sleeve, are just starting to get comfortable and starting to make improvements and then it is time to leave again!
  
  
• Attend courses, training camps, improve your knowledge and skills! Many of the skills learnt in courses will take more than just the duration of the course to master them. Also, having the guidance of an expert instructor can help you fast track your improvements. The money you are spending for their guidance and knowledge will more than likely save you time and money in the long run!

• Once you have these dates you can start building your training plan around it! Remember to include base training(Pool, Strength, Pilates/Stretching/Yoga, Apnea) into your training cycles. Most of the hard work is done here, well in advance of any competition! Preparation is the key to success!

​

• Just as importantly, remember to include rest periods into your calendar! This will not only help your recovery physically, but it will help you recover mentally and prevent burning out and loosing motivation!
  
  
• Find a training partner to help you work towards your goals and give you that extra bit of motivation when you need it! Number one rule of freediving is to never freedive alone.. from a safety point of view this is critical.. not only for safety though, personally I have ALWAYS gotten my best results when training alongside a consistent partner. If possible.. plan your seasons
  
  

Once you have your plan in place you are nearly good to go! Just remember to ensure all your dive gear is in good working order. Whilst that worn out old wetsuit might be fine for CO2 tables in the pool, if you are getting cold during your breath ups you are increasing your risks of lung squeeze when you go to use it for depth! If your neck weight isn't quite weighted correctly then your going to be exerting unnecessary energy during the dive! And if those stiff old heavy fins are giving you cramp it may be time for an upgrade! Having good equipment is going to help you get the most out of each session.. and getting the most out of each session is crucial to having a DEEP and SUCCESSFUL year!!!

Have fun and dive safe!  And for more great tricks of the trade sign up to our newsletter!