When experienced snorkellers and experienced scuba divers hear about freediving courses, they often ask us:
"Freediving is just snorkelling. What could I possibly learn in a course?"
Anyone who has been in one of our courses will have a somewhat better idea of just how much there is to learn.
There is in fact so much to learn, that we had to split the contents into beginners, advanced, expert and speciality courses, because a single course could not feasibly cover it all.
We have had many students with a solid scuba diving background and the feedback we got from them is summed up well in what one of them - a well seasoned technical diving instructor himself - wrote to us:
"They say you never stop learning and after being in the scuba industry for years I thought there wasn't much more I could learn.
How wrong I was.
Outline of the Contents of a We Freedive Beginners Course
Knowledge and Understanding
- Why do You want to freedive?
- How this course will help you with that
- How do we breathe?
- Mechanics of Breathing
- Why do we breathe?
- The roles of O₂ and CO₂ in breathing
- What are your options?
- Conscious vs. subconscious breathing - Choice awareness
- How does this make my dives better?
- Awareness and use of increased CO₂ levels
- What is too much breathing?
- Useful definitions of Hyperventilation and why we don't want to breathe too much before freediving
- What is a 'breathing technique'?
- understanding common breathing techniques and making educated decisions on whether to apply them
- How does Freediving Work?
- The skills involved in the sport of freediving
- How to move like a freediver
- Aquaticity and spacial awareness on scuba vs. freediving. (2D vs. 3D space)
- How to improve your Freediving
- The importance of efficiency in the water and how to achieve it
- Why you always want a buddy
- Buddying principles and safe practises in pool and open water
- What is a breathe-up?
- How to reduce complexity and safely and productively prepare for a dive
- How to begin a dive
- A smooth transition into a successful dive
- How to end a dive
- Putting a safe and sound end to a successful dive
- How to breathe after a dive
- Making the best possible use of our lungs
- Understanding freediving safety
- Potential risks and how to mitigate them
- How to avoid problems
- Safe practices
- How to spot problems
- Recognising troubles
- How to help
- Helping effectively
Pool Skills
- Putting understanding in the water
- Making productive, safe decisions in the water
- How to do nothing at all
- Relaxation at high CO₂ levels in the water
- How to make use of your gear
- Effective use of fins
- How to not work against yourself
- Awareness and control of streamline
- Going too fast?
- Awareness and control of speed
- Where am I going?
- Efficient directional control
- Which way?
- Effective turns
- How to be a responsible buddy
- Safe, effective rescues in the pool
Open Water Skills
- How to deal with pressure
- Effective Equalisation and how to improve it
- How to get down
- Effective duck dives
- How to make dives easier
- Awareness and control over streamline in open water
- How to know where you're going (without looking)
- Directional awareness and control in open water
- How to enjoy your dives
- Increasing your comfort level at depth
- How to get back
- Safe and effective turns in open water.
- How to stay calm in difficult situations
- Dealing with stress at depth
- How to get yourself out of trouble
- Dealing with equipment failure at depth
- How to keep each other safe
- Effective buddying in open water
- How to help each other
- Effective rescues from depth
And this is just a beginners course!
Whatever your level of diving is, our courses will make sure you make the most of what you have and will give you new tools to make your dives safer and more enjoyable.
