Freediving course in Eilat

About a month ago I gave a wedding gift to my friend Yariv, my spearfishing buddy - I took him to Eilat to take an AIDA free diving course.

AIDA is a freediving association, which tries to make some order in this wonderfull, but dangerous sport. Our guide was Gad Levy, a great friend I've met when I worked at Eilat court's security.

We arrived to Eilat on thursday evening after the 5 hours drive, and "hit the sack" to rest properly for the upcoming days. The following morning we started in the classroom, learning some basic diving physiology, mental and physical preparation for the dive (using basic Yoga breathing skills) and precautions to be considered when free diving.

Just when we thought we'll fall asleep, Gad sent us to suit up and get ready for our first wet excersice.(From left to right: Yariv, me, Gad)

The sea condition wasn't at its best, a bit cold, windy and choppy (usually the red sea is calm, clear and warm) but we did our best and had a good practice. Gad showed us the equipment used for freediving - a diving platform made of a float big enough for us to rest on, a "divers in the water" flag, spare snorkel and beltweights, a line at the length of the desired diving depth and a big weight at its end.

We swam to our dive site - The Satil, which is a sunken navy boat wreck lying in 24m, and its deck rising to 18m. The dives are held along the diving line, keeping hand contact with it. When one dives, his buddy keeps looking at him and escorting him in the last 10m on the way up. We focused on basic diving skills, movement in the water, pressure equilibrating techniques and more.



We concluded that day on a cup of coffee and some freediving and spearfishing videos, to have some inspiration for the next day.

The next morning Gad surprised us with a pool session - he decided to take advantage of the warmed pool at the hotel accross the street to eliminate the stress caused by the sea conditions, and to bring us to complete relaxation. At the pool we practiced Static and Dynamic apnea - Static means you put your head underwater and hold your breath as much as you can. Needless to say that your buddy keeps watching and keeping hand contact with you to verify you're OK. Dynamic means you put your fins and weights on, and swim underwater for the greatest distance you can. We focused on correct relaxation prior the dive, and correct recovery after.

I managed to break my record in Static: 3:45 minutes of breath hold!!!

Doing Dymanic dive:

After a couple of hours in the pool we had lunch, rested a bit, and headed for the sea. Today the weather was a bit better, and the sea was clearer (as you can see in the photos). We went back to the wreck and continued practicing, combining rescue drills while Gad gives special instructions for each one according to their skill.

That session Yariv and I dove to 20m and felt good and comfortable:

We finished the day with a great lunch by the sea during which we took a short exam to test our learnt knowledge and to recieve our AIDA certificate.
We headed back to Tel-Aviv full with experiences and with promises of more diving vacations like this in the future, and with enticipation to see how the course upgraded our spearfishing ability, and more important, our understanding of our limits, our bodies and our souls.