Poolside at the 3rd Dutch Apnea Open
Posted By Sam Kirby on 20 December 2004
After the pool, we all carpooled to get 45 people over to a smart restaurant for the Athletes Dinner. As with everything else, the organisation was slick. The food was delicious and a competition the next day did not seem to put anyone off the wine. Suddenly I found myself speaking French to the guys on my right, German to the guy behind me and English to the guy on my left - all while trying to understand the Dutch going on in front of me. An incredible buzz and once again, that feeling of mutual understanding and some kind of deep link from our shared sport despite all the geographical boundaries.
Sunday dawned frosty and sub zero. The pool was ours, all ours and the pressure grew slightly, but nothing like the levels I had previously experienced in Cyprus, Hawaii and Vancouver. Maybe it was because it was an individual event, or not a World Cup, or just that it was the middle of winter and no one was up to their peak performance - but all the athletes seemed fairly relaxed. The poolside looked like some kind of refugee camp as everyone set up yoga mats, camping mattresses and even sleeping bags. I set up next to the "camouflage" boys and Remko's "relaxo-dile" (photos on the website will explain).
The first puzzle of the day was how Susan could be wandering around chatting and announcing top times simultaneously. Finally someone had made automatic, taped announcements work. The day started with static apnea and the shortest subscriptions went first. Times started at less than two minutes and went up to Tom Sieta's inscription of 7 minutes. Four lanes ran at a time with AIDA International Judges Sebastien Nagel, Francois Gautier, Pim and Jorg Jansen each paired up with a local judge. Smiling safety divers were available in the warm up area and competition zone. This was just as well as unlike other competitions I have been to, not many people seemed to have a personal coach with them. I felt sure that many of the competitors, myself included, could have performed better with a coach talking them through their static. And yes Panos - I was grateful for your coaching from the side and didn't ignore you when you told me to come up! I just had delayed hearing from oxygen starvation...
My own performance out of the way, it was time to watch the big boys. Tom, Herbert, Kars van Kouwen and Glenn Venghaus were all up against each other. Kars had been talking much about his "sun gazing" technique, no one knew much about Glenn and we had all seen Herbert in action many times - but all eyes were on Tom. There was a mass synchronised beep as everyone started their watches when his head went down. First we watched Glenn come up, then Herbert and Kars after 6 mins 31 despite the lack of sunshine! Things then went quiet for a further couple of minutes as everyone present gathered poolside to watch. Tom finally surfaced at 8 minutes 58, clean as a whistle and to a huge round of applause once the white cards were given. Stunning!
A short break and some light lunch and the lanes were set up for dynamic. One on either side of the pool so everyone could see, and two judges per lane. The pool was a bit deep for static but the perfect depth for dynamic - a little too deep to stand up in at the shallow end and about the same depth for most of its length with a short drop off at the deep end. There were no difficult jets like the Vancouver pool and the temperature had been hiked up to 28C. After a full morning of static, most people opted to go straight into their dynamic swim with no preparation, myself included. For the first hour or so, it was easy to just get hypnotised watching the other divers. In particular, the no fins swimmers really caught the eye. Panos Lianos had come the furthest of any athlete and had just achieved his best ever static in competition. Having given up his day job to freedive full time, he must have had high hopes for his performances - and he lived up to them. A smooth, steady, perfectly paced stroke took him to 106m no fins - a new Greek record, and another kiss blown towards Texas!
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