Most Impressive PB of the Month

It is with our greatest pleasure that we get to introduce one of our Zenners, Zaw Than, to our PB Hall of Fame for May!

Zaw made it to a 100m DNF, with a swim time of around 2:00+. Pretty awesome for someone who has only been freediving for about 7 months, don't you think? 

We interviewed him to find out more...

First of all, CONGRATULATIONS! How did you feel during your DNF dive?

“I felt really good! It was supposed to be a normal, long swim. Chris, my instructor, told me to swim about 80% of my previous PB (which was 80m), so I wasn't planning to go for a max attempt. I was even worried that I had hyperventilated during my breathe up, because I didn't really feel much contractions.

At 75m, I was wondering whether I should stop, but I saw that I was surrounded by a wonderful safety team (Coleman at my side, George and Martin in front of me, Brook behind me), and decided to keep going. Within 5 strokes, I reached the end of the pool. I still felt pretty good at 100m, but I didn't dare to go further, because I was scared that I would blackout.” 

Did you do any preparation beforehand?

“The Advanced team training really helped! We were doing a CO2 and O2 combination set (8 x 65m DYN with 2 min rest) the session before. During the set, I could feel the contractions kick in super early at 10m. The idea was to keep swimming to the end with the contractions. By getting more used to the feeling of contractions, I managed to relax into them during my PB dive.

Before the dive, I didn't really do any breathing preparation. I was even chatting with George whilst waiting for my turn. This was my first dive of the day, without any warm up (also known as a 'dry face' dive), because Chris mentioned that it is beneficial in dynamic apnea, but not static apnea and depth.” 

Thanks so much, Zaw. We can't wait to see your future progress!