Freedivers of the World

The AIDA Executive Board will use this blog to address the freediving community in its widest sense. Maybe a little bit less formal than news info or a press release on the AIDA site. Maybe taking the liberty of elaborating on certain issues. We may even see commission members write here.

AIDA thanks DeeperBlue.com for supplying this channel to the freediving world and at the same time apologize for not being able to communicate in other languages, such as Spanish, French, Greek, Turkish, Portuguese, Italian, Japanese and other languages from cultures with a long apnea diving tradition. As we also would have liked to be able to address Russians, Slovakians, Polish, Czech and other east European countries in their native languages, or Arabic for that matter. The northern Europeans speak such good English and already thrive in the AIDA Community, so that is less of a problem.

Yet AIDA has not reached out to Asia and Africa but perhaps one day, most likely when this board has been relieved, AIDA Regulations may also be written in Swahili and Vietnamese, and we may have a Chinese female president – inshallah.

OUR HISTORY

We have seen an increase in the number of competitions.  World Championships have been delivered by bold members every year and the rules and judges have been calibrated. AIDA Education has become a force to be reckoned with. We have seen competitive freediving move out of the pioneer era, we have seen enthusiastic “entrepreneur years” with the launch of lanyards and anti-ballast, and now it is time to move into some kind of adolescence – being more mature and aiming further than the thrill of the next event. This board has the unspoken duty to build something that will last long beyond this mandate period and not crumble down because of personal conflicts. AIDA is bigger than any of us.

OUR RESOURCES

The Assembly has called for transparency, for accountability, and for a new power structure. We will need new statutes suitable for a bigger organization, more people involved. Many issues have to be solved, some of them of a technical and practical nature, others more tricky where values will be challenged and we will have to find a majority path among all our diverse members of different cultures.

Yet one of our greatest challenges is at the same time a resource, a diversity of competence, creativity, and enthusiasm spread across the globe.
A man in a snowy Finland near the arctic circle appoints another person sitting on a boat in the Bahamas that waits for a response from a guy in the Netherlands that talks to a person on an island in the Atlantic about a computer program for the internet that has to be ready before a Japanese guy starts an event in Asia were South Americans and eastern Europeans will mingle with hopefully Arabs, Africans, and Americans.

CORE FUNCTIONS

We must constantly remind ourselves of our core functions. AIDA ranks and regulates competitive freediving and we educate according to a world wide standardized system. Here we want to be the best.

Thus we are called: The International Association for the Development of Apnea. Formed by freedivers and still run by freedivers on a volunteer idealistic basis.

We stand on three legs:

  1. Our competitions; mainly our World Championships and record attempts that creates visibility.
  2. Our army of instructors that create new freedivers world wide.
  3. Our top athletes that give our organization a face and thrills the world with their achievements.

WORK IN PROGRESS

Right now there is no, “this is how we used to do it”. Many doors are open, most things are possible. The AIDA President has asked for all commissions (old and new aspiring) to make a plan and a budget. Commissions that have to be filled by new voices.

When Kimmo was selected he set things in motion on the main problem of AIDA: IT. An IT group has been formed led by the President and the Media/PR Officer. This group might evolve into a commission in its own right if the assembly so chooses.

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

The IT work group will in earnest start working on a long list of things that all think are a priority. As we speak, every day e-mails are passed discussing: the web page, forum activity, internal communication, e-mail addresses, internet work groups, order and payment systems, photo galleries, certification systems, update of courses and competitions, but most of all we speak about ranking. Data is being processed daily on this last matter.

If you organized a competition during 2009 check with Ivo Truxa if we have your data (aidaranking@gmail.com).

MEDIA AND PR

AIDA Media/PR is looking for photographers, videographers, editors, journalists, graphic designers and why not a little marketing firm enthusiastic to do some “pro bono” work launching a “world wide freediving federation”. And anyone involved should preferablely have a relationship to this feeling of being weightless on one breath of air under the surface.

ASK NOT WHAT YOUR AIDA CAN DO FOR YOU…

Tell us what you can do for your AIDA. If you want to be involved in PR or the process of delivering an internet platform for AIDA activities – now is the time to step forward. Talkers we have many – now we are looking for doers.

Right now I want to honor the following by mentioning their names: Jonas D, Eric RP, Simo K, Peter S, Ivo T, Paulo N, Francisco G. Some of the most important people in the AIDA organization right now. All Aida nationals are waiting for the result of their work – the ranking list.

At this point the new board would like to thank the old board for their work, and especially the former president for his dedication beyond duty.

Apart from the 22 active nations in the assembly, the board of 8 (we still are looking for a treasurer) will need a staff of some 20 people solving small tasks, heading different projects and work groups. AIDA will be inclusive, welcoming, walking with many feet, and speaking with many voices. Adelante.

on behalf of the Aida Executive Board, January 2010

Sebastian Naslund
Aida Media/PR

Tags: , , ,

Both comments and pings are currently closed.
  • All divers diving 80+ at WC 2009 were offered O2 at surface. If they had scuba licence they could do this deco at depth (5 meters). I do remember seeing someone without a scuba licence being below the surface. These persons were under surveilance from a dedicated safety freediver.
    Sending squeezed drivers down on deco is an unknown scenario that happened several times as well.

    Sebastian
  • Hello Eric,

    And thanks for you valuable feedback. Actually this has been in my suggestions list for our new Medical committee but unfortunately I have not been capable to share that information yet with Dr. John Fitz-Gerald in Skype meeting as he has been busy recent month. I really do hope that I have an opportunity to share this with him in near future. There is also a rule team who works really hard at the moment for making first minor update for current Aida competition rules and later on a little bigger update.

    At the current rules O2 decos are mentioned like this:
    "4.3.4 In water oxygen must be available for post dive breathing both at the surface and at a depth of 5 meters
    for all depth events. A safety freediver or scuba diver must be present to monitor any athletes breathing
    oxygen at depth. No athlete should be allowed to breath oxygen at depth unless they are a certified scuba
    diver and have an understanding of the risks of breathing oxygen at depth. All others should perform their
    post dive oxygen breathing at the surface. Post dive oxygen breathing should be considered mandatory for
    any dive at or beyond 80 meters."

    I hope that I was capable to answer for your good comment.

    Best Regards,

    - Kimmo Lahtinen, President of Aida
  • Eric Fattah
    Thank you for creating this blog!

    One issue that needs to be addressed by our community is the problem of O2 decompression. Currently it is not possible for a freediver to get an O2 bottle for deco, unless he/she has at least advanced nitrox scuba certification.

    I know that during PFI courses students are told about O2 deco but not allowed to use it without scuba certification. I understand also that at the recent world championships, only scuba certified athletes could use the O2 deco, even if they were suffering from mild DCS.

    I spoke to a local dive shop friendly to freedivers, and they said they would love to give O2 bottles/fills to freedivers, but they can't for liability reasons, the diver would need to present some sort of certification card from some agency.

    His suggestion was to convince PADI to allow freedivers to take the advanced nitrox theory course, even with no diving, and this could be enough.

    Since I don't have a scuba certification, I currently buy OXIA health bottles which bleed out 90% O2 with no regulator. After a deep dive I recover for 60 seconds then take a breath of 90% from one of these health bottles and then go down to 6m for 4 minutes for apnea deco. It works, though it is extremely unpleasant due to the hundreds of contractions. Being able to breathe the O2 at 6m would be way better.

    Also at world championships and major competitions I think that O2 deco needs to be not only possible, but mandatory for dives over 75m.

    Eric
blog comments powered by Disqus