EPILOGUE The most relevant thing of this whole trip for me was the amount of things I learned. Things that I learned about my own diving, competition mistakes I made and that I will never repeat (well, never say never), but especially things I learned about myself, my motivation and what drives me (and what…
When I went home from my no-fins dive, I had less than 1 hour to announce for the bifins dive. I had previously decided to go with 98m, but after my little incident I didnt know if it was such a good idea. Despite telling myself that I wouldn’t base my announcement on other freedivers…
After realising why I wasn’t happy with my medal dive I put on the big boy pants and announced to my team captain that I wouldn’t make the same mistake twice and that I would announce 98 m on the bifins day. I easily did close to that in training and my bifins depths have…
After completing my 96 FIM dive that won me a nice fat silver medal at the CMAS world championship, I went home and cried for 24 hours straight. I was so upset with myself for not having announced more and losing the highest place on the podium. I wanted to be on the safe side…
This year I turned 50 years old and I thought I know myself like the back of my hand (or like the inside of my pockets as we say in italian), until I come to a mosquitoes infested island in the Caribbean on a medal hunt, only to realize I dont know this person I’m…
It’s amazing how fast and slow the time is passing when you are in a weird bubble as if spacetime collapsed and expanded at the same time. So while I feel that I literally do nothing all day, at the same time days are passing very fast and at the end of each day I…
TALENT VS EFFORT Recently I was listening to this podcast about grit and the relationship between talent and effort and which one you really need to be successful at something (short answer is both is best but if you have to pick one, effort is by far the determining factor). This resonated with me and…
PART 3 SOMETHING FUNNY IS HAPPENING to me recently. Before my dives I am entirely detached. I have no feelings, no fear, no anxiety, no doubts, no butterflies nor excitement. I hear the countdown and it doesn’t even feel it is directed to me. I hear “official top”, i take my last breath, I go,…
PART 3 DESPITE WAVES AND SLIGHT CURRENT my 93m FIM dive felt quite nice, even though I’ll admit I don’t remember much of the ascent at all. Thanks to all my training in Tenerife i wasn’t too disturbed by the waves during my breathe up, but I really do dread the current. Even though the…
PART 2 Unlike the last 2 comps I participated in this year, I came to this comp quite pumped and self confident because my training was going very well and felt strong both mentally and physically. The first 2 days went 100% according to plan and were as easy as a breeze, and they were…
PART 1 What to say?! Even though by now I have done several dives to over 90, it’s a whole different feeling having finally done it in a competition! I didn’t experienced much stress for the dive in itself, but today we had quite rough conditions; the surface was quite wild and the rope was…
IT’S ALMOST TIME for the next competition (in the neighbouring island of Lanzarote) and my coach Bub (short for Beelzebub) tells me it’s time for tapering. My non-native english speaking brain gets stuck on this strange sounding word. For me, taper are those who tape. Like with colourful electric tapes. Or duct tape. Or any…