Ο Θρυλος της Σουγια

Sougia, Crete, June 22 | July 5, 2009

Training sled diving with Pierre Frolla in Monaco early June proved to be fruitful. On William's first day of training at the 2nd Mediterranean Freediving Meeting in Sougia, Crete, he took the sled down to 100 meters for a casual no-limits dive. The next day to 110 meters and the next, 125 meters. Sled training is a great way to get acclimatized to depth without exerting the diver's body as much as on a self-propelled dive.

However relaxed riding a sled looks like, it actually requires just as much focus as when one dives under one's own propulsive power. For one, the contraption goes down at a higher speed than with self-propulsion. The freediver uses breaks to control the speed of the weighted sled all the while having to constantly equalize the ears. All in all, no small feat !

Once the desired depth has been reached, the freediver has two choices (however, decided before-hand). Either swimming back up the surface (a discipline called Variable Weight) or using an air balloon to lift the diver back to the surface (a discipline called No Limits).

Just as the reference for sled diving in Monaco is Pierre Frolla, when wanting to learn or train sled diving while in Greece, the person to contact is Stavros Kastrinakis. He is an accomplished breath-hold diver, holder of a multitude of national records, including both sled disciplines, of course. If that was not enough credentials, know that he designs, builds and test dives all his sleds. These kinds of things tend to happen when one is the holder of an Engineering Masters Degree.

When in Sougia, Stavros told this most peculiar story: something about Crete being riddled with legends. We knew Crete is definitely the place to be, the place to freedive, the place to hang out, but some say it is the place to spot rare species of mermaid...

A rare sight, however, because mermaids like to swim near the surface and competitive freedivers like to dive as deep as possible. It is therefore only possible to spot these rare specimen to those who go breath-hold diving for the sheer pleasure of freely moving underwater aimlessly. After all, that is what free-diving means.

Θα τα πουμε το προσεχες ετος !