Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Oh my God! (Truly, not blasphemy)

I planned a relatively moderate depth today to iron out any wrinkles and check out my equipmen t and rigging and to just familiarize myself with conditions. Now I would just like to state before I carry on describing the day that I am no newcomer to diving in Durban, I have set a number of records here over the years and I have done some very deep spearfishing here too. I have never been under any illusions about what a challenge it will be to dive really deep here. It is not for no reason that ALL South African deep freediving records since 1999 have been set in either the Mediterranean or Red sea's.

I have always known what it will demand of a diver to retake the record here. There are so many factors to contend with, swell, surface chop, wind, current, very poor visibility (especially below 40m), the fear of sharks (whether perceived or real, more about that later), each one of these factors can be a deal breaker, combined they are formidable.


































So perhaps you will understand the shock when during my first dive to 52m my lanyard got stuck on the bottom plate and I surfaced feeling positively INTIMIDATED! ....I mean here I am in Durban, I have stated my intent to do a dive in excess of 80m to the whole world and I am feeling like this on a 52m dive!

Fortunately, after changing a few things I did a second dive to 54m and it went much better. I made the decision to focus only on what lies immediately in front of me and I have been working through the afternoon with my assistant Roelof on improving our set-up. Roelof was also looking a little downhearted this afternoon, but I told him that he did very well under extreme pressure, he has to deal with the conditions, and he has to deal with me under pressure. He handled himself very well under very trying conditions and he experienced a very steep learning curve. To his credit, he has also put today behind him and is responding like a real winner and focusing on the task in front of him.

Dean and Ian were a real comfort down there, it is so good to be diving with a diver I have known for so many years. Tomorrow evening I will be meeting with his whole crew at Underwater World, Durban.

We have re-set the rope and will dive deeper tomorrow. 




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