Soon comes the Freediving Championship of Moldova, and I decided to go to Italy for training courses by Umberto Pelizzari in the deepest swimming pool in the world.
Venice
This is an amazing place, one of the most unique cities in the world – where no cars are driving, where there is no sewage system, where the residents move by hundreds of boats under hundreds of bridges, and the water level is constantly rising, so maybe in 50 years Venice will be just a history…
But all this come from the sources. Personally, the city seemed for me a kind of an exclusive closed club of local residents, the secrets of which are not revealed to any tourist. How they live there, go to work, to kindergartens, where they walk and how they orient themselves is a mystery to me.
Well, how could I go without a run through such a unique city? I definitely couldn’t! Having thought over the route on the map and uploading it to my watch, I ran out early in the morning. The task is to run on 60 bridges in an hour. One bridge per minute.
Damn, only in Venice you may get lost with a GPS-navigator, because the corridors, lanes, alleys and narrow streets intertwine in the most incredible way. So, I managed to dodge and dot in dead ends, having a ready route in my watch.
As for romance, we finally managed with my beloved to ride by a gondola, bought each other presents and walked around the back streets of Venice.
In the evening, we had a dinner in a nice little restaurant.
Taking this opportunity, I want to tell you about our favorite appetizer – Aperitif by Voloshin, as we call it. You come to a restaurant, you do the order, and in the meantime you take olive oil, BEAUTIFULLY drip in balsamic sauce, add salt and pepper. Now break off a piece of bread, soak it in this beauty and devour!
Generally, Venice for me is a place for a single visit. It’s a weird place, not adapted for living, running and walking under the shade of trees. Although, as a city for couples in love it is perfect.
It’s majesty The Pool
Not far from Venice, near Padua, on the outskirts of a small Italian village, the deepest pool in the world Y -40 is conveniently located.
As the name implies, its depth is 40 meters. Its location is not accidental, because Montegrotto Terme is famous for its hot springs, so it’s always 33 degrees in the pool, and it does not cost the owners a fabulous price. Nature is the best assistant in business!
It really is the king of pools. When you see it for the first time, it steals your breath, even if you are an experienced diver. Transparency – 100 meters, temperature – + 33 degrees, already stretched ropes, buoys are in place, people are diving. You don’t have to take a boat, fear for jellyfish, put on the diving suit using soap, fight with the waves and wind. Ideal conditions for depth exercises!
A unique feature of the pool is the underwater tunnel, in which sympathizers may walk and take photos of fishmen.
The pool looks particularly impressive, when a group of divers comes – when diving into depth, they turn the blue into a boiling wall!
Well, I actually came here for training courses by the freediving legend – Umberto Pelizzari. The only diver, who has set records in all existing disciplines of freediving.
Courses include a theoretical part and the actual pool phase – statics and depth wall.
During the lectures, Umberto told us how the epiglotes works, how one should do the T-block, how not to miss mouthfeel and other specific information about the compensation of pressure at depth, breath-hold in the pool, and blackouts on land.
The guy is funny, charismatic and simple. Umberto has an interesting method of explaining complex physiological processes, such as oxygen transportation by red blood cells or hemoglobin protein functions. He simply says: this crap works like this, use it. And this one does not work, do not use it. And do not stuff your brains with clever scientific terms. It’s quite a controversial method, but sometimes quite useful for beginners.
And, of course, everything could not happen without the romance…
In spite of the ideal diving conditions and the operation on the nasal septum half a year ago, I could not dive below the 26-meters level. Ears were not blowing through, although it may also be due to a light cold.
In the pool, during a training session on the breath-hold I suddenly noticed that the air is going out of… my eyes. I thought, my eyes were playing tricks on me. I videotaped it – that’s right, the air is coming out… So, does it mean that I can blow the glasses with my eyes? And, wearing the nose clip, set my hands free? I’ll have to check it on the depth, although I can hardly believe it will. Better like this – “I can not believe my own eyes…”
The next day, I was diving with a weight sled for the first time (it’s a thing, used in the no limits discipline). You fly down under the weight of a piece of iron, while as at the depth a gas balloon inflates and you jump out like a bubble to the surface. Sensations are fantastic – you don’t have to think about moving in the water, so you can concentrate on the blowing and relaxation.
Then there was a lecture about stretching, lung capacity increase and training of breath-holding on the land. My diaphragmatic breath was not quite right, I’ll have to work on it.
After the courses, there was a traditionally small, modest, freedivers booze in Italian style and a couple of leisure days.
To sum up:
–Pool Y -40 – is the best of all that I saw.
–Umberto – is a cool, not pompous man with a unique experience
–Air actually can come from your eyes.
–Running through the Venice districts is a senseless activity ????
–As for a romantic trip – it’s just right…
