February 2nd Austin, TX

Pics

In December of last year, Phil was coming back from a restful week at Club Med Turks&Caicos. Seated next to him was a charming couple, Paul and Tanya Streeter. They were both sporting Red Bull merchandise, and Phil noticed the strange equipment they had checked at the airport. A conversation ensued.

It turns out that Tanya is the world champion freediver. Freediving is an extreme sport that involves holding your breath and diving to absurd depths in the quest for knowledge of ultimate pain, danger, and sacrifice. This beautiful, tall, athletic woman crushed the old record and somehow made it to 525ft. on a single breath. Needless to say, she's been quite the sensation around the world since, with articles in Sports Illustrated ("the world's most perfect athlete"), Men's Journal (the first female to be featured in 10 years) and numerous television documentaries and appearances.

"Hey, Tanya, do you think you could give Rafe and me breath holding lessons when we come through Austin in early February on the Ultimate Sports Adventure?" Phil asked.

And Tanya, the world champion, quickly agreed. "Sounds like fun," she laughed.

So, Phil sugar-coats the upcoming experience to get Rafe interested: "Rafe, this absolutely gorgeous woman is going to get into a bathing suit and give us lessons on holding our breath." Reluctantly, Rafe agrees. Whether it was the bathing suit or the breath holding lessons that tipped the scale is still debatable. Needless to say, Phil left out any mention of Tanya's husband, Paul, when describing our afternoon outing.

We arrive at the Aquatics Unlimited pool in the outskirts of Austin at around 12. After some introductions, we're shown our wetsuits, full suits, helmets and all. Rafe tries to put his on backwards, but Paul won't have any of that. And, we sit down to talk breathing physiology.

"Static Apnea, or holding your breath underwater while still," Tanya says, "is basically very simple. The key is to increase the oxygen content in your blood, eliminate the carbon dioxide in your blood, and then hold your breath. Spasms that tell you to breath happen primarily because the CO2 level reaches a level that is slightly higher than it is when you're at rest, not because your brain is oxygen starved."

OK, all that clear, we begin some simple stretching exercises designed to loosen the muscles around the lungs and abdomen. Ten minutes of stretching, and Tanya demonstrates a proper "warm up breath" exhales more completely than one would think possible, completely compressing her stomach with abdomen muscles that could bench press a small car. And then, "breathing from the stomach" she fills that space with a vacuum sounding intake that seemingly rips the pictures off the wall. Her stomach swells until she looks pregnant, her back then arches as she completes the intake into the nether regions of her lungs. It is quite impressive, and we are a little taken aback.

"Your turn," she says. And we try. It takes a few minutes to get the hang of it, but soon we're breathing acceptably. "At rest," Tanya explains, "your blood oxygen level is at 98-99%. What we're doing now is raising that level up well over 120%. By doing so, you greatly increase the amount of time that you can breath hold without damaging yourself."

Soon, we're ready for the pool. "Go ahead and pee in the pool she says. For the next 90 minutes, you will not be allowed to move quickly or get out of the pool. The key is to relax completely. Any single muscle, when tense, will burn oxygen and thus reduce your time." We enter an almost hypnotic state, with her commands, breath in, breath out, relax, breath in, breath out.

After a 5-4-3-2-1 countdown, we're to float face down in the water and hold our breath as a test. We do. Phil is stunned to hold off coming up until 1:40, narrowly beating Rafe's initial time of 1:30. "That's pretty good, guys," she says. Paul has a little laugh while filming for us.

"OK, now we go into training. We are going to breath for two minutes, completely relaxed, and then we're going to hold our breath for 1:30." We do it without much trouble. When we're up, "OK, two minutes to recover, then we're going to 1:45." We do it, but Phil experiences the first of what best is described as a total body spasm. "The next one will get easier," Tanya says, "your body is learning about the dive reflex." And, after two more minutes of breathing, we're down again. And she was right, two minutes was easy! A breakthrough!

We cycle two more times, with the final practice being a two minute breathing followed by a 2:30 breath hold. It seems unreal that we're able to do this. Phil, struggling near the end of the 2:30 hold, has a massive spasm that forces him to pee uncontrollably. Ah, nice warm pool...

Practice over, she asks if we're ready to attempt our personal best. We are. Rafe loses the Roshambo, and Phil chooses him to go first. Tanya works Rafe up to the challenge with a good five minute breathing exercise. Phil is concentrating on his own breathing and blocking out the outside world. Relaxation is critical to success. Finally, Rafe, completely calm, turns his head into the water. One minute passes. Two minutes. Three minutes! Finally, Tanya, fearing an overly ambitious personal best, asks Rafe to come up. Three minutes and forty seconds! "I could have gone longer, I think," Rafe says. It was a very impressive effort, and spasm free.

Phil is up next, and is ready in short order. Down under he goes. He is focusing his thoughts by singing ABC's as slow as absolutely possible. It's the third verse, when the first spasm hits at around 2:30. They follow every few seconds thereafter, but Phil battles the instinct to come up, knowing that this is all a mental game. J-K-L... another spasm and he pees again with abandon while sucking in some water. Its mental, stay tough, he thinks. At 3:17, he comes up, lips completely blue, in a fit of spasm. "Breath, deeply, breath," Tanya says. And as his vision clears, Paul and Tanya get a little laugh at his expense. "Man, you were about 5 seconds from blacking out there" she says.

Our dive over, Phil pays Rafe $10. Yes, readers, you knew there had to be a bet. It was a tremendously rewarding experience, and we are very grateful for Tanya and Paul's time. We all go out for a much deserved dinner at an Austin icon, Threadgills.

For anyone interested in redefining the limits of what they thinkpossible, we strongly encourage you to meet and take lessons from Tanya. Check out her website at redefineyourlimits.com. You won't be disappointed.

USA expresses our "deepest" gratitude to Tanya and Paul Streeter as well as to Glenn McFarland and Aquatics Unlimited for the use of their facilities and unwavering encouragement.