1/2 a lifetime. That’s how long I’ve been freediving for, and also the time between two of the most portentous dreams I’ve had. Preparing for a dive: image by Daan Verhoeven at VB 2025 In early 2003, when I was learning to freedive in Utila, Honduras, I had one of those dreams that are so vivid and compelling that you know it’s more than just your unconscious mind doodling on the pillow. My oldest childhood friend appeared and told me repeatedly, ‘Stand in your dream,

Every sport reaches a point where it must choose between integrity and spectacle. Freediving is standing in front of that crossroads...

There’s a story that I’ve been waiting for the right moment to tell, in part because I knew its telling would be arduous. One doesn’t...

A lazy Freediver I’m not an endurance athlete. I’ve never run more than 10km or surface-swum more than 4km. As a teenager I cycled a...

Someone’s got to say it. The “Freediving World Champs” has lost its charm. There used to be a time, in what seems like a different age of...

For those looking for gossip or scandal I’m sorry to disappoint: this post won’t out any athletes, or point a finger. I spend most of my...

The following is an excerpt from my autobiography, published in 2017. It's available for purchase as an ebook from Amazon, and in...

It was the first CNF dive beyond halfway into Dean's Blue Hole. 55 of my body lengths, or 9 meters more than the height of the Statue of...

We stand on the shoulders of our forbears (especially the shoulders of whoever first spoke those words). As a toddler learning to swim...

One of my pet worries as a freediver is that someone will call me out, and say “I heard you can hold your breath for eight minutes. Go on...

Dear weakest link, Today I discovered who you are and where you live. Rest assured that I'm going to be coming round very often from now...

10/10/2010 I once heard an anecdote about Russian trainers screening children to become gymnasts. They asked them all to jump off the...

5/5/2008 Every athlete will have experienced the day where, from the moment you wake up, each smallest thing that happens seems designed...