Vertical Blue’s concept :
- 9 competition days in total, spreaded in 3 acts of 3 days, with a day off between each act
- Each athlete has 6 days out of these 9 to realize his performances in the 3 offered depth disciplines: CWT, CNF et FIM
- The winners are the man and the woman cumulating the most points in the 3 disciplines
- Each one is free to announce each day the discipline of one’s choice, but also not to play the competition and focus on one or two disciplines
Day 1
 |
Ashley Futral Chapman took back her WORLD CNF record with a MASSIVE dive to 67 m without fins!!!! Stunning! VIDEO HERE. Alexei was not totally fresh back to the surface, got a red card for dipping his airways in the water, protested, and won! White card, 121m! Guillaume seems to be back on track and have good sensations for the first time since his food poisoning 🙂 Morgan beat his own french No Fin record with an amazingly easy looking dive to 82m! Bravo Morgan! Nick Mevoli damaged an eardrump riding his ear a bit too much – really too bad as this could be the end of a promising competition for him… I was a bit tensed taking part for the first time to such a big event, it impacted a bit my equalization which was a bit short. I didn’t push, I have plenty of days left to fulfill my objective. Congratulations to Walid for his loooong but successful dive to 90 Rob set a new FIM US record.. Misuzu is maybe the tiniest and deepest female freediver – 85m, white card! 🙂 A normal day like many others in Long Island… |
Day 2
 |
Today was a really colorful day… Lots of yellow and orange! The good news is that in the red cards, only one was for black-out. A surface one, with a protocol that ended up lights turned off. Another red card was for Liv Phillip who was however really fresh surfacing… from a 8 meters dive… she was stopped on the way down by the safety divers as her lanyard went off on her duck dive. She protested though, and got granted with a re-run in the coming days. Miguel Lozano (SPA) broke another national record in FIM discipline (video here). And for the rest of the results, we let you study the list 😉 |
Day 3
 |
 |
Frenchies team was really happy today : Morgan improved his French record in No-Fins to 84m and now aims for the European record, Guillaume dived to 114m with fins and gets slowly but surely close to his personal record, and Rémy reached 90m in the same discipline !
As a matter of interest, Guillaume is so clumsy and jinxed since he got to Long Island, it is beyond imagination. His luggage was lost in Miami when he arrived, he got a fulminant food poisoning the very next day, is covered with mosquitoes bites, he injured his foot, cut his finger trying to cook, started again his food poisoning yielding too early to a yummy burger, and eventually got stung by a scorpion few minutes before his dive to 114m…
Mike Board took reaally on the edge the UK record in constant weight with fins, after he fought a samba and realized his surface protocol on the spot.
2nd dive, 2nd US national record for Ashley Futral Chapman with 76m in FIM.
Today everybody rests and the 2nd act of this competition in 3 parts starts on Saturday 24th !
Jour 4
Announcements
Not less than 2 World Records attempts for tomorrow! William Trubridge, Blue Hole’s resident and organizer of the competition, and Alexei Molchanov, current CWT World Record holder, both announced 126m depth in CWT.
Here is what William Trubridge wrote on his Facebook wall.
As expected, Guillaume will try to improve his French National Record in CWT, and Morgan will attempt to get the European Record in CNF.
I’ll keep on focusing on CWT to improve my recent personal record with a target tomorrow at 92m.
Results
 |
 |
As expected, Dean’s Blue Hole was on FIRE today.
Highlight probably of the year : Alexei Molchanov increased of 1 meter the CWT World Record he already owns since this summer, with a perfect dive to -126 meters (movie on the right). He came out incredibly fresh despite he appeared quite in difficulty after his previous dive to 121m earlier in the competition.
William Trubridge went for the same depth but turned short at 110m. Apparently a problem with the alarm from one of his depth gages prevented him from managing correctly his dive. So now everybody goes with his own forecast: will Will attempt 127m? What will Alexeï announce for his 3 left dives?
 |
Not far behind, Guillaume Nery improved the France National Record in CWT with as usual an easy, controled, smooth dive. Which granted him with the nickname “Mr Smooth” around the Blue Hole. Morgan A.K.A “Mr Perfect” became today Europe Freediving Championin Constant Weight Without Fins with -86m. I safely improved my personal best to 92 m with the fin. Equalization at this depths seems to get now like routine, narcosis reasonable, and sensations excellent… So I really don’t see why I wouldn’t enjoy it a couple more meters deeper in the coming days ! In the end, it’s been full white cards and pleasure for the french team in Bahamas ! Tomorrow the 3 of us will rest while Chloé remains on safety duty, and then we’ll dive again on Monday! |
Day 5
Results
 |
“3, 2, 1, FIGHT!” Tomorrow, Alexei will try to add 2 more meters to his current World Record, just to prevent William from taking it. Guillaume will try a new personal best to 121 meters… Talking about that, I’m thinking… As Riuzo already owns the Japanese National Record, tomorrow ALL freedivers from my session will attempt depths that would grant them a national record, EXCEPT ME! Guillaume, in the name of all other french freedivers, WE HATE YOU for being so smooth and brilliant! At least life is not totally unfair, he can be SO jinxed when he’s not diving : after his foot and finger few days ago, today he managed to cut open his leg on a piece of coral. Serves him right! |
Day 6
 |
 |
Here is Guillaume’s dive to 123m, new French CWT record of the day:
Day 7
Results
 |
|
Day 8
Results
 |
The competition is about to end, and nobody seems spared by tiredness. Few athletes were diving today, many decided to rest. William did 121m CWT and stays ahead of the men competition but he admitted he was now in a “down hill slope energy wise”. Ashley Futral Chapman had a black-out in the last meters of her dive and might have to concede the first place of the women competition to Alena Zabloudilova. The latter got her white card on the edge after a samba efficiently coached by Marc Lenoir on her 65m CNF dive And apparently, Walid Boudhiaf, the Tunisian champion got his 100m CWT attempt sabotaged by the evil Floats gang. His neckpillow got stuck on the fin and followed him to 50m . Walid felt tired because of all that drag, but kept on diving. Fortunately he had trouble equalizing and turned at 75m. The pillow finally floated up and looked flat but easy despite a very long dive time! |
Temporary ranking before the last day of the competition :
 |
 |
Day 9 – Last day
Results
 |
 |
 |
 |
Vertical Blue 2012 in numbers:
– 65 national records and 2 world records!
– 252 individual performances!
– 45 hours of diving over 9 days.
Tremendous! No wonder why everybody was getting a bit tired in the las days 🙂
You can check the videos of the finest dives on Vertical Blue’s official channel.
Remy, congratulations! 🙂
Bravo pour tes 90m Remy, t’as de quoi etre content 🙂
Allez on y crois pour Jeudi 😉
Vas nous chercher ce carton blanc !!!