Welcome to the British Freediving Association Website

F reediving is the sport of breath hold diving in which the freediver descends under water on a single breath of air. Freediving includes leisure activities such as spearfishing and snorkelling as well as competitive disciplines: Constant Weight, Free Immersion, Variable Weight, No Limits, Dynamic and Static Apnea. Freediving has many benefits and can be compared to a martial art. It promotes increased lung capacity, deeper levels of awareness and perception and control over your body.

The British Freediving Association (BFA) is the UK governing body of the international freediving organization AIDA. We promote recreational and competitive freediving, ratify freediving records, and sponsor events for our members. The BFA also supports a growing network of affiliated freediving clubs throughout the UK.

If you are interested in learning to freedive safely, the BFA recommends that you take an AIDA freediving course. A list of AIDA instructors can be found in the education section of our website. Remember that you should never freedive without an experienced buddy with you at all times.

When you join the BFA you gain many benefits: a freediving log book, dive insurance, and the use of the BFA freediving platform at Vobster Quay in Somerset. To join, visit our membership section.

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Latest British Freediving News

22/06/2009: Saltfree Double Dip - 18th - 19th July 2009

The BFA is proud to be sponsoring this years Saltfree Double Dip, the UK's freediving depth championships takes place over the 18 and 19 July at the National Diving and Activity Centre in Chepstow, near Bristol. Entries are welcome from athletes of all levels, from new graduates of the AIDA ** star course to those of you who have been competing for years. The maximum depth is 76m and there is no such thing as "too shallow"!


Saltfree Double Dip 2008 - Photography by Laura Storm

Athletes can choose to compete in two disciplines chosen from Constant Weight, Constant Weight No Fins and Free Immersion. The entry fee is £85.

For more information, to download the entry form and pay your entry fee - visit www.saltfreedoubledip.com.

If you have any questions or would like to come along in a capacity other than athlete please email sam@saltfreedivers.com. We still need safety divers, photographers, judges' assistants and the many other crew members that make these things happen.

21/06/2009: 3 New Womens Freediving National Records in One Day!

The BFA is pleased to announce that 3 new Women's National Records were set on Sunday 31st May at the 2nd Great Camberwell Breath Hold in Camberwell Pool, Central London. The Freediving pool competition, organised by athlete and UK record holder Liv Philip saw freedivers from all over the UK and the world, compete in static, dynamic and dynamic no-fins disciplines.

In the run up to the World Indoor Freediving Championships in Aarhus in Denmark in August, some of the athletes were using the event for valuable competition experience and rankings. Alongside them were many new athletes who were competing for the first time. Organiser Liv Philip says 'we wanted to create a competition with a different atmosphere that would be motivating and encouraging for athletes and give the as near perfect an environment as we could to help the atheltes stay relaxed and produce good performances'. The girls especially took full advantage of the calm atmosphere - reflected by the result of 3 New National records being set during the day.

The first record of the day went to Georgina Miller who did an excellent static breath hold of 5:46 putting, 11 seconds on Livs existing record, well deserved after some months concentrated training on this difficult discipline. The next record went to Mandy Buckley with a wonderful swim of 140m to set a new Dynamic-with-Fin record. Both athletes gaining their first National record and beating there male counterparts by some measure. The final record came right at the end of the day seeing Liv Philip break her own existing record and swim 106m dynamic-no-fins to gain her 8th National record in Freediving. 'I was very happy to do it as it was tough combining competing and organising - now Im looking forward to going home and sleeping!'

Camberwell Breath Hold 2009 - The three new national record holders

The overall Winners with combined scores from 2 disciplines were Georgina Miller for the Women and Chris Holmes for the men, who was competing for the first time in a national competition, completing a static of 4:51 and a nice dynamic of 133m. Other athletes in the overall placings were Barbara Jeschke from Germany experimenting after swappping onto monofin for the first time and Martin Ashkenazy-Jones with a first rate no-fins dive and PB of 104m taking him into 3rd place overall just behaind Alan Barber who had broken his Dynamic record the day before. There were over 15 pbs in competiton at the event.

Athletes can now try to transfer their pool skills to depth as one of the next ebents on the UK freediving calendar is 'SaltFree Double Dip' competition held at NDAC in Chepstow www.saltfreedivers.com . Athletes get to choose 2 freediving depth disciplines over two days.

The event was supported by Fusion Lifestyle, Diving Matrix, Eat Natural Bars and the British Freediving Association.

20/05/2009: AIDA indoor Freediving World Championship 2009 - Aarhus Denmark

The BFA is happy to announce the next Freediving World Championship. There are 3 disciplines DYN, DNF and STA for male and female athletes, and three places in each discipline - that is 18 places max.

To find out more about the championship you can visit the official website by clicking here.

The BFA will choose athletes on the basis of their performance in competition in the last 12 months. Athletes who wish to compete representing the UK should fill in this form and send it to the Chair by June 1st.

Any statement in the form will be verified, with particular regard to performance in competition that should have been officially recorded.

Please do not hesitate to contact us for further details, and get filling in the form.