Breath-taking Fun for anyone

Alexandra · #1 (**permalink**) IP: 124.181.71.83 17-12-07, 04:49 PM

by Rees Quilford
Published Monday 17 December, 2007
The Age Newspaper

NEARLY two-thirds of my life has been consumed by a sport nobody has ever heard of. A sport that exists on the fringe, outside recreational pursuits that Australians commonly amuse themselves with, yet played by "normal" people.

It is a game that has males alongside females scuffling around on the bottom of a swimming pool while wearing snorkels. The sport of underwater hockey is as entertaining as it is bizarre.

I stumbled across the game while growing up in country Victoria, after I tagged along to the local pool with a couple of mates. We were greeted gruffly by the pool manager and player, a man whose abundant body hair gave him the appearance — when observed underwater — of a mobile kelp forest.

He introduced us to the basics of the sport: how to breathe through a snorkel, how to kick properly wearing fins, how to duck dive, how to push the lead puck along the bottom using the little wooden bat and how to flick the puck into the steel goal trays that were positioned at both ends of the pool.

Over time, a love for the intricacies of this strange game emerged that will remain with me to my (hopefully watery) grave. It is an infatuation that has dragged me all over Australia and to the other side of the globe, introduced me to a horde of engaging people and has allowed me to represent my country. Last year I officially became the worst performed Australian Men's Underwater Hockey team vice-captain when we finished a disappointing fourth in the 2006 world championships held in Sheffield, England. It is something I plan to rectify at the 2008 championships in Durban, South Africa.

From January 17 to 20, 250 competitors from Australia will participate at the 2008 Australian Underwater Hockey National Championships at the Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre.

Despite its low profile, the game has a surprisingly long existence. Invented in the 1950s by a group of English scuba divers looking for a way to avoid the head-splitting cold of the northern oceans, it is now played in more than 30 countries.

Some, including the US, France and Australia (the first national championships here were held in 1975) have celebrated aquatic sporting traditions, but there are also many that don't. Underwater hockey is played in many nations not commonly associated with water, let alone leisure, such as Namibia.

Water is the great leveller: tall plays short; stocky against rake thin. Engineers, students, labourers, architects and doctors have found their way into the sport. It is not uncommon to see a 60-year-old playing in the same game as a 16-year-old. This is partly due to a scarcity of players as most Australian cities don't have an organised inter-club competition. Many clubs simply run informal competitions where the players who turn up are evenly divided into teams.

While in some respects water may be a leveller, with it comes the obvious obstacle of having to hold your breath while undertaking strenuous exercise. As a result, underwater hockey players tend to develop their lung capacity and breath-hold and, in some cases, this ability almost borders on the ridiculous.

Several years ago, a fellow player, Al Reid, who is a doctor at St Vincent's Hospital, conducted a study as part of his medical degree. He compared the breath-hold of underwater hockey players with that of similarly fit athletes from other sports.
Using modified SCUBA diving breathing apparatus he varied the oxygen mix then timed the participants' breath-hold. He recorded some remarkable results.

"Standard non-players, they were holding their breath for between one to two minutes. On 100% oxygen they were getting up to three to four minutes," Reid said.

But this paled by comparison with results achieved by the underwater hockey players. "The best of the underwater hockey players got up to 15 minutes breathing 100% oxygen." Breathing normal air (which contains about 21% oxygen), he held his breath for "just under five minutes".

There have been times when I have cringed at the incredulous questioning that inevitably follows even the briefest mention of underwater hockey, but that is part of playing a marginal sport.

Rather than shy away from the absurd, I have chosen to revel in it. If sport is just a distraction from the monotony of daily existence, then underwater hockey should reign supreme. What could be more distracting than holding your breath until you think your lungs are about to burst while trying to push a piece of plastic-coated lead along the bottom of a pool?

Rees Quilford is playing coach of the Victorian men's underwater hockey team.

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