Monfins and fin swimming

As those of you who now and then check out our blog know, Emily and I got our monofins a few days ago from the Ukraine.  We since have tried them out and love them!  But with the last post, the pictures and our telling people with great excitement about the fins came a variety of questions.  I thought I'd simply answer some of them here by talking a bit about fin swimming, how we got the idea of getting monofins and why you may have never heard of it before.

The last question is the easiest to answer.  For those of you who are from the States, chances are you have neither heard nor seen monofins before.  Fin swimminig is a very popular sport in Europe and Asia, but hardly know at all here in the US.  Some of that might be due to the historical origins of the sport.

In the 1960s military divers in Europe met for competitions using longer stereo fins.  The monofin was developed back in 1969 in the Soviet Union, and already three years later, at the European Championships of 1972, some of the medal winners were using monofins.  

Early monofin from the USSR.

Monofins have a fiberglas blade with a rubber pocket for both feet at one end.  The large area of the fin yields an about 12-15 times greater thrust than human feet, resulting in maximum velocities of about 3 m/s (based on the 2008 world record over 50 m sprint in 14.04 seconds; current world record over 50 m free style swimming: 21.28 seconds). 

The first World Championship in fin swimming was held 1976 in Germany.  It takes place every other year under the organization of the World Underwater Federration, the Confederation Mondiale des Actives Subaquatiques (CMAS).  

There are competitions in four different disciplines:

Surface: 50, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1500 meters as well as 4x100 m relay and 4x200 m relay

Surface bifins (stereofins): 50, 100, and 200 meters

Apnea: 50 meters

Immersion (with tank and regulator): 100, 400, and 800 meters.

In addition to these disciplines, which are all held in swimming pools, competitions in long distances (1500, 3000, 6000 and 250000 m) swimming are held in open water.  

So, why and how did we get interested in fin swimming?  As a teenager in Berlin I was a member of of a SCUBA club (DUC Berlin) that also had a fin swimming team.  We had quite a successful team, with a world record holder over 50 m, Jürgen Kolenda.  I was always fascinated with the sport, but never enough to participate (not competitive enough, I guess...).  When Emily and I picked up swimming again, I trained like I did back then, using fins, mask and snorkel.  And then I thought that it'd be fun to try monofins and looked into ordering one.  Bogdan, the guy who makes the fins we bought, was really great in our e-mail conversations helping me with finding the right fin.  He also made me a great price for an additional fin for Emily, who by now was so taken by the videos she had seen online that she agreed to getting a fin.  And now we are both trying to swim straight in monofins.