Depth and presence

Freediving is a sport that’s tricky to categorise; each dive begins out of the water, on the surface, where your awareness finds itself in a noisy, fast-paced environment dominated by the rush of immediacy, from which it seeks to escape. Your blood is pumping, body alert, yet prepared. You pause - a deep breath in - then you dive down, and something changes. The world slowly goes silent until it shrinks down into one single thing: presence.

“What I like most about this sport is that it helps me be present,” shares Amanda Negrín, Orca’s freediving ambassador. “It pushes my body to its limit in survival mode.”

She’s not talking about records or metres. She’s talking about full attention, which activates in the moment everything else begins to disappear, leaving you with nothing more than your breathwork, a sense of calm, the ocean and total self-control down in the depths.

Perhaps this is why so many people who discover freediving come from life paths you wouldn’t expect. In Amanda’s case, it all started with yoga. The connection was instant: the breathwork, mental control and meditative state. One day she decided to try out freediving for the first time and dove down 15 metres. Here, down in the depths, was where she experienced a feeling she found difficult to put into words, but easy to remember. 

“I experienced a sense of peace I’d never felt before.”

There’s something addictive about freediving for those who understand it. Not just because of the adrenaline, but the self-awareness and mental clarity involved, and the rare chance to be completely in one place. Amanda sums it up in a nutshell: “It’s unique.”

The life of an Ocean Lover, however, doesn’t only happen on big trips or during deep-sea dives. It often happens at the end of a normal day. When you finish work, the evening settles in and the sea awaits, as always, prepared for your mutual dialogue. “I always go in the evening,” she explains. “And you feel totally different when you get out of the water compared to when you go in. It’s as if everything that’s weighing on you gets washed away by the sea.”  

This is where your equipment truly matters; it becomes a part of your routine on the days that become repetitive and blend into one another. It’s the wetsuit you use again and again, simply because it works.

Designed for this kind of constant relationship with the water, the new Mantra TRN is made for those who experience the sea without a schedule; for spontaneous sessions, frequent training and unplanned getaways. A versatile, comfortable and durable suit, designed for day to day use.

Amanda’s clear about the importance of this from the start, emphasising one word: ease. “It’s so easy, it molds to your body straight away and you feel very comfortable moving about in the water.”

In freediving, freedom of movement is no minor detail. A suit that fits your shoulders, rib cage and diaphragm allows your mind to focus on what it needs to: the dive itself - not your wetsuit. Durability also matters, taking into account the effects of consistent use and salt water over time. “I’ve been using Orca’s suits for years and they’re still in perfect condition,” Amanda tells us.

Perhaps this is why, when we asked Amanda to define the new Mantra TRN as an Ocean Lover’s companion in one word, she didn’t hesitate in saying: “Versatile.”

Because being an ocean lover rarely means doing the same thing over and over. Sometimes you might train during the week, and other times you might just swim about and float. Sometimes you might travel to the other side of the world and swim with humpback whales, as Amanda recalls was one of her most memorable experiences in French Polynesia. 

Sometimes it’s about simply knowing that, when you return to the water, it’s all there waiting for you: the silence, the calm and that version of yourself that only emerges under the water.  

The next adventure on Amanda’s list is Okinawa. Meanwhile, she’ll continue to do what ocean lovers do best: return to the sea whenever they can.