It is kind of a mental thing as alot of people can hold their breath for about 2 minutes, static, before passing out. If you're swimming underwater you're going to burn up more O2 so it will be alot less. If you're in reasonably good shape you should be able to do a 50 meter underwater swim. It hurts but is really not as difficult as you think. At BUD/S, I think we only had 3 or 4 guys in my class that failed the 50 meter underwater swim. This is done pretty early in the course, like the second or third week.
It really has nothing to do with lung capacity. There are other physiological factors at work.
It is easier to hold your breath underwater, especially the deeper you go. If you're going to do this make sure someone is watching you as you can easily blackout. I know a SEAL who died doing breath holds in the 50 foot tower at BUD/S. If you go deep you feel pretty good, like you can hold your breath forever, but as you come up to the surface you can have a shallow water blackout.
It's also easier to hold your breath in really cold water.
They have breath holding contests and the pros can typically get over 8 minutes underwater. The world record is 19 minutes and 21 seconds underwater. You read that correctly. 19 freakin' minutes and 21 seconds by a swiss free diver.
I believe part human, part demon David Blaine held his for 17 minutes.
It takes alot of training to get up there in the extreme ranges. There's some tricks they do, and there's specific exercises that help as well. It's also very dangerous and kills alot of brain cells.
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Originally Posted by Split66
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