how do you stay alive while gaining experience?

[Nick_Radov]

If you don't have experienced buddies to act as mentors for the dives you want to do then just pay a qualified instructor to work with you on skills development and guide you on more challenging sites. Many instructors are willing to work with you outside of formal certification courses.

 

[Nick_Radov]

Do the training, then do a bunch of dives at that training level. Doing the same dive at your training level doesn't mean you won't see something new or encounter a challenging situation. For example, last year my buddy and I did a dive on the Doc DeMille at 150'. We both had training at this level and had made this dive before. This time, we were last off the boat on a hot drop. We were late and the current took us over the wreck before we saw it. I saw an anchor line drifting out in the blue and it was clear that was attached to the wreck. I started swimming hard for it. I realized quickly that I could make it, but I would be 100% spent getting there. Also, my buddy wasn't going to make it. I looked and she had already dropped to the sand and was crawling. I knew that was a better option. I dropped to the sand and we both crawled our way onto the wreck, breathing hard. Once there, the current was swirling around and we burned more gas finding a spot to get out of the current. We spent way more gas than planned and cut our dive short. Ascent and drift deco was uneventful. The point is the dive turned out to be harder than we expected. Take home: 1) we were diving within our training 2) dive went different than expected. 3) we were not out of our depth and still learned something.

Good comment, but the other lesson here is that tech diving in any significant current really requires a DPV. It's hard enough to swim in a full tech rig. Add in a strong current and it becomes impossible. That's a problem if you need to quickly reach a buddy in an emergency. Plus hard exertion at depth can cause hypercapnia, which starts a cascade of other physiological issues. Not safe, and not fun. I prefer to do my maximum effort workouts on the running track rather that 150 ft underwater.

I now tend to think that ocean tech diving ought to be taught with scooters from the beginning. Or at least that should be an option within course standards based on environmental conditions. While adding another piece of complex gear does increase task loading and introduces additional failure modes (like flooding or a runaway motor or prop fouling), I think on balance scooters do often reduce the overall risk level even for new tech divers. (Obviously I am not recommending that new tech divers start using scooters without proper training and experience on shallow dives first.)

 

[RyanT]

In South Florida, a good hot drop doesn't require a scooter. If the drop isn't so good, then yes, a scooter is very helpful!

 

[happy-diver]

I am not tech course qualified, not particularly rec course qualified either but I have gleaned
a few manuals, and plenty of other literature, mix my own gas, and get invited on tech dives
on commercial boats without having a ticket, so the big instructor of everything guy, well he
is extremely qualified and capable, he hires a boat and invites a few apparently like minded
people to go over 40m, and the only request he has is that folks turn up with a printed plan

So all the tech certified divers turn up with some scratchings on crumpled paper, or nothing

I turn up with printed plans overstay plans lost gas plans and all of it also on a 3 page slate

Not because I want to appear legitimate but if the guy running the dive requests something
the guy should at least command some respect

respect - Google Suche