Peak Performance Bouyancy training....is one day enough?

[jbrians]

One of the most common problems I find with new divers is they obtain neutral buoyancy and never even know it. This is because when lungs are half full you will be neutral. by exhailing will cause you to start sinking and a slight intake will cause you to rise. So case in point once you obtain N/B just let your breathing do the rest!

You hit the nail on the head!

So many divers get into trouble because they are either blowing or venting their BCD to try to do the job that their lungs can do. if you are a few pounds neg on exhale and a few positive on inhale, you are perfectly trimed for your depth. Spend less time mucking with the equipment and more time paying attention to how you fit into the environment and things come together really quickly.

 

[MaxBottomtime]

I agree with Boulderjohn. Most divers believe they have their skills down after 50 dives or so, but I've never seen anyone with less than 300 dives with decent buoyancy. It takes knowledge to make sure you're using the correct gear and using it correctly, but floating horizontly in the same plane while moving around in water that may also be moving takes a lot of experience.

 

[Crowley]

More rebellion but I think the "fin pivot" is an exercise of no real value. If your chest/head is up and your fins are down (on the bottom) then you are out of trim right off. N

You are kidding right!?!?!

This excercise has nothing to do with trim! It's the first stage in getting students to understand the concept of being able to establish neutral buoyancy at a given depth and manoeuvre underwater using only their breath control. I would suggest that for recreational open water training it's one of the single most important skills a student can learn - appreciating that delay between beginning an inhalation and when you actually start to become postively buoyant and vice versa; the point at which you need to start exhaling so you swoop gracefully over stuff rather than blundering into it or instigating an ascent too far; these are vital skills for any diver to learn.

Watching a student (or a check diver) do this single skill gives me a good indcation of how that person understands these concepts. How well they perform a fin pivot gives me a very good idea of how well they will be able to control their buoynacy whilst diving.

When teaching recreational divers, as is the OP, the fin pivot and variations thereof (one finger 'push ups', for example) are excellent tools in an Instructor's arsenal for a number of different reasons. Dismissing them out of hand would be, I think, misplaced.

Happy pivoting

C.

 

[Peter Guy]

Crowley -- while I agree with the general point of your post, I must take exception to a specific statement:

it's [fin pivot] one of the single most important skills a student can learn

. I don't believe the "fin pivot" should be taught AS A SKILL but, to the contrary, as an EXERCISE to develop THE SKILL of neutral buoyancy. While perhaps picking nits, I've heard too many instructors harp on the fin pivot, in and of itself, without making the point that THE SKILL is neutral buoyancy. The fin pivot is merely one way of helping the student learn the skill.

In "my other sport" (dressage), we teach our horses (and their riders) exercises but all too often the rider doesn't comprehend that they ARE merely exercises for the purpose of developing some other SKILL by the horse (and rider). And it gets worse because we "test" the exercise during a show which may, or may not, indicate the horse/rider has learned the skill. (We call it learning the tricks.)

I'm afraid this is also what all too often happens in OW training too since we "test" during the OW dives the ability of the student to do a fin pivot as opposed of the skill of neutral buoyancy. In OW dives 2 & 3 the student is to demonstrate neutral buoyancy by "fin pivot or hover" but, in reality, how many students are asked to do the hover (the skill desired) as opposed to the fin pivot (the exercise designed to demonstrate the skill).

I hope my students will understand, and learn, the skill of neutral buoyancy and that the fin pivot is merely one exercise to help them understand and learn that most important skill.

 

[boulderjohn]

. I don't believe the "fin pivot" should be taught AS A SKILL but, to the contrary, as an EXERCISE to develop THE SKILL of neutral buoyancy.

The fin pivot's value--and I agree it has value--is introducing the concept of using your breathing to fine tune buoyancy, including especially the ability to monitor your buoyancy, anticipate changes, and adjust breathing accordingly.

Once that purpose has been achieved, I don't see any point in going back to it. It is not required for the OW dives, and I never include it there. It is not part of the required PPB skills, nor should it be. PPB students should only do a fin pivot if the instructor determines that significant remediation is in order.