[scratchmyback]

We had a practice session last night in the pool before our OW checkout next weekend. I have purchased a 7mm farmer jane wetsuit but it hasn't arrived at my LDS yet so I borrowed a loaner to get my weighting sorted out in the pool and to get used to doing my skills in it.

I had such a hard time controlling my bouyancy in 12 feet of water! I was wearing 28 lbs plus 2 lbs each on my ankles (I have floaty feet). Apparently I did great according to my DM buddy but I felt like I was bouncing all over the place. It made my mask removal/replace seem like a piece of cake in comparison. As a result I didn't get to practice many skills, I spent a good portion of the time trying to prevent runaway ascents although I was able to do my fin pivot fine and was able to swim around the pool neutrally bouyant at some point.

I found I was getting really frustrated and was breathing more rapidly and shallowly than I wanted. Which I think just started a cycle that was hard to get out of.

We will only get to a depth of 22 feet in the quarry next weekend for the OW dives. Everything I've read on here tells me that the neoprene will compress enough so that I won't be fighting the wetsuit the entire time when I'm trying to demonstrate my skills. It is something that I don't need or want to distract me so my question is....is that depth going to make a that big of a difference? Was it a bad idea to wear the 7mm to the pool to do skills? Or was it good to wear it so that I could see prior to OW what it feels like in such a shallow depth?

Laura