Long classes or split up, with or without LDS home base?

For the past couple years I've considered the 5+ day slog that can be GUE Tech1 (or Cave1) to be just "too much" - 8am to 10pm etc. The UTD way of doing ~3day weekend chunks made more sense to me. It probably still does from a learning theory perspective - how awake can you be in a day4 lecture at 8pm?

I'm coming back around to appreciating the "slog" approach though, since when its affiliated with a shop (like Zero Gravity) it ends up teaching a variety of intangibles on top of the actual in-water and lecture materials. One "intangible" that I have noticed is lacking in some of the shorter courses which may not be using a shop as a home base is just how much organizing, fixing, and johnny on the spot rigging technical or cave diving takes.

I know that we modified gear (lights, regs, spools, and reels) during my tech or cave classes to better suit course expectations. And repaired lights and suits which failed during the course among other things. All while others were filling tanks and everything else that the course requires. IIRC I actually borrowed Joe Talavera's backup suit for the last day of my DIRF course when I ripped a seal, pressure tested and repaired leaks in KMD's drysuit halfway through Cave2, etc.

Students have many of the same issues in other courses, but without the constant 5+ day presence of the instructor and the shop environment the students don't seem as prepared for these inevitables.

e.g. if your SPG hose is too long in MX Chris (or Danny or Fred) will hand you the proper length off the shelf, tell you to install it with the tools on the bench, and charge you for it. Issue solved, time to move on. In classes which aren't being supported by a shop or maybe are just one day this week and another day next weekend, the instructor can point out the hose being too long, but the student's LDS may not stock 22" HP hoses, or they may forget to buy one or feel like its not critical and wait etc. Net they show up for course day 2 a week later with the same gear problems.

Anyway, I'm coming to appreciate 5+ day slogs where students gain an appreciation for how to fix issues and juggle all the gear and plans (charters, fills, repairs, etc) that go into technical/cave diving. And lectures "at the shop" which serve double duty to resolve gear issues under instructor oversight as they happen, instead relying on a tired, working student's initiative during intervening days off from class.

So I'm coming around to a new perspective that while the 5 day+ courses are tough on the body, mind & gear, tech and cave diving "for real" requires some tenacity and endurance which can be hard to appreciate otherwise.

I don't know . . . I think the lesson is that things break and you have to fix them. If the student is going home and showing up next time with something not fixed, then it's up to the instructor to make it extremely plain that that kind of mindset doesn't work for this kind of diving.

I'm sure there are some things that you give up by breaking up classes and losing momentum, but for me, not trying to prop my eyelids open at 11pm to listen to a powerpoint presentation, and being able to think in the water because I'm not dead tired, are worth it.

Our T1 class was seven days. Sure, it was a lot of long days, but I really felt we benefited from gaining momentum as the class went on. Each day was a chance to improve on past mistakes while they were still fresh in our memories. Obviously this model breaks down once people become too exhausted to continue, but I didn't find a week to be pushing it yet.

I assume it's like most things, different approaches work for different people. Some people just aren't going to be able to "slog" through 5-7 day courses, no matter what theoretical/actual benefits such a class structure might offer. For them, smaller chunks are the answer.

TSandM:

I don't know . . . I think the lesson is that things break and you have to fix them. If the student is going home and showing up next time with something not fixed, then it's up to the instructor to make it extremely plain that that kind of mindset doesn't work for this kind of diving.

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And when their LDS doesn't stock proper SPG hoses, or requires a week to fix a reg, or "forgot" to order helium?

As an example, I figured out how to pressure test and fix drysuits in the middle of Cave2. From Danny working on KMD's suit. Next time mine fails in FL, I could get the supplies to make wrist & neck clamps at Walmart for $10, fix it on a hotel floor, and be diving later that day or at latest the next.

Generally I have never been up to 11pm. I was up until 10pm once in Tech1 with AG. He was filling tanks after lecture, if he can dig deep and fill tanks after diving and lecture, students can knuckle down and soldier through too. The crucial parts of class are not in lecture anyway.

The reality is you will be diving tired. Red-eye flight to MX? Drive to BC anyone? How about driving from Marianna to Ginnie cause it started raining and all the river caves are blown out? You will also be fixing gear on the fly or in the field after class - best to get used to both IMO.

Rainer:

I assume it's like most things, different approaches work for different people. Some people just aren't going to be able to "slog" through 5-7 day courses, no matter what theoretical/actual benefits such a class structure might offer. For them, smaller chunks are the answer.

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Sure, part of my point is that if someone is having issues with 5 day courses then they aren't really capable (yet or ever) of being (e.g.) WKPP expedition support where dives are 24hrs long or Ox Bel Ha where the entrance is several km into the jungle. Students who took their courses in bits and pieces spread over month(s) may think they understand, but if they were never exposed to the logistics, organizing and fixing and "slog" of day after day diving then they don't really know.

rjack321:

And when their LDS doesn't stock proper SPG hoses, or requires a week to fix a reg, or "forgot" to order helium?

As an example, I figured out how to pressure test and fix drysuits in the middle of Cave2. From Danny working on KMD's suit. Next time mine fails in FL, I could get the supplies to make wrist & neck clamps at Walmart for $10, fix it on a hotel floor, and be diving later that day or at latest the next.

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Even if classes are split you are still spending the exact amount of time at base camp with all it's logistics. Not sure why a participant's LDS would have to come into play.

rjack321:

Generally I have never been up to 11pm. I was up until 10pm once in Tech1 with AG. He was filling tanks after lecture, if he can dig deep and fill tanks after diving and lecture, students can knuckle down and soldier through too. The crucial parts of class are not in lecture anyway.

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Being in fairly good shape I am OK with a long grueling day. The problem for many folks including myself is the pressures of career and family do not come to a stand still while I am at play requiring a fair amount of attention turning the long multi-day class into one stressfull event...

rjack321:

The reality is you will be diving tired. Red-eye flight to MX? Drive to BC anyone? How about driving from Marianna to Ginnie cause it started raining and all the river caves are blown out? You will also be fixing gear on the fly or in the field after class - best to get used to both IMO.

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All these scenarios are choice driven. Morning or afternoon dives can always be cancelled. Try telling Bob Sherman, David Rhea, etc. that you are pooped and want the afternoon off. Although the rest of you have far more GUE class experience than myself it seems apparent the principal purpose of multi-day classes are scheduling and cost driven concerns.

Fortunately, I only live 5 minutes from Dean Marshall's shop who now only teaches Tech 1-2 in split sessions. The ability to crawl into my nice bed instead of a High Springs mildew infested rat trap? - priceless!

I don't know. By day 5, I had mostly just figured out how much food I eat in 5 days, and what food to avoid buying at the mexican gas stations after everything had closed up and when I didn't have enough time left in the night to fix gear and be able to hit a restaurant. Accidentally left my iphone in my drysuit undergarmet when I was having all kinds of leaky drysuit issues and killed my iphone.

If the point is to push students to the breaking point to where I was a zombie on day 5 and I still managed to do all the drills and pass the course and never broke down, then it was mission accomplished. I'm not sure about the value of learning in that kind of condition though. By day 5 I was pretty switched off -- performing, making some mistakes due simply to mental fatigue from 16-hour days and not quite enough sleep -- physically I'd hit a plateau where I could just keep plodding along forever, but mentally I'd totally switched off and shut down. I was also maxing out on frustration -- eating ****ty gas station food and killing my phone and being out another $300 or so. Some people argue that stress makes for better learning, but that was the kind of stuff we were going through on day 2 or day 3. By day 5 it was fatigue and frustration and I don't think that makes for good learning. I learned I shouldn't be doing 5 days straight of that.

If the point is to *test* me in those kinds of conditions, then mission accomplished. It shouldn't get any worse than that. If the point is to learn, though, then I don't understand what or how I was learning in that condition...

rjack321:

Sure, part of my point is that if someone is having issues with 5 day courses then they aren't really capable (yet or ever) of being (e.g.) WKPP expedition support where dives are 24hrs long or Ox Bel Ha where the entrance is several km into the jungle. Students who took their courses in bits and pieces spread over month(s) may think they understand, but if they were never exposed to the logistics, organizing and fixing and "slog" of day after day diving then they don't really know.

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With all due respect I doubt they are looking hard at a group of PNW professionals (self included) for WKPP expedition support divers. Cave country, including Gainesville, Orlando to Ft. Lauderdale provides legions of young able bodied candidates willing to drop whatever they are doing to join in for free...

rjack321:

Sure, part of my point is that if someone is having issues with 5 day courses then they aren't really capable (yet or ever) of being (e.g.) WKPP expedition support where dives are 24hrs long or Ox Bel Ha where the entrance is several km into the jungle. Students who took their courses in bits and pieces spread over month(s) may think they understand, but if they were never exposed to the logistics, organizing and fixing and "slog" of day after day diving then they don't really know.

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I doubt I'll ever be doing 24 hour long dives, ever. There are only a few people in the world doing expedition cave/technical diving at that level, and I'm cool not being one of them. Is the point of Cave 2 to test you and see if you are Casey or JJ, or is the point to test if you're good enough to handle a single double-stage dive a day?

Sure, part of my point is that if someone is having issues with 5 day courses then they aren't really capable (yet or ever) of being (e.g.) WKPP expedition support where dives are 24hrs long or Ox Bel Ha where the entrance is several km into the jungle.

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Is the point of Cave 2 to test you and see if you are Casey or JJ, or is the point to test if you're good enough to handle a single double-stage dive a day?

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I agree with you, Richard, that a split class isn't going to teach you about the energy involved and expended in a major project.

You're a project diver. You're out looking for things like that to do. I'm sure you could have volunteered on the recent Ox Bel Ha project and gotten a good taste of what's required to run such an event.

Me, on the other hand . . . I ain't no WKPP diver. I have no aspirations to do major projects or 24 hour dives. And I would guess that I am FAR more typical of the divers trained by GUE or UTD than you are. I don't NEED to prove that I can cave dive intelligently when I'm exhausted, because one thing Heather taught me early on is to recognize that I can't. When I do my line-following cave tourist trips and get out of bed one morning and can't drag my butt down the stairs, I take a day off. I have that luxury.

In my surgical residency, one of the rationales for working us as hard as they did (and with as much sleep deprivation as they did) was that, when we were in practice, we'd be taking call and have to operate all night when we'd worked all day, and then operate all day the next day. It's true that you have to do that sometimes, and it's good to know that you can, and also good to know that you aren't the sharpest knife in the drawer on the second day. But that's life and death stuff. RECREATIONAL cave and technical diving should be done, in my very strong opinion, by people who are rested and mentally ready to do it. People doing huge projects involving a ton of scheduling, travel, expensive equipment and gases and the like may have to push their personal limits, but the rest of us don't, and our training, in my opinion, not only does not need to fit us to do so, but is much better aimed at helping us recognize when we are below par and should stay out of the water.

I do think you have a good point about having some kind of home base or heavy-duty spares and repairs capability. If you're trying to run a tech class out of a shop that doesn't have technical equipment or has little inventory, you may well end up wasting valuable class time because of gear issues.