Griffo
Contributor
Theres been a number of threads lately around DIR / GUE in the non DIR forums. I find these particularly interesting as I am currently going through the Fundamentals class. Dont know what DIR is?
What is DIR anyway? | DIR Theory
Lynne also posted a link a little while back to the GUE Rec1 course video, which I found fascinating. It had me wishing Id learnt to dive that way.
Now theres all manner of post Fundies reports in the DIR forums, but I wanted to write something to describe the experience for an inexperienced diver, and discuss it in the open forums where newer divers are more likely to read it. I dont want this to be another pro-DIR or anti-DIR thread, theres enough of them, but something between a class report and a discussion on how Fundies can improve the new diver.
First I should explain my diving background to put everything in context. I did the Fundies course with my Fiance, there was just us two and our instructor. Liss first dove ~10 years ago when she did a typical backpacker tropical PADI OW course. She never dove again until last year.
Myself, I first dove around 12 months ago, when we were in Thailand on a short holiday. Wed spent most of the holiday snorkeling, something that was still new to me, when Liss suggested we did a try-dive. I had no desire to do it myself, but was like why not and off we went. I did two try-dives to 15m and 18m with both dives around the 50min mark. Ill admit that the skills part kneeling in the shallows scared the hell out of me, but the two dives I found very relaxing. The bug had bitten, and I fell in love with the sport. I ran home and immediately did the PADI e-learning OW course. But I had no desire to dive in the cold Melbourne waters. So around 8 months ago, we took off for a 10-day diving holiday in Santo, to dive on the SS President Coolidge. I did my OW course on the first two days, with about 30 minutes of theory, and 4 dives in a shallow bay. This was actually an SSI course as no PADI instructors were available on the entire island. But thats another story. The next day, as a freshly minted OW student, we went out and started diving the Coolidge, and over the next few days did dives down to 40m, going into deco on most dives. Now I had fallen in love with both diving and wreck diving. On the last dive of the holiday however, an incident occurred with my Fiancé that could have been extremely nasty. The positive of it was that I came away determined that I needed to do a whole lot more training before attempting penetration diving again. I also wanted to be able to dive as effortlessly as our guides did, and learn a hell of a lot more about dealing with underwater emergencies.
So back in Melbourne, and with the decision to go diving here, we rushed out, found a dive shop we liked, and sunk a lot of money into gear. I started down the usual path, did Nav, Nitrox, and attempted to do Deep and Wreck (Ive done the theory of Wreck & Deep but the dives were continually cancelled, but thats another story). I was kind of shocked that not only was I still not trained for penetration diving, but nobody was actually telling me how to dive better. Id specifically ask my dive intructors for pointers, but was usually met with a youre fine, dont worry about it style of answer. Subsequently I have discovered that my trainers only had around 100 dives themselves, but thats a digression.
The great Internet search then began, as I sought out more information on how to dive properly. Numerous tech diving sites were discovered, then I ran across the DIR forum on Scubaboard. Needless to say, when I finally read the GUE equipment page, a lot of things made sense to me. The incident I referred to above simply would not have happened if we were in familiar gear, knew how to use it, and dove as a proper team. None of this is unique to GUE or DIR, but it seemed the only agency that covered it soup to nuts and gave me the ability to be taught everything I was seeking, in a structured manner, rather than spending years working it out myself.
Another long story short, it turned out that Liss actually worked with a GUE Fundies instructor, so the stars were aligned. I understand for some people its not that simple to find a GUE instructor, but I was very fortunate. This is also important to note when I describe the actual course while I still obviously pay full fees like any other student, it means that there was a level of flexibility that may not be afforded to a fly-in / fly-out course.
So with the decision made to do Fundies, I undertook a complete equipment swap to compatible gear. Gone were the Jacket BCs, short hoses, plastic torches, retractors, curly clip cords, big knives and other assorted Christmas tree adornments that various people had convinced me to buy.
We went for our first few dives on the backplates, and fell in love with them. Ill admit that I did NOT find them easier buoyancy wise than the jackets, however the freedom of diving in a plate is just indescribable until you do it. With all the additional layers, hoods, undervests, thick gloves etc necessary to dive here wet, it was even more noticeable not having that frontal squeeze.
We then had our instructor fit us properly to the gear, and went on a live-aboard for a long weekend. We got in 12 dives with the setups to get familiar with diving them. We specifically attempted to work on our trim and buoyancy, however Im not sure that it helped at all in the end. Basic familiarity with the gear was a plus however.
So we booked in Fundies, deciding to take it wet and in singles, and go for a rec pass. We had intended to do this a couple of months ago, but for a number of different reasons the beginning of the course was delayed, so the water here ended up being around 57F rather than 63F. It doesnt sound much, but did make a difference in the end. At this stage we had about 40 dives in the logbook, but these had mostly been completed over a period of only 8 months or so.
Day 1: Theory
The first day was actually a post work evening doing theory. We spent 4 hours over dinner going through a number of slide decks, and watching video of the basic skills. We got to watch what we should really be looking like underwater, and got to see the skills multiple times in slow-mo and with pause and rewind, which is really useful for pointing out the little details that you miss at first. There was a lot more theory here, but Im a little hazy on what was taught on which day
Day 2: Practice
The second day started with land-drills. Laying on the ground practicing kicks and the correct position. Trying to isolate and clench my glutes to keep my knees up. Going through the basic -5 drills dry on land. Multiple times until they were really drilled in.
Then it was off to the pool to put this all into practice. Analyse the gas, get the gear setup, then jump into the pool to do the swim test. Doh! I had forgotten about this. A 14m? underwater swim, then 6 laps of the 50m pool. I havent done laps in over 15 years, and 2 laps in I was seriously worried. But I got there in the end, with over half the time to spare it seems. The underwater swim however, I failed abysmally. Three times in a row. So we parked that, and moved on to the first dive.
The first pool dive was from memory just propulsion and trim. Easy right? This was the beginning of having my ass kicked continually. In a good way J
The video captured is really a great training aid. I was told continually that I needed to bring my knees up, but until I saw the video of my finning, I couldnt understand how much I was dropping them. Watching the video (especially from behind where you could see how much I was rocking) afterwards was very eye opening. I managed to do the flutter and frog kick OK action wise. The modified kicks always resulted in cramp. So Id get two or three kicks in, and cramp would stop me in my tracks.
The back kick.. well, I got there eventually. The first few attempts were a disaster, but I eventually ended up moving very slowly backwards.
The second dive added in the basic 5 (reg out in, reg swap, donate, mask clear, mask removal and return). These are basic drills right? Easy as???
Wow. Not when trying to remain in trim, in 2m of water in a swimming pool. While I got through them, every time I would ascend at least a meter. And to be honest, if the pool was deeper, I probably would have gone higher. I felt.. rather useless. And then my backup reg started free-flowing constantly, leading to an abort of the diving day. We were near the end, and decided to pick it up the next day. So at the end of the day, exhausted, feeling rather low about my ability in-water, I re-attempted the underwater swim, and got it first go. It must have been nerves J
Day 3: Open Water Dives
So we drove down the coast around 1.5 hours to do our first OW dives. While there are heaps of shore dives here, very few go very deep, so we had to take a trek. It was immediately apparent that the diving was going to be rubbish, so we switched the day around, and went back to the classroom.
We spend the next few hours finishing the theory component of the course. This is where a lot of things really clicked for me. While I had read the book, going through the slide deck using the system in real-life scenarios, made a lot more sense. The ability to do estimation calculations for minimum deco, O2 clock, etc are all incredible simple to do in your head, in real time. Metric probably helps though
Its probably the first time I actually thought the whole no relying on the computer makes real sense. Its also great the way you can question any part of the system, and a thorough, complete, rational argument is available to answer it. Forget the politics, these guys have really thought this stuff through.
Anyway, classroom over, we re-investigated the dive conditions, but they were still rubbish, so we binned the day, and re-organised for 2 weeks later. I was actually glad, as it gave me time to practice.
Next Week: Private Practice
So we took the opportunity, and rented out a dive pool at the local pool complex for a few hours. We spent the time practicing our kicks, and basic five.
I found myself now completely unable to back kick. I was just rocking back and forth. Id been warned about this though and already knew how to fix it. This is another part of the instruction that I loved there was a lot of this may happen, this is what you will be doing to cause it type information sharing.
Day 4: Open Water
So the next weekend we were back at the same pier, ready for the next day of diving. This day we were doing the Basic-5 as well as SMB deployments, proper S-Drills, maskless swims etc.
The first dive we did the basic-5, and S drills. I felt like the most incompetent diver ever. I just could not seem to hold trim. I was finning constantly, could not hold position, kept ascending while doing drills, and sculled with my hands. We had to thumb the dive when Liss started shaking from the cold. During the ascent, I got massive cramp the kind that tears muscle, and Im still limping from it. My ascent was rather comical. In retrospect, although I wasnt shivering, my reaction time was definitely slower towards the end of the dive, so I was happy it was thumbed.
In reality I was over it for the day. Our instructor was incredibly supportive though, constantly telling us that we were being too harsh on ourselves. That hed taught experienced tech divers who had struggled just as much, and for novice divers that we were doing well. Still, Im pretty harsh on myself, and did not look forward to the next dive at all. But after lunch and a good warming up, the sun appeared, the temperature raised a little bit, and we felt game enough to re-don the wet semi-drys.
Down we go, and now a current has appeared, so there we were, trying to hover, stay in trim, and do S-drills while finning into a current and fighting off the cold. Talk about task loading We then went through the SMB deployments, during which for once I felt entirely comfortable for the first time. Thats thanks to youtube and the fact Ive done it the GUE way from the first time I ever shot one off. It is however the first time I have ever pulled an SMB back down, rolled it up, and put it back into my pocket. It is certainly a good challenge!
I then watched Liss go through the same process, and at the end realized that there I was, finning into a current, holding position and trim, without consuming most of my mental effort in doing so. I then thumbed the dive as I was too cold, so we didnt get to finish the rest of the skills.
Whats Next:
Well, theres still a couple of dives to go and skills to go through. But rather than getting cold while hovering in one spot, we are going to do them more as recreational dives, where we dive somewhere with more than sand to view, and do the skills throughout the actual dive. Theres even talk of us flying north to warmer waters to do so. So in some ways the formal part of the fundies class is over. Due to the access we have to our instructor, he has offered to just keep diving with us until he feels that he can pass us, rather than offer a provisional. I think we will go that route rather than be issued a provisional pass and have to be re-assessed within the 6 months. Im sure Ill learn more this way.
So how do I feel about the course? Well it certainly kicked my ass. I was all set to jet off to Thailand in a few weeks and do a TDI tech course. No way in hell Im doing that now (still diving, but without the course). People talk about task loading, but until you are cold, trying like hell to maintain trim, keep perfect buoyancy, and achieve whatever it is you are trying to do, do you realize just how high the bar should be for technical diving. I thought I had decent buoyancy control I mean I could do a rec style S-drill fine, but was shown how bad my buoyancy really is. I thought I was fairly horizontal. I laugh at that now. I thought I was OK at task loading I mean Ive dealt with some minor issues underwater without panic or issue. I laugh even louder at myself.
What is DIR anyway? | DIR Theory
Lynne also posted a link a little while back to the GUE Rec1 course video, which I found fascinating. It had me wishing Id learnt to dive that way.
Now theres all manner of post Fundies reports in the DIR forums, but I wanted to write something to describe the experience for an inexperienced diver, and discuss it in the open forums where newer divers are more likely to read it. I dont want this to be another pro-DIR or anti-DIR thread, theres enough of them, but something between a class report and a discussion on how Fundies can improve the new diver.
First I should explain my diving background to put everything in context. I did the Fundies course with my Fiance, there was just us two and our instructor. Liss first dove ~10 years ago when she did a typical backpacker tropical PADI OW course. She never dove again until last year.
Myself, I first dove around 12 months ago, when we were in Thailand on a short holiday. Wed spent most of the holiday snorkeling, something that was still new to me, when Liss suggested we did a try-dive. I had no desire to do it myself, but was like why not and off we went. I did two try-dives to 15m and 18m with both dives around the 50min mark. Ill admit that the skills part kneeling in the shallows scared the hell out of me, but the two dives I found very relaxing. The bug had bitten, and I fell in love with the sport. I ran home and immediately did the PADI e-learning OW course. But I had no desire to dive in the cold Melbourne waters. So around 8 months ago, we took off for a 10-day diving holiday in Santo, to dive on the SS President Coolidge. I did my OW course on the first two days, with about 30 minutes of theory, and 4 dives in a shallow bay. This was actually an SSI course as no PADI instructors were available on the entire island. But thats another story. The next day, as a freshly minted OW student, we went out and started diving the Coolidge, and over the next few days did dives down to 40m, going into deco on most dives. Now I had fallen in love with both diving and wreck diving. On the last dive of the holiday however, an incident occurred with my Fiancé that could have been extremely nasty. The positive of it was that I came away determined that I needed to do a whole lot more training before attempting penetration diving again. I also wanted to be able to dive as effortlessly as our guides did, and learn a hell of a lot more about dealing with underwater emergencies.
So back in Melbourne, and with the decision to go diving here, we rushed out, found a dive shop we liked, and sunk a lot of money into gear. I started down the usual path, did Nav, Nitrox, and attempted to do Deep and Wreck (Ive done the theory of Wreck & Deep but the dives were continually cancelled, but thats another story). I was kind of shocked that not only was I still not trained for penetration diving, but nobody was actually telling me how to dive better. Id specifically ask my dive intructors for pointers, but was usually met with a youre fine, dont worry about it style of answer. Subsequently I have discovered that my trainers only had around 100 dives themselves, but thats a digression.
The great Internet search then began, as I sought out more information on how to dive properly. Numerous tech diving sites were discovered, then I ran across the DIR forum on Scubaboard. Needless to say, when I finally read the GUE equipment page, a lot of things made sense to me. The incident I referred to above simply would not have happened if we were in familiar gear, knew how to use it, and dove as a proper team. None of this is unique to GUE or DIR, but it seemed the only agency that covered it soup to nuts and gave me the ability to be taught everything I was seeking, in a structured manner, rather than spending years working it out myself.
Another long story short, it turned out that Liss actually worked with a GUE Fundies instructor, so the stars were aligned. I understand for some people its not that simple to find a GUE instructor, but I was very fortunate. This is also important to note when I describe the actual course while I still obviously pay full fees like any other student, it means that there was a level of flexibility that may not be afforded to a fly-in / fly-out course.
So with the decision made to do Fundies, I undertook a complete equipment swap to compatible gear. Gone were the Jacket BCs, short hoses, plastic torches, retractors, curly clip cords, big knives and other assorted Christmas tree adornments that various people had convinced me to buy.
We went for our first few dives on the backplates, and fell in love with them. Ill admit that I did NOT find them easier buoyancy wise than the jackets, however the freedom of diving in a plate is just indescribable until you do it. With all the additional layers, hoods, undervests, thick gloves etc necessary to dive here wet, it was even more noticeable not having that frontal squeeze.
We then had our instructor fit us properly to the gear, and went on a live-aboard for a long weekend. We got in 12 dives with the setups to get familiar with diving them. We specifically attempted to work on our trim and buoyancy, however Im not sure that it helped at all in the end. Basic familiarity with the gear was a plus however.
So we booked in Fundies, deciding to take it wet and in singles, and go for a rec pass. We had intended to do this a couple of months ago, but for a number of different reasons the beginning of the course was delayed, so the water here ended up being around 57F rather than 63F. It doesnt sound much, but did make a difference in the end. At this stage we had about 40 dives in the logbook, but these had mostly been completed over a period of only 8 months or so.
Day 1: Theory
The first day was actually a post work evening doing theory. We spent 4 hours over dinner going through a number of slide decks, and watching video of the basic skills. We got to watch what we should really be looking like underwater, and got to see the skills multiple times in slow-mo and with pause and rewind, which is really useful for pointing out the little details that you miss at first. There was a lot more theory here, but Im a little hazy on what was taught on which day
Day 2: Practice
The second day started with land-drills. Laying on the ground practicing kicks and the correct position. Trying to isolate and clench my glutes to keep my knees up. Going through the basic -5 drills dry on land. Multiple times until they were really drilled in.
Then it was off to the pool to put this all into practice. Analyse the gas, get the gear setup, then jump into the pool to do the swim test. Doh! I had forgotten about this. A 14m? underwater swim, then 6 laps of the 50m pool. I havent done laps in over 15 years, and 2 laps in I was seriously worried. But I got there in the end, with over half the time to spare it seems. The underwater swim however, I failed abysmally. Three times in a row. So we parked that, and moved on to the first dive.
The first pool dive was from memory just propulsion and trim. Easy right? This was the beginning of having my ass kicked continually. In a good way J
The video captured is really a great training aid. I was told continually that I needed to bring my knees up, but until I saw the video of my finning, I couldnt understand how much I was dropping them. Watching the video (especially from behind where you could see how much I was rocking) afterwards was very eye opening. I managed to do the flutter and frog kick OK action wise. The modified kicks always resulted in cramp. So Id get two or three kicks in, and cramp would stop me in my tracks.
The back kick.. well, I got there eventually. The first few attempts were a disaster, but I eventually ended up moving very slowly backwards.
The second dive added in the basic 5 (reg out in, reg swap, donate, mask clear, mask removal and return). These are basic drills right? Easy as???
Wow. Not when trying to remain in trim, in 2m of water in a swimming pool. While I got through them, every time I would ascend at least a meter. And to be honest, if the pool was deeper, I probably would have gone higher. I felt.. rather useless. And then my backup reg started free-flowing constantly, leading to an abort of the diving day. We were near the end, and decided to pick it up the next day. So at the end of the day, exhausted, feeling rather low about my ability in-water, I re-attempted the underwater swim, and got it first go. It must have been nerves J
Day 3: Open Water Dives
So we drove down the coast around 1.5 hours to do our first OW dives. While there are heaps of shore dives here, very few go very deep, so we had to take a trek. It was immediately apparent that the diving was going to be rubbish, so we switched the day around, and went back to the classroom.
We spend the next few hours finishing the theory component of the course. This is where a lot of things really clicked for me. While I had read the book, going through the slide deck using the system in real-life scenarios, made a lot more sense. The ability to do estimation calculations for minimum deco, O2 clock, etc are all incredible simple to do in your head, in real time. Metric probably helps though
Its probably the first time I actually thought the whole no relying on the computer makes real sense. Its also great the way you can question any part of the system, and a thorough, complete, rational argument is available to answer it. Forget the politics, these guys have really thought this stuff through.Anyway, classroom over, we re-investigated the dive conditions, but they were still rubbish, so we binned the day, and re-organised for 2 weeks later. I was actually glad, as it gave me time to practice.
Next Week: Private Practice
So we took the opportunity, and rented out a dive pool at the local pool complex for a few hours. We spent the time practicing our kicks, and basic five.
I found myself now completely unable to back kick. I was just rocking back and forth. Id been warned about this though and already knew how to fix it. This is another part of the instruction that I loved there was a lot of this may happen, this is what you will be doing to cause it type information sharing.
Day 4: Open Water
So the next weekend we were back at the same pier, ready for the next day of diving. This day we were doing the Basic-5 as well as SMB deployments, proper S-Drills, maskless swims etc.
The first dive we did the basic-5, and S drills. I felt like the most incompetent diver ever. I just could not seem to hold trim. I was finning constantly, could not hold position, kept ascending while doing drills, and sculled with my hands. We had to thumb the dive when Liss started shaking from the cold. During the ascent, I got massive cramp the kind that tears muscle, and Im still limping from it. My ascent was rather comical. In retrospect, although I wasnt shivering, my reaction time was definitely slower towards the end of the dive, so I was happy it was thumbed.
In reality I was over it for the day. Our instructor was incredibly supportive though, constantly telling us that we were being too harsh on ourselves. That hed taught experienced tech divers who had struggled just as much, and for novice divers that we were doing well. Still, Im pretty harsh on myself, and did not look forward to the next dive at all. But after lunch and a good warming up, the sun appeared, the temperature raised a little bit, and we felt game enough to re-don the wet semi-drys.
Down we go, and now a current has appeared, so there we were, trying to hover, stay in trim, and do S-drills while finning into a current and fighting off the cold. Talk about task loading
We then went through the SMB deployments, during which for once I felt entirely comfortable for the first time. Thats thanks to youtube and the fact Ive done it the GUE way from the first time I ever shot one off. It is however the first time I have ever pulled an SMB back down, rolled it up, and put it back into my pocket. It is certainly a good challenge!I then watched Liss go through the same process, and at the end realized that there I was, finning into a current, holding position and trim, without consuming most of my mental effort in doing so. I then thumbed the dive as I was too cold, so we didnt get to finish the rest of the skills.
Whats Next:
Well, theres still a couple of dives to go and skills to go through. But rather than getting cold while hovering in one spot, we are going to do them more as recreational dives, where we dive somewhere with more than sand to view, and do the skills throughout the actual dive. Theres even talk of us flying north to warmer waters to do so. So in some ways the formal part of the fundies class is over. Due to the access we have to our instructor, he has offered to just keep diving with us until he feels that he can pass us, rather than offer a provisional. I think we will go that route rather than be issued a provisional pass and have to be re-assessed within the 6 months. Im sure Ill learn more this way.
So how do I feel about the course? Well it certainly kicked my ass. I was all set to jet off to Thailand in a few weeks and do a TDI tech course. No way in hell Im doing that now (still diving, but without the course
). People talk about task loading, but until you are cold, trying like hell to maintain trim, keep perfect buoyancy, and achieve whatever it is you are trying to do, do you realize just how high the bar should be for technical diving. I thought I had decent buoyancy control I mean I could do a rec style S-drill fine, but was shown how bad my buoyancy really is. I thought I was fairly horizontal. I laugh at that now. I thought I was OK at task loading I mean Ive dealt with some minor issues underwater without panic or issue. I laugh even louder at myself.
