Greetings scuba fans! When we left our intrepid bunny she had completed her first flip fin experience in the pool. (See this thread.)
Our furry experimenter took the fins back to the pool last night during her OW student's final pool session. Joining the regular staff was a student from the advanced class who read the previous episode and wanted to try the flip fins for himself. Naturally bunny agreed to share
Poolside finds the rabbit in full gear donning the Omega Flips while standing close to the edge as always. Yes, you're supposed to don the fins then your gear and walk over to the edge but when you've been donning gear before fins for years and you're a slow learner you just sort of do things the old way.
Staff chimes in with "Trying it again eh?" as the bunny steps to the edge of the pool to giant stride with her fin tips up. Bunny, armed with tips from Teamcasa and another reading of the instructions is ready for battle!
SPLASH! Let the kicking begin! Instead of just trying to generally kick and get the fins to lock the rabbit focuses on her body position and the sweep of her leg. Pausing a moment she goes through her mental checklist then while remaining vertical focuses on taking her right leg straight back behind her and bringing it forward with power. Coordination eludes her and the leg goes back with power instead...crap...focus bunny, focus. She re-establishes her position and gently puts her right front behind her and looks as if she were setting up to do a feet-first surface dive since her left leg instinctively went out in front of her. "Whatever" she thinks and leaves the rebellious left leg sticking out in front while sweeping the right leg forward under her. Fin moves into position but does not lock, not enough power to get over the "hump." Our determined rabbit lines up again. Throwing the kick from the hip while simultaneously bringing the left leg back results in the satisfying click of the right fin locking into place...as well as the naked kicking sensation of a lost left fin...GRRRRR! To be fair, the wetsuit booties are too small for the fin pockets and spring straps since they were sized to fit the drysuit boots which are nearly big enough to require their own zip code. When bunny wears the wetsuit booties with the fins she can easily fit a finger between her foot and the fin pocket on each side, so there is 1.5 inches of space between the booties and the sides of the fin pocket and that doesn't count the space on top of the bootie.
A staff member retrieves the lost fin as the bunny drifts toward the bottom to fetch it. The determined rabbit dons the left fin and attempts to click it into place while kicking horizontally but can't generate enough power on the downstroke with her annoyingly uncoordinated left leg. She tried stepping on the fin while face down hovering and can't seem to step hard enough to lock it so she rolls over on her back and steps again. Still no luck! The left leg wants to move the same direction as the right leg which moves the fin away from the pressure point....aaaaargh! Bunny heads for the surface and tries the method that worked for the right fin. Unfortunately the bunny always does a feet first surface dive with her left foot to the front so switching it up and putting the left foot in the back is adding even more coordination challenge to the act. The first couple tries are unsuccessful, the left leg won't cooperate and can't generate enough power to lock the fin. Success happens on the third try though and the bunny swims off to see how the fins feel today.
Focusing on a frog kick she finds she can glide almost half way across the deep end on a single kick, probably 10 feet or so. Pretty good considering the bunny's frog kick could certainly be more efficient. Suddenly she realizes she's not feeling the torque of the fins as bad as the last time, it's still there but not nearly as hard to deal with. The bunny is adapting and the fins are getting easier to use, cool! They definitely feel much lighter than her medium Jet fins and not quite as stiff but they aren't actually mushy, just a little softer which seems to make kicking feel easier.
The advanced student gets in and bunny approaches him to trade fins. His fins say "Imperial" and have a picture of a turtle on them, bunny wonders if these are real Turtles or knock-offs as she dons them. If they are real Turtles then this will be a good comparison. The fins are huge on the booties just like the Flips, the bunny is wishing for spring straps as she wrestles the rubber straps over the back of her boots.
Bunny heads off to corral the OW students now that they are in the water. The first thing she notices is the torque of the Turtles when she frog kicks. These feel exactly the same way the Flips did during the first pool session. Managing to look down at her fins while frog kicking horizontally at the same time she sees the foot pocket flexing, bending inward to touch her bootie. "AHA! That's the source of the torque feeling!" she realizes. Basking in the thrill of discovery and still staring at her feet the bunny looks up just in time to avoid ramming her head into the crotch of a male student who happened stray in front of her.
The rest of the pool session is spent in the Turtles while the advanced student gets to play with the Flips. Our furry hero tries out the frog kick glide and is pleased to see the Turtles and the Flips generate the same amount of distance for her. The Turtles are definitely heavier to work with but today the feel of the blade's movement in the water was the same for both Flips and Turtles. The bunny is happy
Side note...
SOMEBODY who shall remain nameless (D.R.I.S) manages to convince the bunny to order a second, smaller pair. He THEN points out they make a pair with a shorter, wider blade so the order is switched to those because the bunny can't resist short bladed fins.
The last time someone sold this rabbit something she didn't want and then something she didn't need he ended up paying dearly for it...he eventually ended up proposing marriage and she said "Yes!" It's been almost 6 years and he's still trying to figure out what the heck he was thinking
Ber :lilbunny:
Our furry experimenter took the fins back to the pool last night during her OW student's final pool session. Joining the regular staff was a student from the advanced class who read the previous episode and wanted to try the flip fins for himself. Naturally bunny agreed to share
Poolside finds the rabbit in full gear donning the Omega Flips while standing close to the edge as always. Yes, you're supposed to don the fins then your gear and walk over to the edge but when you've been donning gear before fins for years and you're a slow learner you just sort of do things the old way.
Staff chimes in with "Trying it again eh?" as the bunny steps to the edge of the pool to giant stride with her fin tips up. Bunny, armed with tips from Teamcasa and another reading of the instructions is ready for battle!
SPLASH! Let the kicking begin! Instead of just trying to generally kick and get the fins to lock the rabbit focuses on her body position and the sweep of her leg. Pausing a moment she goes through her mental checklist then while remaining vertical focuses on taking her right leg straight back behind her and bringing it forward with power. Coordination eludes her and the leg goes back with power instead...crap...focus bunny, focus. She re-establishes her position and gently puts her right front behind her and looks as if she were setting up to do a feet-first surface dive since her left leg instinctively went out in front of her. "Whatever" she thinks and leaves the rebellious left leg sticking out in front while sweeping the right leg forward under her. Fin moves into position but does not lock, not enough power to get over the "hump." Our determined rabbit lines up again. Throwing the kick from the hip while simultaneously bringing the left leg back results in the satisfying click of the right fin locking into place...as well as the naked kicking sensation of a lost left fin...GRRRRR! To be fair, the wetsuit booties are too small for the fin pockets and spring straps since they were sized to fit the drysuit boots which are nearly big enough to require their own zip code. When bunny wears the wetsuit booties with the fins she can easily fit a finger between her foot and the fin pocket on each side, so there is 1.5 inches of space between the booties and the sides of the fin pocket and that doesn't count the space on top of the bootie.
A staff member retrieves the lost fin as the bunny drifts toward the bottom to fetch it. The determined rabbit dons the left fin and attempts to click it into place while kicking horizontally but can't generate enough power on the downstroke with her annoyingly uncoordinated left leg. She tried stepping on the fin while face down hovering and can't seem to step hard enough to lock it so she rolls over on her back and steps again. Still no luck! The left leg wants to move the same direction as the right leg which moves the fin away from the pressure point....aaaaargh! Bunny heads for the surface and tries the method that worked for the right fin. Unfortunately the bunny always does a feet first surface dive with her left foot to the front so switching it up and putting the left foot in the back is adding even more coordination challenge to the act. The first couple tries are unsuccessful, the left leg won't cooperate and can't generate enough power to lock the fin. Success happens on the third try though and the bunny swims off to see how the fins feel today.
Focusing on a frog kick she finds she can glide almost half way across the deep end on a single kick, probably 10 feet or so. Pretty good considering the bunny's frog kick could certainly be more efficient. Suddenly she realizes she's not feeling the torque of the fins as bad as the last time, it's still there but not nearly as hard to deal with. The bunny is adapting and the fins are getting easier to use, cool! They definitely feel much lighter than her medium Jet fins and not quite as stiff but they aren't actually mushy, just a little softer which seems to make kicking feel easier.
The advanced student gets in and bunny approaches him to trade fins. His fins say "Imperial" and have a picture of a turtle on them, bunny wonders if these are real Turtles or knock-offs as she dons them. If they are real Turtles then this will be a good comparison. The fins are huge on the booties just like the Flips, the bunny is wishing for spring straps as she wrestles the rubber straps over the back of her boots.
Bunny heads off to corral the OW students now that they are in the water. The first thing she notices is the torque of the Turtles when she frog kicks. These feel exactly the same way the Flips did during the first pool session. Managing to look down at her fins while frog kicking horizontally at the same time she sees the foot pocket flexing, bending inward to touch her bootie. "AHA! That's the source of the torque feeling!" she realizes. Basking in the thrill of discovery and still staring at her feet the bunny looks up just in time to avoid ramming her head into the crotch of a male student who happened stray in front of her.
The rest of the pool session is spent in the Turtles while the advanced student gets to play with the Flips. Our furry hero tries out the frog kick glide and is pleased to see the Turtles and the Flips generate the same amount of distance for her. The Turtles are definitely heavier to work with but today the feel of the blade's movement in the water was the same for both Flips and Turtles. The bunny is happy
Side note...
SOMEBODY who shall remain nameless (D.R.I.S) manages to convince the bunny to order a second, smaller pair. He THEN points out they make a pair with a shorter, wider blade so the order is switched to those because the bunny can't resist short bladed fins.
The last time someone sold this rabbit something she didn't want and then something she didn't need he ended up paying dearly for it...he eventually ended up proposing marriage and she said "Yes!" It's been almost 6 years and he's still trying to figure out what the heck he was thinking
Ber :lilbunny:
