hand assisted back kick?

[Mr Carcharodon]

I For another, it's difficult to swim with your hands and not silt. For a third, swimming with your hands is inefficient and burns up a lot of gas.

So how does this work? Given the articulation of the hand the thrust can be more precisely directed with the hand than the foot. Which should reduce the chances of silting.

How is swimming with your hands less effcient that swimming with your feet? Do you have any measurements to back this up? And the orginal poster was asking about making small movements so this may not apply in any case. Competitive swimmers seem to profit from using their hands rather significantly so I question the lack of effciency. There may be more power in a finned foot, but that is not the same as effciency.

I agree with your first point about the lights. And personally find the back kick very useful. But your second two reasons may me nothing more than conventional wisdom, and wrong.

 

[LiteHedded]

So how does this work? Given the articulation of the hand the thrust can be more precisely directed with the hand than the foot. Which should reduce the chances of silting.

How is swimming with your hands less effcient that swimming with your feet? Do you have any measurements to back this up? And the orginal poster was asking about making small movements so this may not apply in any case. Competitive swimmers seem to profit from using their hands rather significantly so I question the lack of effciency. There may be more power in a finned foot, but that is not the same as effciency.

I agree with your first point about the lights. And personally find the back kick very useful. But your second two reasons may me nothing more than conventional wisdom, and wrong.

i dunno. do your next dive with no fins and see what happens to your sac rate. I imagine it will increase

 

[fnfalman]

What about using the webbed gloves? I once dived with a paraplegic and he used those webbed gloves to great effect.

 

[Blackwood]

Competitive swimmers seem to profit from using their hands rather significantly so I question the lack of effciency.

Competitive swimmers aren't wearing drysuits (assumption on my part), wings and doubles like the OP.

I know from experience that waving my hands around doesn't get me anywhere near as much motion as fining. In a wetsuit and a single tank, yah, I may be able to get around pretty well with a nice extended breast-stroke.

 

[Teamcasa]

Competitive swimmers seem to profit from using their hands rather significantly so I question the lack of effciency.

Competitive swimmers aren't wearing drysuits (assumption on my part), wings and doubles like the OP.

I know from experience that waving my hands around doesn't get me anywhere near as much motion as fining. In a wetsuit and a single tank, yah, I may be able to get around pretty well with a nice extended breast-stroke.

Simply waving your hands around will indeed just spike your SAC and leave you looking goofy but a skilled arm movement (like a competitive swimmer may use) will give you more agility in the water while diving wet or dry, singles or doubled up.

However, the whole point of limiting arm/hand movements is not to make less agile but so that you learn to maximize your fin skills and minimize your efforts by using only your fins. Swimming with your hands is not a sin, just a skill you need to unlearn.

 

[Mr Carcharodon]

Competitive swimmers aren't wearing drysuits (assumption on my part), wings and doubles like the OP.

I know from experience that waving my hands around doesn't get me anywhere near as much motion as fining. In a wetsuit and a single tank, yah, I may be able to get around pretty well with a nice extended breast-stroke.

Efficiency is work out for energy expended. Swimming with your hands is efficient because the thrust goes where you want it to. There is no doubt less power than swimming with fins. But that does not mean it is always wrong to use your hands.

I seem to recall the conventional wisdom in question to come from JJ’s book. Which to the best of my knowledge was not divinely inspired. Although some of you seem to be willing to accept it without evidence so it is a religious text in that sense.

I really do like the back kick and think everyone should learn it.

 

[scjoe]

How often are people finding they really need to back up and how far are they backing up? Is this more of a question of having taken the time to learn a skill people just want to use it?

 

[Bubbletrubble]

How often are people finding they really need to back up and how far are they backing up? Is this more of a question of having taken the time to learn a skill people just want to use it?

@scjoe: I'm sure that use of the back kick is very setting-dependent.
Whenever I'm diving a wall and taking pictures, a back kick is invaluable.
I can imagine that back kicking would also be necessary when diving in tight places (wrecks, caves).
It can also be very useful in keeping yourself properly positioned relative to your buddy team during ascents and descents.

When I back kick, it's mainly to hold my short-term position in the water column against a very slight current or to back up slightly to get my subject in focus. I never find myself having to do the kick for long periods of time.

That being said, I see no shame in hand-sculling a little every now and then to get in position. It's not very efficient...but for fine positional movements it doesn't need to be.

 

[ae3753]

How often are people finding they really need to back up and how far are they backing up? Is this more of a question of having taken the time to learn a skill people just want to use it?

Backwards kick is not only used to back up, but to hold position. As the result, I use the backwards kick quite actively. For example, in ascents and descents, I use the backwards kick to position myself relative to my teammates to keep everyone together.

If I need to back up, it's typically 1'-5'. I shoot a lot of video, so backing up and turning while my hands are holding the video camera steady is very common for me.

 

[Mr Carcharodon]

How often are people finding they really need to back up and how far are they backing up? Is this more of a question of having taken the time to learn a skill people just want to use it?

I seem to have my hands full with camera a lot of the time, so the back kick is quite handy. Also if you overshoot or want to hold position in surge it is useful.

It does seem to use just a fraction of fin surface and as such does not seem to be very effcient however. Although maybe I have bad techique.