Open Water Courses and the Swim Test

[divemed06]

jepuskar once bubbled...
I am kind of confused as how you feel you know how the 'populace' as you call it, deals with swimming and Scuba diving? Your a swimming instructor, scuba instructor, both, you have done studies on this?

Please tell me what swimming in your swim trunks and then putting on a BC, mask, fins, scuba tank, WEIGHT, ohh and dont forget that snorkel, wetsuit etc....have to do with each other?

From your teaching experience examples and the two different sides of the spectrum, basically what your saying is, no matter what level of swimming ability one has, there is noway to determine their Scuba diving ability or comfort level. This tells me that one does not have a direct correlation to the other.

Good swimmer = poor comfort with scuba
Poor swimmer = excellent comfort with scuba
Good swimmer = excellent comfort with scuba
Poor swimmer = poor comfort with scuba

What I am trying to say is, once you put the gear on it all changes.

Respectfully yours,

jason

I would tend to agree with DSD, on the one hand, and Jepuskar on the other. As an experienced lifeguard, I can tell you that my transition to Scuba was a bit quicker then the rest of my class. There is no doubt that being a good swimmer has its advantages for diving; be it physical or psychological. However, I have found some extremly skilled swimmers not transition smoothly to scuba because the control they once had over their environment (ie. the water) is now gone because the environment has now changed (due to the scuba gear). In other words, for some people its harder to "accept" these environmental changes. Case in point: I had a national level synchronized swimmer in my class; she could swim circles around anyone and could hold her breath forever while upside down in the water and doing the splits. She had, however, a heck of a heard time with scuba because she just could not stop holding her breath under water...she finally got over, but it took a long time! That being said, I think its important for every diver to be:
1) comfortable in DEEP water (ocean, lake, river...whatever they dive)
2) able to support themselves at the surface of the water (without gear)
3) be able to swim from point A to point B safely and EFFECTIVELY (we had a guy in our class who could not swim forward...he would try to do a front crawl...but ended up going backwards )

Physical fitness is probably more important than swimming ability;but if you have both...great!

 

[DeepSeaDan]

... Jason,

The point of my examples was to demonstrate that like you, I have seen several instances where people perform quite different from what I have come to expect to be the "norm"; by that I mean some individuals who I expect to do poorly due to poor swimming ability suprise me with a higher level of ability in diving skills. Converesely, we have the aquatic superman, whom I usually expect to do well, but finds the going slow & difficult.

These people differ from the norm due to inherent personality characteristics; as an educated guess, I'd say the former to be a person of calm disposition, not easily rattled, and the latter being an anxious personality with probable self-confidence issues. In these examples it is clear that swimming ability is a mute point.

But they are, in my eyes, the exception, not the rule.

It has been my experience that on average / on the whole ( does this sound familiar? ) poor swimmers do not acclimate effortllessly to scuba from the get-go & well-trained swimmers ( same notation as above! ) usually do.

Such exceptions aside, the "average" / "normal" entry level diver will be personally safer, will progress faster, will enjoy themselves greater, will be more likely to complete the program if they come to me with adequate swimming skills.

My opinions are based solely on my observations over almost 30 years of diving & as many years as an active participant in swimming fitness training.

On what, do you base your opinion, Jason?

D.S.D.

 

[jepuskar]

Well DSD, I have spent atleast 31,500,00 seconds of my life as a scuba diver to your mere 30 years.

Swimming in itself has nothing to do with Scuba diving, the only common factor is water. Forget exceptions, forgot the NORM, I'm talking about being 60 feet under with a tank on your back, being able to swim on the surface is not going to help you at 60 feet.

I'll agree that the comfort level with the water in most cases is higher with swimmers, but that doesn't mean they will be able to Scuba dive worth a crap. I don't need 30 years of experience to tell me that, while you call me an exception.....I just look at it as fact.

I wish I could come up with another example right now, using another sport or whatever, but I'm tired...

I have a 400yd swim I have to do on Wednesday, how ironic.

 

[Big-t-2538]

jepuskar once bubbled...

What I am trying to say is, once you put the gear on it all changes.

While I completely agree with that statement Jason, I do still think that a person needs to be able to swim in order to SCUBA dive. They don't have to be world class swimmers, but they have to be able to swim.....swimming gives a person a sense of ability to move (fin techniques), a sense of ability to float (bouyancy control), and a sense of ability to maintain themselves in the water just a little bit (trim).

That being said, I have seen some excellent swimmers who just can't dive to save their arses, but I have yet to meet a diver with even mediocre skills who can't swim at least 200 yards.

 

[Lead_carrier]

Big-t-2538 once bubbled...


That being said, I have seen some excellent swimmers who just can't dive to save their arses, but I have yet to meet a diver with even mediocre skills who can't swim at least 200 yards.

Is this using any type of stroke or is it limited to strictly a forward crawl. That sometimes makes a world of difference.

Actually Big-t, I have met a couple of divers that would probably fall into your exception to the rule for swimming 200 yards. One was a paraplegic, that was a very competent diver in his own right. He had modified a pair of fins to fit his hands so he had to work a lot more than the rest of us to achieve the same comfort level. The other lost part of his arm in an accident. Gearing up was tricky for a while and after retraining himself to use what he had he was a very good diver, but never did learn to surface swim enough to amount to much. He told me why bother, he prefered scuba. Granted these 2 are exceptions to the rules but they just go to show that there are always someone willing to work their butts off to make themselves the exceptions.

 

[Big-t-2538]

Lead_carrier once bubbled...
Is this using any type of stroke or is it limited to strictly a forward crawl. That sometimes makes a world of difference.

Who has limited anything to front crawl....breast stroke, side stroke, elementary back stroke...etc, etc....actoally those three strokes are more condusive to learning more finning techniques than front crawl.

Actually Big-t, I have met a couple of divers that would probably fall into your exception to the rule for swimming 200 yards. One was a paraplegic, <snip the details> Granted these 2 are exceptions to the rules but they just go to show that there are always someone willing to work their butts off to make themselves the exceptions.

There are always exceptions....and this is clearly a prime example....I applaud anyone who works half this hard to achieve their goals. as a matter of fact, I'm looking forward to the Special Olympics swim meet we're involved with in October.

 

[DeepSeaDan]

"Forget exceptions, forgot the NORM, I'm talking about being 60 feet under with a tank on your back, being able to swim on the surface is not going to help you at 60 feet."

Jason,

I have never stated that marginal swimmers CANNOT be good divers; on the contrary, I've reiterated several times, using examples, that this is indeed a "fact", albeit an "exception".

This debate originally concerned the necessity of a swim test to qualify for a scuba cert. You take exception to this rule because you are a weak swimmer but a strong diver. You have seen other weak swimmers who are good divers & you have seen strong swimmers who are weak divers. From your vantage point, swimming ability is a non-issue.

My point of view stems from that of an Instructor. The agency I teach for has standards I must follow. I am responsible for the safety of my students & I am very careful in screening candidates to insure their safe participation in the sport. In my experience, the "fact" is that the majority of weak swimmers are not "Jasons" - they need time in the pool to become water-savvy, they do not possess those qualities of character ( that you apparently have ) which allow them to be comfortable in the water sans swimming skills.

I think we've bout beat this horse to death.

Regards,
D.S.D.

 

[Walter]

Jason,

I've very impressed with your 31,500,000 (you did drop a zero, didn't you?) seconds of experience. That's a whole year! (of course if you didn't drop a zero, it's almost 5 weeks) In that year, how many dives have you logged? How much time do you have underwater? Under what conditions have you dived? How long did you work on a charter boat saving poorly trained divers? How many rescues have you made?

Sorry, nothing personal, but your experience level doesn't lead me to give much credit your opinion on this topic.

You are correct in thinking swimming and diving are different. You are incorrect in thinking swimming isn't important.

When you give examples of who has problems and panics with relation to their swimming ability, you are leaving out many other important factors. The ability to swim is an important link in the chain to become a good safe diver. It is not the only factor. The ability to swim is important. Learning to free dive is important. Truly mastering skills (too often skills are not mastered) is important. Mastering confidence building skills is important. Skipping any one of these important steps makes a diver more likely to panic when things go wrong. Since most divers have skipped most (sometimes all) of these steps, I would expect divers with excellent swimming skills to panic. They have a house of cards built on a solid foundation, but it's still a house of cards.

 

[jepuskar]

DSD, your right, we have beat this to death, but thanks for the compliments even though you have never seen me dive.

 

[o2scuba]

FreeFloat once bubbled...


NAUI, I think.....although the instructor is qualified TDI instructor as well.

I don't fault him at all - in fact I think he's being lenient (or is it hopeful??) in letting me continue. I wouldn't let me continue. Sure he may have high standards but I don't think he's wrong in setting them as long as they're reasonable, and fairly applied. All the other students seem to have fish genes in them with the exception of just one other person, and that person is very very buoyant so has no problems treading, etc. Which sort of makes me stand out in the crowd.

You ...THINK?????

You are half way through the class and you don't know what agency?

I am a PADI instructor so I don't know NAUI requirements. Anyone NAUI instructors care to comment on the weight retrieval?

I know pool bricks are used in lifeguard training, but I fail to recognise ANY value of asking SCUBA students to meet this requirement. Are you training to be a recreational diver, or a Navy Seal?

When you dive for a weight, you are holding your breath, definately not something you want to get the habit of while diving.

I've heard other horror stories of instructors who require students to swim the length of the pool underwater, on one breath.


As far as standards. Standards are set by the agency. PADI requires a 100yard swim and 10 minute saurface float (tread).

Asking students to do MORE than the requirements is far from reasonable, lenient or prudent.