It's simple, you want to waste less air? Then control your breathing.
Yes, But "HOW"?
Just relax? try to breath less? Some yoga apnea related technique?
Someone told me breath with your belly not with your lungs.
Any suggestion?
Actually it is simply "nearly everything" so often it is not simple.
Thx EastEndDiver, I've been skin diving for all my life, recently I started to scuba dive and I found it amazing. Only problem is that I'm 230 lbs and I pretty much finish my tank in a while.
Your suggestion will be "get a bigger tank?"
Height and fitness level are part of the mix, but so are relaxation and dive profile.
That's a good point GLWD, struggling trying to get controlo of my dive sound familiar to me, more buoyancy control can help me.
OK, so my comprehension of your
profile page is limited, but I have worked with some top
bodybuilders, pro football players, serious marathoners and Himalayan climbers.
After reading this thread twice, I think the good advise is scattered at best.
Sergio Longhi:
I've been skin diving for all my life
Working from this, I will assume your finning is what it is; changing a lifetime muscle memory is not a quick change, nor is it likely needed.
Likewise, your body and mind already have a handle on how much "inhalation" is required for a given muscle moment, so I agree with previous posts that recommend "normal inhalation", for the most part (more later).
Exhaling is the key for many divers. As a baseline, full exhalation gets rid of the most CO2 and CO2 buildup is often the trigger to breath. Full exhalation also gives your lungs the most negative average buoyancy through the breathing cycle.
When diving at a constant depth, I breath in "normally" and then exhale completely, taking about twice the time as the inhalation took.
My body position is typically slightly chest lower than fins, with a slight arch to the back. Moving forward there is "downforce" from both the body position moving through the water and from the angle of the finning, so my BC is slightly positive at the mid point of my breath cycle, from a stationary standpoint. As my lungs fill past this mid point, a small straightening of the "back arch" gives slightly more downforce from the forward motion water pressure on the body and from the finning angle, so "lift" is negated.
Complete relaxation of the upper body muscles is impossible, but being as upper body relaxed as possible is what I believe reduces CO2 buildup the most; relax those shoulders and limit arm movement. The brain is a major upper body muscle as well, and just thinking hard seems to increase my air consumption considerably. When solo or with my BDB my air consumption is way better than when guiding or teaching other divers.
As depth changes, the more anticipation the better. Going up and down a few meters can often be "handled" by small changes to the baseline breathing pattern; dipping down for a bit all I need is a slightly bigger than normal inhalation and not quite so full exhalation, rising up for a moment all I need is a slightly smaller inhalation with an extended time at full exhalation. If I know that I will soon be returning to the depth my BC was adjusted for, I can chose to "just" use lung volume until I get back to that depth.
When I know I will be changing depth for some time, I am already thinking about the best time to change BC inflation levels. Ascending is the direction that needs the earliest anticipation, because with each exhalation our tank's buoyancy moves in the positive direction.
Many divers make gear changes as they get more experience underwater, and then brag about how the gear changes made all the difference in their air consumption. They some how totally forget they also have more experience underwater.
For someone that has been skin diving all their life, more experience with a relaxed and controlled body position underwater is perhaps all that is necessary.
That said, this lean "tri-athlete wanabe" did drop significant coin on quality exposure protection and a couple 120 cft's.
