gobuyastick
Contributor
well over a year ago i recieved my brand new custom sized DUI FLX Extreme drysuit. I was super excited to receive it and take my drysuit class, but life finds a way to ruin things. Between college classes and other things i didnt get to take the class but still was able to find time to dive. Later on one thing led to another and i wound up learning to dive doubles instead of taking a drysuit class over the past few months. Fast foward to now and finally made the time to take the class with my buddy (we'll call him Bob) and Kathy Dicker as the instructor.
Day 1
We meet at starbucks at 830 to go over some of the lesson plans, do introductions, what we expect to get out of the class/our future goals if we have any. My eventually goal is to become a cave diver so cave 1 is what im striving for to be ready for in the next year. Anyways, we stop with the powerpoint and decide to head over to TigerTail lake for some actual diving with our brand new drysuits! Weather hasnt been stellar but the rain and overcast helped us not die from the south florida May heat, so that was a big help . After unloading equipment we brought out the suits, discussed how they work, the features they have, etc. It was like a whole drysuit crash course. Spending some time on that we put together a dive plan of what we need to work on and how we will go about it. Trim, stability, and buoyancy are of the upmost important to work on. We eat a quick lunch and don our suits with the help of kathy showing us how to get in easily, we then zip up and go into the shallows (3ft of water) and float around on the surface to cool off. We then get out get our equipment on, and head back into the water. On the surface we do a GUEEDGE and descend down. Kathy has us in about 5ft of water that way we can try it out, get use to the suit before we go a bit deeper. First impressions of diving dry: i hate it!
We kick around the shallows and surface after a few minutes under. We debrief on the surface, she tells us what to work on and how to go about it. My buddy bob has gotten use to the suit really quickly whereas im struggling lol. Oh well, people learn at different paces no biggie. I had a hard time dumping gas because i wasnt moving my elbow right, i was exaggerating the subtle roll and moving my whole body and i didnt have enough gas in my suit. Youre suppose to add enough to get rid of the squeeze, but i was diving with the squeeze.. figured that out and dumping gas became 75% easier. For the next couple of dives we moved slightly deeper and our goal here was to make a safe ascent for depth (15ft), we get down, kick around a bit, get together and ascend, stop at 10ft and continue up. The ascent felt great, we nailed the stop and it was slow and controlled. But it wouldnt have cut it in a fundies class, our situational awareness dipped quite some since we are task loaded with the suits and our trim was out of wack and we drifted alot from the up line. We debreif on the surface and do a quick GUEEDGE, and descend down to work on trim, stability and buoyancy. I thought i was in flat trim but i was really wasnt, its like fundies all over again.. my trim was thrown off for whatever reason and she was trying to help me out with it. While practised not moving and getting my trim back she would help bob out and alternate. We then would kick around and explore around the platform before ascending and trying not to look like newbie divers. We would do this two more times before we called it a day. When all packed up we went to the shop and get fills, finish lecture, make plans for the next day. Sunday the 27th has some nasty weather so we rescheduled for next sunday. At the end if the day i learned to love my drysuit, its a great piece of gear and i cant wait to get better at using it.All in all it was a great experience and i recommend it for anyone wanting to dive dry, its alot for me to handle but over time, and the more i practice the better ill become. Cave 1 is my goal and im not going to let my troubles in a drysuit stand in the way. Kathy is always a great instructor, i always get to dive with her so its fun to get to take another class and learn more from her
. Ill update next week with part 2
Day 1
We meet at starbucks at 830 to go over some of the lesson plans, do introductions, what we expect to get out of the class/our future goals if we have any. My eventually goal is to become a cave diver so cave 1 is what im striving for to be ready for in the next year. Anyways, we stop with the powerpoint and decide to head over to TigerTail lake for some actual diving with our brand new drysuits! Weather hasnt been stellar but the rain and overcast helped us not die from the south florida May heat, so that was a big help . After unloading equipment we brought out the suits, discussed how they work, the features they have, etc. It was like a whole drysuit crash course. Spending some time on that we put together a dive plan of what we need to work on and how we will go about it. Trim, stability, and buoyancy are of the upmost important to work on. We eat a quick lunch and don our suits with the help of kathy showing us how to get in easily, we then zip up and go into the shallows (3ft of water) and float around on the surface to cool off. We then get out get our equipment on, and head back into the water. On the surface we do a GUEEDGE and descend down. Kathy has us in about 5ft of water that way we can try it out, get use to the suit before we go a bit deeper. First impressions of diving dry: i hate it!
We kick around the shallows and surface after a few minutes under. We debrief on the surface, she tells us what to work on and how to go about it. My buddy bob has gotten use to the suit really quickly whereas im struggling lol. Oh well, people learn at different paces no biggie. I had a hard time dumping gas because i wasnt moving my elbow right, i was exaggerating the subtle roll and moving my whole body and i didnt have enough gas in my suit. Youre suppose to add enough to get rid of the squeeze, but i was diving with the squeeze.. figured that out and dumping gas became 75% easier. For the next couple of dives we moved slightly deeper and our goal here was to make a safe ascent for depth (15ft), we get down, kick around a bit, get together and ascend, stop at 10ft and continue up. The ascent felt great, we nailed the stop and it was slow and controlled. But it wouldnt have cut it in a fundies class, our situational awareness dipped quite some since we are task loaded with the suits and our trim was out of wack and we drifted alot from the up line. We debreif on the surface and do a quick GUEEDGE, and descend down to work on trim, stability and buoyancy. I thought i was in flat trim but i was really wasnt, its like fundies all over again.. my trim was thrown off for whatever reason and she was trying to help me out with it. While practised not moving and getting my trim back she would help bob out and alternate. We then would kick around and explore around the platform before ascending and trying not to look like newbie divers. We would do this two more times before we called it a day. When all packed up we went to the shop and get fills, finish lecture, make plans for the next day. Sunday the 27th has some nasty weather so we rescheduled for next sunday. At the end if the day i learned to love my drysuit, its a great piece of gear and i cant wait to get better at using it.All in all it was a great experience and i recommend it for anyone wanting to dive dry, its alot for me to handle but over time, and the more i practice the better ill become. Cave 1 is my goal and im not going to let my troubles in a drysuit stand in the way. Kathy is always a great instructor, i always get to dive with her so its fun to get to take another class and learn more from her
. Ill update next week with part 2
