Am I worthy to take lessons?

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A lot of, if not most, people automatically associate being overweight with being poorly conditioned. That is not always the case, although dropping the weight is nearly always a good idea and makes the fitness situation even better. On the other side of the coin, I know a lot of skinny people who have trouble diving as, light weight or not, they are in poor physcial condition, don't get enough excercise, smoke, drink too much, etc. But because they are skinny, no one automatically assumes they are out of shape.

Sadly the reality is that being overweight is not politically correct and that ironically overweight people are the last remaining group about whom it is politcially correct to express predjudice. It's PC to over generalize and make assumptions about a person's character, life style choices, ability and motivation based solely on weight, but no one would publicly do the same based on a person's race or religeon.

I would not get hung up on anything anyone says on Scubaboard regarding this issue. I do agree with the previous suggestions that you should see your doctor and get his opinon. Swimming and diving is often a great way to start losing weight and increase cardiovascular fitness and if your doctor indicates there are no medical contraindications, then go for it.

There is some truth in the intuitive reasoning that larger people use more air than smaller people. But that is also an over simplification as there are a lot of other factors involved. Many tissues in the body are very low demand in terms of O2 use and tend to have very limited blood through them. Fat is one of those tissues. From a decompression model standpoint it is normally treated as a realtively slow compartment that on gasses and off gases slowly due to the reduced blood flow.

This deviation from more normal proportions may potentially affect the validity of various deco models but it does not have nearly as direct an effect on air consumption. If a particular tissue type isn't getting and using a lot of O2, it isn't going to affect your air consumption to anywhere near the same degree as many other psychological and physiological factors will. This certainly fits with my observations of many, many divers of various levels of experience over nearly 20 years of diving.

So despite the intuitive nature of the idea, air consumption is certainly no where near to being a linear function of body weight or even body mass index.
 
DA - I agree with your comments. Statistically, being overweight (not even obese) puts you at-risk in a number of different categories. Not only that, statistical studies have shown that adding weight in the later stages of your adult life can be even more detrimental. This is regardless of the fact of how well conditioned you may feel you are.

That said, it's your body, have at it!
 
DA Aquamaster:
I would not get hung up on anything anyone says on Scubaboard regarding this issue. I do agree with the previous suggestions that you should see your doctor and get his opinon. Swimming and diving is often a great way to start losing weight and increase cardiovascular fitness and if your doctor indicates there are no medical contraindications, then go for it.
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I agree with DA Aquamaster that you should see your doctor first. If you are clinically obese then you need to make sure you do not have other risk factors (hypertension, high cholesterol, sedentary, etc.) for exercise. If you have any of these risk factors, you'll want to get them under control first. Certainly you can get cleared for an exercise program by a physician, but it's one thing to be exercising in a controlled environment where, if you feel fatigued or winded, etc., you can stop and assistance is immediately available. It's an entirely different matter in diving. My thought is to get assessed/cleared by a physician and, if you're not already doing so, begin a supervised exercise program to achieve a reasonable level of fitness *before* you take up diving.
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Like others have said, get a doctors oppinion of your health condition before taking the plunge. Everyone is required to do this before their first OW session anyways, regardless of physical appearence or weight.

If a medical proffessional clears you for diving then, by all means take the plunge and make the underwater enviroment your new :smilie_ho

Your excess weight may or may not make your gear more expensive and your airconsumption greater but once you´ve started diving both the money and extra air will seem well worth it ;)

As others have said diving may also inspire you to make "healthier" choices that will improve not just your diving but your overall quality of life!

If you haven´t signed up yet then what are you waiting for ?!
Join the UW party :dazzler1:
 
More important than your weight is your level of phyiscal fitness.. As someone who has been diving since 1981 at a body weights which have varied from 170 to 260.. I will share that diving IS less exerting when you are lean and fit... but I've loved it always..

Use equipment that fits. If you're not exercising, start. Have fun!!
 
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