Sorry to burst a lot of bubbles but what you think is 1 mile an hours is more like 1/4 mile an hour.
Here is something to think about.
The US Olympic trials cut mark for the 200 meter mens freestyle is 1:52:89. Call it 1 minute 53 seconds. This works out to 3.97 miles an hour. Now these guys are striped down to their spedos and have even shaved off all their body hair, or they are in the newer slick full body suits. They are also doing a full out sprint.
For a diver in the same physical condition with exposure suite, tanks, etc. doing a sprint might make it to 1.5 miles an hour.
But lets face it, not to many on this board have olympic class fitness conditions. I would imagin that almost all would be shot after a sprint at 1/2 knot for 60 to 90 seconds.
But divers have fins you might say - next time you are in the pool do 3 laps at full speed in your fins and see how much your legs burn.
For those who say they can go faster, I have been in 1 knot curent for deco hangs, it is not fun, a 1.5 knot curent is imposable to hold on in for more then a few minutes (that is why we have John Lines) and anything above that is not diveable unless you do a drift deco.
So, figure the avg diver will be between 1/8 and 1/4 miles per hour over any distance greater then 100 yards.
