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Its a sign that the new diver hasn't adapted comfortably to the water yet.
Diver Control: Hand Swimming
- Thread starter Trace Malinowski
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Or they have not learned the full cadre of kicking techniques yet.
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Intro to tech is often times the first time divers are expected to stay horizontal.
The OW diver's happy place is vertical. Thinking back a ways, that's how I held position. I didn't have a back kick, so I could swim in circles or go vertical. Watching safety stop video of divers I know who have hundreds of dives, yet have never seen horizontal as a standard confirms that vertical is the happy place.
Transitioning to a primarily horizontal attitude presents a few challenges.
First, is just staying horizontal and not going to our happy place. It takes a bit of focus initially and as soon as focus shifts, knees seem to drop. Once the knees drop, our ass will follow.
Then, there's the issue of fin control. Thrust can be directed with a decent paddle fin and a bit of technique, but that takes practice. Initially, most fin movement translates into forward movement. Without good fin control, sculling is the only way to stop.
Many people coming into an intro to tech course have very limited experience with paddle fins. This may likely be the only course that required paddle fins. If they are transitioning from positively buoyant fins, the difference can be significant. I see a lot of hand sculling taking place as a means to compensate for issues with balance or shifting gear.
I don't think trim and buoyancy control can be mastered to the point that hand sculling can be entirely eliminated in the typical OW course, but there's no reason they shouldn't know the benefits, be very clear on what it looks like and know the fundamental concepts which will enable them to achieve the desired result with some practice and tweaking.
That's what Intro to Tech courses are for.
Seriously, divers should have this stuff nailed well before considering Intro to Tech, but I'd have to guess many are taking Intro to become better divers and learn this stuff. I didn't learn it in either of my OW courses, my DiveCon course or as an OWI.
If diver's were required by all agencies to be able to swim and snorkel to some degree of proficiency this wouldn't be something that is being discussed.
OP
No, I haven't failed anyone for coming to class looking sloppy. Intro to Tech is certainly a place to loose such habits. However, I wonder how divers who have completed several courses prior to enrolling in technical training (including dive pros) don't come to class with better limb control. I would expect the entry level technical diver to have a relaxed attitude in the water without flailing. When I picture a competent and controlled diver (especially a pro), I imagine the diver being able to dive with arms folded. I imagine the diver stopping, falling into a relaxed vertical posture and turning with ease of fins movements in a vertical position, and then lifting into a horizontal swimming position as the diver begins to kick.
Not all bad habits can be trained out of new divers during the short open water courses that are currently the norm. However, if training is supposed to be modular, but achieve the same end, I question the value of advanced and specialty training that doesn't stop hand swimming.
While it is true that instructor performance and teaching ability is related to student performance and ability, sometimes a student's abilities and capacity for learning would require a sizable investment in money and times. Also, not every instructor is the best for each student. Sometimes an instructor who is able to coach many students to meet standards during allotted class time simply cannot connect with one student who might learn better from another instructor's methods.
There is no question that you might be able to get through to a student I can't. By the same token, I might be able to get results from a student that you can't seem to bring up to speed. In that sense, we would fail where another would succeed. I have a guy I'm sending to my friend, Bob Sherwood, because I couldn't fix him. Yet, even though he has very poor skills he went to another instructor to achieve advanced nitrox and deco. He honestly is not safe at that level. He remarked that he was impressed with his instructor for controlling the buoyancy of 4 students during class. The instructor actually had to inflate or deflate wings as needed because the students lacked control, but passed them anyway.
At what point do we hold a student back? Do we let a kid slip through the public school system without being able to read? Does the kid's college professor let him ride for the football scholarship? In diving, when does an instructor say you need greater control? Rather than focus on the mantra of trim, buoyancy and propulsion because these are not universally agreed upon, I thought I'd start with a universal examination of uncontrolled or crutch use of hands since they may be retarding diver skill, comfort and ability at the most elementary level.
SB is allowing me to see how many participants believe hand swimming is a bad habit (or not) in divers and pros and whether the desire to eliminate it is strong or not really something divers might support.
Eric Sedletzky
Contributor
Hand and arm movements have some uses in extreme cases.
I dive in an area that is known sometimes for excessive wave action and surge which can be exellerated when it is funneled through an underwater canyon or corridor. These breaks in large rocks are very common where I dive and it's easy to find yourself in such situations on shore dives.
The normal plan is to try and avoid days when surge action is high but it doesn't always work out that way.
There have been times when I've had to use everything I had including my arms and hands to keep myself in position during an oncoming surge and wait for the surge to go back so I could sail through a ravine or a tight spot between two large rocks again using hands to steer my way through these channels and avoid slamming into stuff.
Trying to hang in a skydiver position with hands neatly folded in front and just using a frog kick to try and manage those types of conditions does not provide the thrust, power, or front end steering control needed to stay on course and not get an arm full of urchin spines. A good strong scissor kick and a few hand movements are what work in those situations, at least for me.
Where I dive it's a whole different animal and if I have to grap kelp stocks, use my hands and arms to position myself when the ocean is going, so be it.
Some people may call me a hack but I really don't care.
I've been at this long enough now to know what works for me and what doesn't for the environment that I dive in.
I dive in an area that is known sometimes for excessive wave action and surge which can be exellerated when it is funneled through an underwater canyon or corridor. These breaks in large rocks are very common where I dive and it's easy to find yourself in such situations on shore dives.
The normal plan is to try and avoid days when surge action is high but it doesn't always work out that way.
There have been times when I've had to use everything I had including my arms and hands to keep myself in position during an oncoming surge and wait for the surge to go back so I could sail through a ravine or a tight spot between two large rocks again using hands to steer my way through these channels and avoid slamming into stuff.
Trying to hang in a skydiver position with hands neatly folded in front and just using a frog kick to try and manage those types of conditions does not provide the thrust, power, or front end steering control needed to stay on course and not get an arm full of urchin spines. A good strong scissor kick and a few hand movements are what work in those situations, at least for me.
Where I dive it's a whole different animal and if I have to grap kelp stocks, use my hands and arms to position myself when the ocean is going, so be it.
Some people may call me a hack but I really don't care.
I've been at this long enough now to know what works for me and what doesn't for the environment that I dive in.
Paladin
Contributor
Ya know, some of you guys would have purple fits if you watched me dive. When I'm underwater, my focus is on enjoying myself. I use my hands, my feet, body position, whatever it takes to do what I want to do. Yes, I have seen divers swimming by holding their hands folded in front of them. Looks kinda silly to me. When I'm swimming, my hands are wherever they are comfortable or where it makes sense, to me, to put them.
Forget this obsession with horizontal. My angle depends on which way I'm heading at any given time. At the surface, I jack knife and head for the bottom head down. After my dive, I ascend with my head toward the surface.
I flutter kick. Period. Tried the frog kick once. Don't like it. It looks and feels ridiculous.
If I want to scull, I scull. If I feel like settling to the bottom, then I settle to the bottom. I am not PC. Don't wanna be and it ain't gonna happen. In fact, I will often go out of my way to avoid being PC.
I jump in the water. I have fun. I come up. I do what I do however I want to do it. I started out snorkeling as kid and once I learned SCUBA, I simply became a snorkeler with a tank on my back.
Forget this obsession with horizontal. My angle depends on which way I'm heading at any given time. At the surface, I jack knife and head for the bottom head down. After my dive, I ascend with my head toward the surface.
I flutter kick. Period. Tried the frog kick once. Don't like it. It looks and feels ridiculous.
If I want to scull, I scull. If I feel like settling to the bottom, then I settle to the bottom. I am not PC. Don't wanna be and it ain't gonna happen. In fact, I will often go out of my way to avoid being PC.
I jump in the water. I have fun. I come up. I do what I do however I want to do it. I started out snorkeling as kid and once I learned SCUBA, I simply became a snorkeler with a tank on my back.
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Reading this thread made me recall what my husband used to say to me after my first few dives "You were awfully busy down there". and I was trying to find my comfort zone in the water. I like to think I am now much better but sculling is an easy habit to fall into when uncomfortable in a situation. In fact I noticed it yesterday when diving in my new dry suit....was able to catch myself and stop it though
I don't have a lot of experience working with students, but what I have seen is this: People use their hands when they are unstable. A lot of the time, they're unstable because they have a tank on their back that won't stay put, and they don't know how to play "reverse bicycle" and balance it above them. This is often complicated by soft, oversized BCs that don't stabilize the tank well, and by soft, floppy fins that don't "bite" the water and can't really be used very effectively to stop the tendency to turn turtle.
When I swim with the students as a DM, I tap them and show them how to put their hands together. If they persist in flailing, I'll gently slap their hands, and when they look at me, I'll shake my head "no". They try -- most of the time, they really try. But they don't have a solid body posture platform, they don't have fins that help them, and they're in gear that magnifies the problem. If all those problems could be solved, you could make quiet hands a condition for certification. Failing that, I think you can only keep telling them WHY their hands are busy, and keep reinforcing that that is a sign of instability, and it needs to go away.
If you can't get them in good equipment, and you can't help them balance themselves, you can't ask them to stop using their hands.
When I swim with the students as a DM, I tap them and show them how to put their hands together. If they persist in flailing, I'll gently slap their hands, and when they look at me, I'll shake my head "no". They try -- most of the time, they really try. But they don't have a solid body posture platform, they don't have fins that help them, and they're in gear that magnifies the problem. If all those problems could be solved, you could make quiet hands a condition for certification. Failing that, I think you can only keep telling them WHY their hands are busy, and keep reinforcing that that is a sign of instability, and it needs to go away.
If you can't get them in good equipment, and you can't help them balance themselves, you can't ask them to stop using their hands.
dumpsterDiver
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I try to explain to students that they will soon be doing things with their hands, holding a light on a night dive, a camera, a speargun, a lobster net and tickle stick and maybe a floatline all at the same time. They need to understand that their hands will often be occupied with other stuff. It is also kinda harsh, but you can demonstrate what the hand flailing does to the buddy, (i.e., getting a hand caught on their second stage hose loop and vilolently ripping it out of their mouth).
I once had to DM/buddy up with a parapelegic diver who could only hand swim. He did great, but every time I would get realxed (and forget about his legs) I would look back at him and he would be doing the hand swimming and my stomach would instantly roll over and I would kinda freak out. My diving nervous system always views drastic hand swimming as a precursor to panic and possibly a bolt for the surface, so my students did not do it much at all.
I still use my hands to spin around sometimes and as someone else mentioned, when in turbulent water, I will use my hands to crawl or grab or bounce off of stuff.
I once had to DM/buddy up with a parapelegic diver who could only hand swim. He did great, but every time I would get realxed (and forget about his legs) I would look back at him and he would be doing the hand swimming and my stomach would instantly roll over and I would kinda freak out. My diving nervous system always views drastic hand swimming as a precursor to panic and possibly a bolt for the surface, so my students did not do it much at all.
I still use my hands to spin around sometimes and as someone else mentioned, when in turbulent water, I will use my hands to crawl or grab or bounce off of stuff.
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