Failed Open Water in Dry Suit and Devastated - Any Advice?

Please register or login

Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.

Benefits of registering include

  • Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
  • A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
  • You can make this box go away

Joining is quick and easy. Log in or Register now!

You are definitely not the only person to struggle! I did my OW over 2 weekends in a 7mm wetsuit, and of the 10 students who showed up the first day, only 5 got certified on the last. I did a separate drysuit course a little over a year and 100 dives later. I still mostly prefer wetsuits for shore dives, in part because the extra 6 lbs. of lead I need even compared to that thick wetsuit makes the walk on dry land so much more effortful. I also rarely do more than one shore dive per day, and I avoid rocky beaches. I've done over 350 dives, about half of them in a drysuit, over 100 from shore, and yet I'm not at all confident I could pass the 3-day course you attempted without dropping from exhaustion.

You've gotten a lot of good advice in this thread. The first thing you should do is stop beating yourself up. The next thing is to figure out how to break this challenge down into more manageable pieces:

- You might have been overweighted, even for your drysuit. You will definitely need less weight in a wetsuit. It may be possible to do some short dives in a wetsuit even where you live, or you could go someplace warmer to finish the course.

- The weight is less bothersome diving from a boat. Again, you may be able to make arrangements locally, or you could go someplace warm.

- The weight is more manageable if you're only doing one dive per day, and not diving 3 days in a row. You could look into private lessons locally to go at your own pace, or again, you could travel.

- You can improve your physical strength, and you probably will over many dives just by taking it slow. But if travel or a modified training environment isn't in the cards for you in the near future, you could hit the gym for a few months before trying again. I know a woman tech diver about your size who hoists her tiny self up and through the surf with a drysuit and a pair of 100 cubic foot steel tanks like she's going for a stroll in the park. She works out like a fiend and tells her adoring mentees that we girls can do everything the boys can do; we just have to work harder.

- To some extent, you do get used to the restrictive hippo feeling of a drysuit. To some extent, it's about proper fit, which you may not have had. Again, diving wet at least for now while you gain proficiency and physical strength may help. If you really want to dive dry in Iceland, you may want to bite the bullet and buy a drysuit, perhaps one that's custom-made for you.
 
Hey OP, I just did my DS specialty and one diver (I think he had ~25 OW dives?) failed. He took himself out because he wasn’t feeling comfortable with everything, which I couldn’t blame him for. Diving dry is a lot trickier than wet, and with the added overland expedition they had you do, they didn’t do you any favors.

Go do your OW certification dives on vacation someplace warm. Coki Beach in St Thomas will be the easiest, most relaxed beach diving you could ever imagine.

Once you have a bit of comfort with everything else, if you want to go dive at home, see if there are better dive sites with less of an obstacle course to get in. Or a better dive shop.
 
(I also needed an additional strap around the neck seal)
Well, that’s sketch! It’s not uncommon with rental drysuits but it’s poor practice. Fit is important with these things.
If you’re a little girl packing a big steel tank will be hard, your advantage is you don’t need to. An Al80 should have plenty of air for your reduced consumption.
I don’t walk far in full gear either. For shore dives I usually pack the tank first and everything else on a second trip. The tank is safe enough unattended.
You shouldn’t need to be particularly buff to do this sort of thing, pay no attention to the elite navy swimmers in scuba gear advertising, we’re mostly fat old dudes.
 
The cost of living is very high in Iceland and I would imagine the ow course is no difference.

Suggestion?
1. Find another operator in Iceland but make sure the course last a lot longer than 3 days.
2. Find another operator somewhere else.

Please do not give up.
 
There are some red flags about your course and equipment.

However the only really useful advice I can provide is travel to Fort Lauderdale and get trained by Ryan @custureri. While I am an instructor, I am smart enough to have someone else certify my wife and daughter. That person is Ryan. He is extremely good dealing with things like biomechanic and psychology that few do. He is exceptional and I guarantee you'll come away confident and enthusiastic.

And he'll get you certified in a dry suit.
 
I'm more of a newbie diver and it sounds like tasking overload plus maybe the need for a mild exercise plan do to the unique diving in that area.

Being in the Pacific Northwest, I did that training in 45F water so had tons of exposure and weight also, and all our dives were shore dives.

Tasking overload is different for everyone. It's challenging enough learning all the new concepts, but then you throw in trying to develop muscle memory with new gear, and a challenging environment, and lastly a fear of the unknown.

I don't know if this is possible for you but I would recommend going somewhere tropical and do the class again, where all you need to do is focus on the basic skills.

Then, come home, do a basic exercise program in the gym for a couple months, and take the dedicated drysuit class.

By breaking up the basic skills in an idea environment from the added task loading of the cold water and drysuit, and getting a couple months of daily exercise, I thinking it'll all seem less overwhelming.
 
I want to make a quick comment on the reference to the "strap around the neck." I don't know what she means, but I have seen something that might be what she is talking about.

A few months ago, I was on a trip where a veteran diver had a soft, flat, rubber-like ring that he put around his neck before putting on his drysuit. When he put on the drysuit, the neck seal made a beautiful seal around that ring.
 
One of these?
 
One of these?
Yep. He loved it.
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/swift/

Back
Top Bottom