Question GUE - Is it much different to traditional agencies like SSI or PADI?

[NothingClever]

...but don't practice anything you believe is a skill that will be covered in class. The purpose of the course is to teach you, and the curriculum covers everything you need to know. You are not expected to know anything when you begin Fundies other than the absolute rudiments of scuba that any OW diver learned in their course.* It has been said that a downside of practicing what you believe are the "skills" in advance of Fundies is the potential for ingraining bad habits. To what extent that is true I do not know--it has been debated here on SB--but I believe the upside of coming into class with no preconceived notion of how to do a skill outweighs the possible downside of having learned something incorrectly.

This is great advice.

@Manchz I coach (instruct) at a high level in American motorsports and our school has a steady flow of students who either over-prepare or come in with high confidence about their experience. When we run the students through some basic drills, many of them get knocked back a bit (but not from a negative coaching style) because they're discovering their bad habits or realizing they're not as skilled as they thought they were. You can see the ones who are frustrated at having to undo hours, days, weeks, months and years of bad habits - I know because I was one of them when I was a student in the school.

The students we really enjoy are the ones who come in knowing very little, just listen and focus on execution. It's amazing to get phone calls and text messages from them later in the season as they progress much faster than the ones who thought they were going to roll in and ace the school or show the instructors "how it's done".

You have a great attitude and because you're starting early, you're going to come out the other side as a really stellar diver. You're going to get on that liveaboard and when you tell people with 500 dives that you have 50, you'll know you were classically trained.

 

[Manchz]

This is great advice.

@Manchz I coach (instruct) at a high level in American motorsports and our school has a steady flow of students who either over-prepare or come in with high confidence about their experience. When we run the students through some basic drills, many of them get knocked back a bit (but not from a negative coaching style) because they're discovering their bad habits or realizing they're not as skilled as they thought they were. You can see the ones who are frustrated at having to undo hours, days, weeks, months and years of bad habits - I know because I was one of them when I was a student in the school.

The students we really enjoy are the ones who come in knowing very little, just listen and focus on execution. It's amazing to get phone calls and text messages from them later in the season as they progress much faster than the ones who thought they were going to roll in and ace the school or show the instructors "how it's done".

You have a great attitude and because you're starting early, you're going to come out the other side as a really stellar diver. You're going to get on that liveaboard and when you tell people with 500 dives that you have 50, you'll know you were classically trained.

What a great vote of confidence and insightful feedback - thank you.
The advice on this forum is really second to none!

 

[Tassie_Rohan]

I do not have any friends/family/or any people I know that dive. So there’s no buddy other than the one LDS assigns, and sometimes they can’t find me a buddy (winter season, reduced demand) so no dives happen.

Any guidance would be greatly helpful. I started my OW theory in December 2023 and now 10 months later, I do think commercial agencies like PADI/SSI, etc kinda suck with how little they focus on foundational principles that are the building blocks of good diving experience, and when you want to learn more - do another course which again falls short of what it promises!
Given that my LDS is one of the best in the city, it’s the agencies I would think are crap.

Can I make a suggestion that will totally change your situation?

Join some dive clubs. There are several in Auckland - join a few and see which one you click with best.

Joining a club means you will end up belonging to a group of like-minded divers, and most clubs are welcoming to inexperienced divers. Then dive regularly and raise some of the skills you would like to practice with your new dive buddies - most would be happy to help you critique and practice your skills.

Rather than focusing on dive shops, training agencies and courses, focus on building a network of dive buddies and becoming a regular diver. Watch a video or two on frog kicks then practice during your social/club dives. Get a BP/W and long hose and practice with it for a while.

Consider GUE-F once regular diving stops delivering large improvements to your skill set (finning, buoyancy, trim, etc). When you feel comfortable with how you dive its a good time to find an instructor to put you outside the comfort zone again.

Cheers
Rohan

 

[steinbil]

Consider GUE-F once regular diving stops delivering large improvements to your skill set (finning, buoyancy, trim, etc). When you feel comfortable with how you dive its a good time to find an instructor to put you outside the comfort zone again.

While I agree it's a good idea to join a dive club for the social aspect and to have more dive buddies and opportunities to dive, I think it would be a mistake to postpone Fundamentals because of it. The advice and mentorship you can get through a dive club can be good or bad, and for a newer diver there's no way to know what advice to trust, whereas with GUE you have the best quality control in the industry, so you are pretty much guaranteed top notch training. Let the instructor teach and use the dive club for social diving. I have heard countless stories of people regretting not doing Fundies earlier, and not a single story of anyone doing it "too soon".

I did Fundamentals after 20 dives, and it was a fabulous start to my diving. I dive weekly with a local club, and it's great, but I am very glad I was confident in my protocols, and in setting limits before I started diving there.

 

[Wibble]

Hello all.

Since I posted here in Feb 2024, I dropped the idea of GUE-F as I was way too new to the sport. Now I am planning to do it in Feb/March 2025, and have found 1 of 3 instructors available in NZ - who I am speaking to end of this month. Would have about 25 or so dives by then.

I tried a fair bit to get private instruction from LDS (and of course pay), but that’s been an impossible task. Here’s the issue - they can’t teach skills privately what they teach in courses (agency restrictions I guess). They are a generally very good/helpful dive shop. This is what I asked:

• I told them I wanted additional support with buoyancy as I was really struggling and it made dives very stressful - if I should do PPB. They said do drysuit and buoyancy is covered in that (also I wanted to dive in winter in NZ, water is 13 degrees). So I did that, that probably helped about 10% more, but I base that more on my own research (I have been ruthlessly learning more about buoyancy from google/youtube/SB etc), rather than anything specific taught by the instructor but the theory material made sense, which i then Youtube’ed to understand more.
• I asked if they can teach me frog kick (because I watched others whilst diving, and from YouTube - and I tried to copy it - and for the few times I think i did it, felt it kept me bit more stable). They said to do Advanced Open Water.
• I asked about backward kick cos when there’s a reef in front of me and a person next to me, I have to contort my body in like a U shape to turn direction and I completely lose control. Well, that’s taught in a tech course.

I feel like the basics are so rubbish, foundations so weak - yet they just want to sell you next course, then the next. My LDS is recommending I do AOW, so I can do liveaboards. It’s a sales pitch, to which I said a sharp no, not until basics are better, which I think can take me a couple of years honestly —- as there’s no feedback, just me trying different things i see on YouTube.

So that brings me to GUE-F, which I have done plenty of research on by now. My little progress in diving has been due to this forum and due to YouTube, and just doing it again and again to get comfortable. I am at 15 dives now (when I posted, I was at 4).

I have read that even if you fail GUE-F, you learn so much. I can religiously follow a good teacher, good feedback and advice is worth its weight in gold (I naturally have no coordination instincts, I suck at most physical-based activities unless I practice heaps). Even the OW - I started in Dec 2023, couldn’t complete, and took a private class or two, then re-did in Jan 2024 privately and finally got it. Didnt come easy.

I do not have any friends/family/or any people I know that dive. So there’s no buddy other than the one LDS assigns, and sometimes they can’t find me a buddy (winter season, reduced demand) so no dives happen.

What is the opinion on doing GUE-F at around 25 dives mark? I know it’s a rigorous course, which is what appeals to me - but given that it’s about 5-6 months away, what can I do to better prepare for it?

• Does it require more physical fitness than OW? If yes, what kind - so i can work on it.
• What should be focussing on over my next 10 dives keeping GUE-F in mind? (A personally set goal is trying to figure out frog kick using YouTube as a guide n just testing that out every time i go in the water)

Any guidance would be greatly helpful. I started my OW theory in December 2023 and now 10 months later, I do think commercial agencies like PADI/SSI, etc kinda suck with how little they focus on foundational principles that are the building blocks of good diving experience, and when you want to learn more - do another course which again falls short of what it promises!
Given that my LDS is one of the best in the city, it’s the agencies I would think are crap.

I still want to continue doing div trips with my LDS, but outside of a course, they are not responsible for what I do, what i learn (or not learn), etc. This is where curiousity for GUE as an organisation kicks in.

PS - Goal is to be a better rec diver. Nothing else for now.

What is utterly absurd is that the "shop" with their so-called highly skilled and experienced instructors cannot mentor someone to develop their skills. This is tantamount to admitting they do not have the skills they purport to offer. Either that or they're too engrossed in the sell courses, sell courses, sell more courses...

Any good instructor can mentor people. The issues sounds like the dive shop doesn't have the skills nor the people to train them.

Seems that it's not a good dive shop.


I can only speak from my experience, but the above doesn't surprise me in the slightest. I found that the recreational divers, based around dive shops, frequently only use the basic diving skills and not the far higher level skills required in the technical community. I used "frequently" as not all are like that; some outfits have technical divers teaching and these are the ones which you need to seek out and use.

Technical diving is often seen, especially by the recreational/NDL community, as deep, long, complicated diving. It is not, although it can be. Technical diving absolutely requires strong core skills (buoyancy, trim, finning) as a basis for those more challenging dives, especially when dealing with problems. The recreational community tends to treat barely adequate core skills as acceptable; in technical circles, adequate skills are completely unacceptable.

Which is why GUE Fundamentals exists to sort out and set the standards for core skills. Other technical agencies do offer the same thing but don't have the same level of recognition.

Fundies is a great course and will be extremely challenging if your core skills are weak. You should be able to arrange to dive with other people who understand what good looks like. Those core skills require a lot of effort to perfect, but all the effort put in will make your diving -- any kind of diving -- far more pleasurable and safe.

I'd also suggest finding a good experienced technical diver instructor to help you with some mentoring (although some people would argue that basic skills with little knowledge of techniques is a better starting point as you don't need to break bad habits).

 

[Lorenzoid]

Join some dive clubs. There are several in Auckland - join a few and see which one you click with best.

. . .

Consider GUE-F once regular diving stops delivering large improvements to your skill set (finning, buoyancy, trim, etc).

I think I disagree that the best order is join a dive club first and then take Fundies later, but I do agree diving with a club and learning from mentors there can be advantageous. I would add, though, that if one takes Fundies first and later joins a dive club, it may be necessary to adapt to how one's fellow members dive. A diver will leave Fundies with some very specific ideas of how various things should be done, and that's not a bad thing for a new diver. I suspect it is easier to adapt to prevailing club practices later than to enter Fundies with things ingrained that may differ from how they're taught in Fundies. I really don't know--just my suspicion. A flexible, open-minded diver should in theory be able to do it either way--Fundies first or club first--and then at some point when they have enough experience to understand the implications, decide how they prefer to do things.

 

[DiveLikeAMuppet]

The most important thing is - go diving .

Shop that wouldn’t provide a day or two of coaching is just bad.

If you can’t find a Fundies course nearby, look for a decent instructor that would teach intro to tech or just be happy to spend a day or two on coaching in a quarry.

Clubs can be a good and bad environment - some are brilliant, some are split fin ankle weights seahorse maniacs but it’s still a place where you can learn about local dive spots, boats and maybe find some diving friends.

 

[NothingClever]

some are split fun ankle weights seahorse maniacs

LoL

 

[johnkendall]

Hello all.

Since I posted here in Feb 2024, I dropped the idea of GUE-F as I was way too new to the sport. Now I am planning to do it in Feb/March 2025, and have found 1 of 3 instructors available in NZ - who I am speaking to end of this month. Would have about 25 or so dives by then.

I tried a fair bit to get private instruction from LDS (and of course pay), but that’s been an impossible task. Here’s the issue - they can’t teach skills privately what they teach in courses (agency restrictions I guess). They are a generally very good/helpful dive shop. This is what I asked:

• I told them I wanted additional support with buoyancy as I was really struggling and it made dives very stressful - if I should do PPB. They said do drysuit and buoyancy is covered in that (also I wanted to dive in winter in NZ, water is 13 degrees). So I did that, that probably helped about 10% more, but I base that more on my own research (I have been ruthlessly learning more about buoyancy from google/youtube/SB etc), rather than anything specific taught by the instructor but the theory material made sense, which i then Youtube’ed to understand more.
• I asked if they can teach me frog kick (because I watched others whilst diving, and from YouTube - and I tried to copy it - and for the few times I think i did it, felt it kept me bit more stable). They said to do Advanced Open Water.
• I asked about backward kick cos when there’s a reef in front of me and a person next to me, I have to contort my body in like a U shape to turn direction and I completely lose control. Well, that’s taught in a tech course.

I feel like the basics are so rubbish, foundations so weak - yet they just want to sell you next course, then the next. My LDS is recommending I do AOW, so I can do liveaboards. It’s a sales pitch, to which I said a sharp no, not until basics are better, which I think can take me a couple of years honestly —- as there’s no feedback, just me trying different things i see on YouTube.

So that brings me to GUE-F, which I have done plenty of research on by now. My little progress in diving has been due to this forum and due to YouTube, and just doing it again and again to get comfortable. I am at 15 dives now (when I posted, I was at 4).

I have read that even if you fail GUE-F, you learn so much. I can religiously follow a good teacher, good feedback and advice is worth its weight in gold (I naturally have no coordination instincts, I suck at most physical-based activities unless I practice heaps). Even the OW - I started in Dec 2023, couldn’t complete, and took a private class or two, then re-did in Jan 2024 privately and finally got it. Didnt come easy.

I do not have any friends/family/or any people I know that dive. So there’s no buddy other than the one LDS assigns, and sometimes they can’t find me a buddy (winter season, reduced demand) so no dives happen.

What is the opinion on doing GUE-F at around 25 dives mark? I know it’s a rigorous course, which is what appeals to me - but given that it’s about 5-6 months away, what can I do to better prepare for it?

• Does it require more physical fitness than OW? If yes, what kind - so i can work on it.
• What should be focussing on over my next 10 dives keeping GUE-F in mind? (A personally set goal is trying to figure out frog kick using YouTube as a guide n just testing that out every time i go in the water)

Any guidance would be greatly helpful. I started my OW theory in December 2023 and now 10 months later, I do think commercial agencies like PADI/SSI, etc kinda suck with how little they focus on foundational principles that are the building blocks of good diving experience, and when you want to learn more - do another course which again falls short of what it promises!
Given that my LDS is one of the best in the city, it’s the agencies I would think are crap.

I still want to continue doing div trips with my LDS, but outside of a course, they are not responsible for what I do, what i learn (or not learn), etc. This is where curiousity for GUE as an organisation kicks in.

PS - Goal is to be a better rec diver. Nothing else for now.

Don't listen to anyone who says you need more experience before taking Fundamentals. In my experience those divers with little experience can do pretty well on the fundies class. The reason is that you have few engrained habits, and those habits aren't solidly fixed yet. Take the class in recreational configuration, discuss your goals with the instructor and enjoy the process. You may not pass the class, but probably will, and whether you do or not you'll come away with an understanding of what and how to continue improving. I've had students with as few as 7 dives come through and pass, but importantly improve and give themselves a great base to build on in future.
A lot of the people who say "wait until you have more experience" probably took fundamentals with between 100 and about 500 dives. This is the time when people find it hardest they have a few strongly engrained habits, but are not actually comfortable enough to break them, so they struggle, and it takes a lot of effort. Imho it's a worthwhile effort though

In terms of what to work on before fundies, I'd say breathing. Think about what happens to your buoyancy as you breathe, and try to avoid everything having completely full or empty lungs, and try to breathe slowly.
Everything else you'll go through on the class, and you can do yourself a disservice trying to preempt things, as you may get it wrong, and make it worse for yourself.

Thanks
John

 

[TooCold]

I tried a fair bit to get private instruction from LDS (and of course pay), but that’s been an impossible task. Here’s the issue - they can’t teach skills privately what they teach in courses (agency restrictions I guess).

Haven't used BCD underwater with Drysuit yet, as Drysuit inflator just does the job!

So the LDS where you did your OW and where you rent your gear won't/can't give you one-on-one instruction? And they taught you to use your drysuit for bouyancy control, not your wing? Is that the only shop in your area? You may find a quite different approach at a different shop...

If your impression of wetsuit divng was that it was more difficult than drysuit, then I'm guessing it was a big thick floaty 7mm for the same cold local waters? That plus an aluminum tank can be a challenge.

So here's something else to maybe consider (if money and time allow). You're OW certified so take a vacation to one of those many beautiful tropical islands north of you and do some really easy boat diving, get comfortable, relax, and enjoy. If you've never experienced tropical diving in little or no exposure suit, you're going to feel like you've gone to heaven. EVERYTHING is easier, which means you're not climbing that really steep learning curve.

Talk to prospective dive shops before choosing, be up-front about your situation (you've been really open here on SB - kudos to you) and pick a shop where you feel confident that they'll be helpful and welcoming. (Some can be quite snotty with beginners, even if they're pumping out PADI OW grads every few days.) Also, to channel @happy-diver, think less, worry less; if you're surviving cold water drysuit dives then you will DEFINITELY be as good as lots and lots of vacation divers on the boat, especially after your first few dives and you get your weight dialed in. Just diving in nice cozy clear warm water a couple of times a day, day after day, is the practice, practice, practice that settles down basic required skills (like using your BC for bouyancy control).