FLL Diver once bubbled...
Not really. A couple of those pictures are pretty obvious to even the unDIR initiated. However a couple of them don't look any different that what's posted on the WKPP site.
They don't look anymore streamlined with all those tanks hanging off them and the scooters than =some= of the pictures folks here are making fun of.
Actually, I believe they do. Look at the pictures closely... sure, the DIR guys and the DIW guys both have lots of bottles. But take a closer look.. the DIW guys have bottles all over the place, hanging straight down, pointing forward, creating the maximum possible drag. The DIR guys have their bottles horizontal, or pointing down so that most of the bottle is in the slipstream.
Compare:
http://www.wkpp.org/images/Wakulla072200-mini-mee/jj_wak722_13.jpg
vs
http://www.frogkick.nl/diw/pages/diw01.htm
Also notice that spare scooters are towed behind the DIR divers. And that this guy has a *carabiner* on one of his stages. And what's that hose I see hanging straight down out of the picture?
I suppose that at first glance, all of these guys have lots of bottles and a ton of gear, so they "don't look any different." But if you take a closer look at all of those pics on the DIW site, then at the DIR pics, the DIR guys do appear to have more well thought out setups (in my unexperienced cyberdiver opinion, that is).
Look at
this guy. He's apparently got a couple of bottles slung off his left side, and appears to be attached to a scooter, but look how incredibly bare and clean his belly side is. Then look at
this one. Or
this one. Or even
this one. I'm not saying any of these guys are bad or stupid divers, God knows it's not my place to say that. But looking at these pictures, the anal focus of DIR divers on the best possible gear configuration and not settling for anything less than totally optimal is, well, apparent.
Look closely through the DIW images, and read the points (they're not that hard to decipher). I dunno, they seem to make perfect sense to me.