How often do you practice skills?

[TSandM]

I was out last night with a newer diver, and we did a round of S-drills, and I noticed I really wasn't sharp. And I started thinking about it -- back in the days when I was always between classes, we did lots of practicing. We'd either have designated training dives, or just put skills into fun dives.

But when I went to do my Cave 2 class, I was seriously hampered by not having practices things like line-following exits and moving the team across the line, because I had forgotten many of the fine points. And now, I'm just kind of slow and clumsy at drills, which I haven't done in a drysuit for quite a while. (We do some S and valve drills at the beginning of each cave diving trip, but that's different )

So I wonder how often folks who have finished their formal classes actually practice their emergency procedures. After all, one hopes we never have occasion to use them for real -- so the only time we'd go through them is in formal practice.

 

[ppo2_diver]

I try to practice at least one skill on every dive. It might be something as simple as a mod-S, shooting a bag, to carrying bottles and gas switches. Call me a wuss, but I typically wait for warmer water to practice mask skills.

 

[rjack321]

So I wonder how often folks who have finished their formal classes actually practice their emergency procedures. After all, one hopes we never have occasion to use them for real -- so the only time we'd go through them is in formal practice.

Aren't you doing air shares and such with students in classes? As a demo, DM, or maybe a fill-in buddy? Those are my practice days honestly.

I am diving "for real" enough and there are enough little things on the dives at my limit that I think I'm staying sharper than the average tack at stuff like nearly blind exits.

 

[Nixdax]

As cave diving is a weekly event for me most of the skills get practiced in the course of normal diving. I try to do some of the more obscure ones (lost line etc...) every couple of months when I am doing a dive at a site where it is safe for both the environment and I to practice the skill.

 

[TSandM]

The only air-shares I've done with students have been in the pool, using a standard recreational gear setup -- the hand off the octo thing. I haven't had the chance to work with any hog rigged classes in a long time.

I've actually been getting in a few staged decompression dives recently, so I'm not worried about stuff like gas switches that one actually DOES on such dives. I was just thinking about valve shutdowns and gas sharing and blind exits, which are things that, if dives proceed as they ought, one is never going to have to do. The other end of the "practice all the time" curve is "I'm doing the dives, I don't need to practice at all," and I think each end has its issues.

And I was frankly curious as to whether people diving at this level have any kind of routine they've developed for making sure they practice such skills. Danny told us to do S and valve drills every 2 or 3 dives, but I see that mostly honored in the breach.

 

[boulderjohn]

Here in Colorado keeping skills sharp is a serious problem. We don't have many people who do technical diving, and we don't have any place locally to do real practice.

We do a trip roughly once a month to New Mexico (6-7 hour drive) where we can do some work in a deep sink hole, but schedules often conflict. Even that is not ideal--laying line on the wall of a sink is not the same as laying line on the bottom of a cave. (It is over 300 feet deep, and I have yet to see the bottom.) I did one such trip in May, and I won't be able to do one again until at least August because of schedule conflicts.

During spells like this, I try to find time to get into our shop's pool, but that is often booked, so it can be hard to find a time. If I do find that good time, it can be very hard to find someone else who can join me for such practice. Consequently, I usually go it alone. You can practice some skills alone, but you can't work on many others.

The last couple of times I got in some solo pool time (late March), I tried to work on cave skills. I put a variety of objects in the water and laid line. I looked for a lost buddy on that line. I did some jumps from one side of the pool to the other. I even closed my eyes and did lost line drills. It helped.

I had a similar bad stretch this time of the year last year, and when I tried to get back into action in late summer, I found my skills had eroded badly. I am hoping to avoid that this year, but it is not looking good right now.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

I was out last night with a newer diver, and we did a round of S-drills, and I noticed I really wasn't sharp. And I started thinking about it -- back in the days when I was always between classes, we did lots of practicing. We'd either have designated training dives, or just put skills into fun dives.

But when I went to do my Cave 2 class, I was seriously hampered by not having practices things like line-following exits and moving the team across the line, because I had forgotten many of the fine points. And now, I'm just kind of slow and clumsy at drills, which I haven't done in a drysuit for quite a while. (We do some S and valve drills at the beginning of each cave diving trip, but that's different )

So I wonder how often folks who have finished their formal classes actually practice their emergency procedures. After all, one hopes we never have occasion to use them for real -- so the only time we'd go through them is in formal practice.

Learned that one the hard way ... last October I traveled north of the border to go do some tech dives with some folks I hadn't dived with before. Got up there, got in the water, reached back to do my valve drills ... and couldn't. I'd let myself get out of the habit, gained a few pounds, and hadn't been keeping up with my stretching exercises. Not only was it a major embarrassment, but we ended up not doing the dives we'd planned to do.

Between age and chronic shoulder problems, valve drills will always be a struggle for me ... especially in a cold-water undergarment. What I learned was that those stretching exercises will have to be a regular part of my daily regimen for as long as I decide to keep diving doubles ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[Dive-aholic]

Learned that one the hard way ... last October I traveled north of the border to go do some tech dives with some folks I hadn't dived with before. Got up there, got in the water, reached back to do my valve drills ... and couldn't. I'd let myself get out of the habit, gained a few pounds, and hadn't been keeping up with my stretching exercises. Not only was it a major embarrassment, but we ended up not doing the dives we'd planned to do.

Between age and chronic shoulder problems, valve drills will always be a struggle for me ... especially in a cold-water undergarment. What I learned was that those stretching exercises will have to be a regular part of my daily regimen for as long as I decide to keep diving doubles ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

Or you could just go sidemount...


I practice skills on a regular basis. Some of them are in the courses I'm teaching. Some of them are planned into dives. Some of them just happen as a natural course of the dive. It's almost weekly that I'm doing real zero visibility exits...at least for a couple hundred feet.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

Sidemount's in my future, Rob ... if for no other reason than that it's a more practical alternative than doubles for some of the places I like to dive (not in caves, but in remote locations and off of small boats) ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[TSandM]

I think this is one place where people who INSTRUCT technical diving have a big advantage -- because they ARE doing basic skills on a regular basis.

I got together with some friends last night, and we did a 40 minute or so lake dive just for skills practice. I was glad we did. My valve drills were okay, but the S-drills were just plain rusty. I needed the practice. And the dive was fun, too!