I love new divers - but whats the definition??

[TheHobster]

I enjoyed Lynne's thread - as an instructor I have been fortunate many times to have done what she did - it is incredible usually - so what is a newbie??

Is it experience in a few different locales? here in the Midwest we have some folkls that only dive tropical; some only dive local for $$$ reasons -

Is it # of dives? even if all are in a pretty benign quarry?

Is it a variety of dive types? ie: boat, shore, quarry, current, drift, ice?

My own ideas: 50 dives of which a bunch need to be salt water from a boat; minimum AOW training; has the experience to tell great lies at the apres dive deco stop

after all, diving is 90% social

 

[Ben_ca]

Did you do 100 dives or 1 dive 100 times?

 

[Dive-aholic]

It's the experience and variety. I know instructors that do 300 dives a year....the majority in one quarry. I know instructors who haven't seen salt water in a couple of years because the shop they own takes up too much of their time to allow them to dive. I also know divers with 100 dives a year in a dozen or more locations that vary from calm lakes to ocean shore dives with major surge. Ben hit is on the head.

Did you do 100 dives or 1 dive 100 times?

 

[daniel f aleman]

Newbie: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newbie#U.S._Navy_usage

 

[KMD]

Anything that you havent done before would make you a newbie at it.

 

[TheHobster]

Did you do 100 dives or 1 dive 100 times?

yes, as an instructor I have done 1 dive probably 1000 times!!! some have been memorable as well but doing skills and tours in the same quarries where the bluegill and I are on a first name basis can be "same old same old"

However, I have made it a point to dive for myself as well. I have a number of dives in a variety of locales including Southern California (both beach and boat); Florida Panhandle (beach, boat and springs); drift diving in West Palm, reef & wrecks in Keys, reefs in Bahamas and Grand Turk, liveaboards in Bahamas, NC wrecks, Lake Michigan wrecks, quarries to 120' (bring in the brass monkeys!), under ice, and as a Master Instructor I did a Discover Local Diving dive in Puget Sound - thats about it so far

on my list of things to do yet: cavern class; Flower Mounds; Cozumel; GW diving off San Diego; more Puget Sound diving; Wreck Alley, the Speigel Grove, the Doria (it's a family thing)

 

[Christi]

I know instructors that do 300 dives a year....the majority in one quarry. I know instructors who haven't seen salt water in a couple of years because the shop they own takes up too much of their time to allow them to dive. I also know divers with 100 dives a year in a dozen or more locations that vary from calm lakes to ocean shore dives with major surge. Ben hit is on the head.

Along that same line, I know instructors (and regular divers as well) who overinflate their numbers so incredibly that if they even sat down themselves and calculated what tey claim, they would see how impossible and ridiculous their claims are. They probably count their pool sessions, but even then, according to some of the ones I am thinking of...they would have had to do 4 dives a day everyday for the last four years or so. As a point of reference, full-time divemasters who dive everyday for a living (in Cozumel for example) only log an average of 500 - 800 dives a year! That's 2 to 4 dives a day 304 days a year (taking into account that they get one to two days a week off. If they dove 4 dives a day, 304 days a year then they would log ovr 1000 dives...but even that is not realistic due to low season, occasional illness, etc.

My point is that it doesn't do anyone any good to lie about how many dives they have...it's pretty easy to tell when you're embellishing!

And in response to Ben, I've done some dives well over 100 times and like Preston, I try to dive other locales and envirnonments when I get the chance to. Still, 90% of my dives have been right here in Cozumel. I haven't yet done any cold water diving, but I"m hoping to change that next year and dive the Channel Islands.

 

[shakeybrainsurgeon]

I can only speak from my experience as a surgeon, since I don't consider myself experienced in diving.

1) Experience is a relative term --- if someone is bright and observant, they can learn quickly and become experienced quickly. Dolts can do something 1000 times and never be considered "experienced". (Some people are experienced after 20 dives, others may do 100 and not have any clue. I agree that 50 is a reasonable figure, though.)

2) Diversity matters --- doing a given surgical operation in a variety of situations and a variety of anatomies is more valuable than homogenous experience

3) Adversity matters --- doing a hundred smooth operations does not teach you as much as a few bad ones

4) Numbers matter, but regularity matters more --- better to do an operation every other week over a year than to do twenty in one week --- the mind is better trained with low numbers of regular reps than high numbers of infrequent reps.


I try to improve my experience diving through diversity (shore and boat diving, tropical and quarry diving) and regularity. When I travel to dive locations, professional and family commitments usually prevent me from making more than 3-5 dives/trip. However, I can afford to do that four to five times a year. Thus, I have averaged only about 30 dives/year --- but I get some dives in almost every month. I hope NOT to gain experience through too much adversity!

 

[Christi]

I can only speak from my experience as a surgeon, since I don't consider myself experienced in diving.

1) Experience is a relative term --- if someone is bright and observant, they can learn quickly and become experienced quickly. Dolts can do something 1000 times and never be considered "experienced". (Some people are experienced after 20 dives, others may do 100 and not have any clue. I agree that 50 is a reasonable figure, though.)

2) Diversity matters --- doing a given surgical operation in a variety of situations and a variety of anatomies is more valuable than homogenous experience

3) Adversity matters --- doing a hundred smooth operations does not teach you as much as a few bad ones

4) Numbers matter, but regularity matters more --- better to do an operation every other week over a year than to do twenty in one week --- the mind is better trained with low numbers of regular reps than high numbers of infrequent reps.


I try to improve my experience diving through diversity (shore and boat diving, tropical and quarry diving) and regularity. When I travel to dive locations, professional and family commitments usually prevent me from making more than 3-5 dives/trip. However, I can afford to do that four to five times a year. Thus, I have averaged only about 30 dives/year --- but I get some dives in almost every month. I hope NOT to gain experience through too much adversity!

Excellent points and analogies.

One of the questions I ask divers who have never dove with me is when their last dive was. I want to know not only how MANY dives they have, but in what environments and how frequently they dive. That information gives me more information than a c-card or #of logged dives, or even years certified. I had a guy claimed he didn't need a refresher course because he was an experienced diver. He had been certified for over 20 years after all! His last dive was 8 years ago, and prior to that he had only logged 20 dives!

 

[D_B]

New Diver = me
I have training (maybe even good training) but not experiance ... and I am very aware of that, and I do not confuse the two

Christy ... coming out to dive the Channel? Cool! Are you going to make Catalina too? Maybe I can see you there
Always thought I would love to dive your outfit in Cozumel, since reading your posts here at ScubaBoard