Is horizontal position really better?

[wetb4igetinthewater]

So as painfully slow as I believe the change has been, it is still coming.

Well I hope the rate accelerates. Only time will tell.

 

[chillyinCanada]

That's not a bad analogy. Now I would ponder whether having more refined skills helps skiers have more fun.

It most certainly does!

 

[Celt]

Considering the destruction I saw pretty much all divers do to a reef while in Belize, I agree. Now most were vacation divers (and poorly trained), but the most egregious person was the photographer with over 25 years of diving.

The fact that large amounts of people are visiting fragile eco systems guarantees their destruction whether on land or water. For my diving, wreck or rugged shore , the structure is varied so whether horizontal or otherwise I can glide through without touching. I think time in the water teaches that. But I know nothing about teaching so I'll leave that to the people involved.

 

[Celt]

In the first decade or so of my diving, I did a lot of diving in Cozumel and got to know the reefs well. I learned the dives you did on those reefs varied dramatically by the quality of the divers in your group.

On a dive in Akumal, the DM had said before the dive that my friends and I were the only people signed up for the next dive, and he wanted to take us to a more advanced site. Unfortunately, another couple signed up, and the wife was simply terrible. We went to that site, but he wouldn't let us get anywhere near the coral canyons and swim throughs. After the dive, he apologized, saying he had wanted to show us a really cool site, but he couldn't do the intended dive with that couple.

I know nothing about teaching so have no solution to that, but is it the lady's fault after paying for training and paying to go on the dive? Why not tell people straight up the dive involves a delicate swim through and there not trained for it, and bring them somewhere else.

 

[Doby45]

I am now going to add this point to the last post for a different reason. The dive guide who had wanted to take us to the advanced site had been our DM for the morning dive, and that was the first time he had seen us. He had decided that we were all very advanced divers, which is why he wanted to take us to the advanced site. He told us that the couple who had joined us only had about 25 logged dives, and so their buoyancy and trim were still at a beginning level.

That DM was very surprised when I pointed to my two friends and said I had just certified them as OW divers the day before. He had just witnessed their first two dives as certified divers.

That is the difference you see when teaching OW students while neutrally buoyant rather than on the knees.

Had close to the same thing happen at the local aquarium dive. I went on the dive as a birthday guest of a good friend of mine and a recent student. Naturally, you dive in a corralled group at the aquarium. After the dive, the DM for the dive, came over and told myself and my friend that we looked very natural in the water with our trim and propulsion. That's when I told the DM that I was an Instructor and the other guy was a recently certified student.

 

[Blackcrusader]

I get it. Better trim, streamlined, less energy spent especially with current so less gas. Easier to stay neutral. But, really, is the horizontal position always the best one?

always for photo shots

 

[Ayisha]

...I've often also been cited as being a DIR or GUE diver due mostly to my modified Hogarthian approach to diving.

Nah, it's because some of us have seen you interviewed in an intro to GUE video that still gets played today in Fundies courses, workshops and seminars.

 

[Blackcrusader]

I know nothing about teaching

I come up to end of a dive to do a safety stop and see this so took a video.
Imagine what these students are thinking of their Chinese PADI instructor then? Peak Performance class or not I have no idea?

 

[wetrat]

My experience is that horizontal position with knees bent utilizing the frog kick is not only most efficient in terms of gas consumption but is most considerate to other divers in terms of not disturbing silt. This position is mandatory for survival in a cave and transfers well to recreational diving.

 

[The Chairman]

Nah, it's because some of us have seen you interviewed in an intro to GUE video that still gets played today in Fundies courses, workshops and seminars.

Yeah, I guess the GUE peeps thought I was one of "theirs" as well. We had just finished the dive on the Speigle Grove as part of a GUE seminar back in 0-something down in Miami. I was there as media, but the other media guys were horrid in the water. I was embarrassed for them, but they had no clue. JJ and I crossed paths a couple of times cruising below and afterward, as he and I were talking about how the seminar went, he said something like "you looked good down there." From him, that was high praise, and the next thing I know there's a camera in my face at the dock. I think he might have mentioned the fact that I didn't have a wet suit on as well. When anyone makes a remark online about me thinking that I have excellent trim, I simply remember JJ's remark from almost 20 years ago. Oh hell, he might have just been a case of him being nice, but I didn't get that vibe. This was during the time I was just beginning to realize that you didn't need to kneel in OW class and it encouraged me on that quest. Now I've spent 20 years figuring out the best way to teach to keep my divers off the reef. I believe that teaching them how to be horizontal is the basis of them being in control. Buoyancy becomes far simpler, gas consumption drops, and so on. I don't whip them with my safety sausage if they break horizontal as-long-as they don't floof the bottom.