OP
And yes, you CAN do frog in splits. Not ideal, but it's possible.
My journey into tech
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KevinNM
Contributor
But can you backkick in splits?
Congratulations. Who said weight loss was cheap, especially for divers. Smaller drysuit, smaller BC.
If your plan is to go tech, I would suggest the TDI SM course. The skills are geared toward tech and should include some stage/deco bottle handling. You'll be that much ahead of the game when it comes to your full tech courses.
OP
Needing a smaller BC isn't an issue if you dive a BP/W. Simply adjust the webbing as needed. Luckily my wetsuits (3/5/7) will fit me a good while yet.
I'm doing things slowly in a very deliberate order. SDI SM, with a full season of diving SM at the quarry (2018). Then TDI SM (2019), and AN/DP the following year (2020). Getting very familiar with SM before I start anything tech related (including stage bottle handling) is the goal for doing it this way.
OP
Yes and No.
A couple of years ago I was assigned a scuba refresher class for a father and son (mid teens). As we geared up, I took one look at the son's fins and said they were not his. They were Atomic split fins, size XL, and he was an average size mid teen boy. He insisted they were his, although he had not used them in the year since they had dived last. I told him that whenever he had done that dive, he had left with someone else's fins, and we confirmed it when he put them on. They were hopelessly too big.
I had him try on my fins (Size L), and he could wear them, although they were a bit big. I wore those giant Atomics, which were too big for me. They had spring straps that barely touched my heels.
Bak kicking is a big part of my normal instructional technique in the pool, and I did give it a try, even though I had to keep putting the spring straps back into place. There are two techniques for back finning, one that uses the sidewall as the propellant surface and one that uses the fin face. The Atomic fins had no real sidewall, so I had to use the technique using the face of the fin. Incredibly, I had no trouble whatsoever. I actually did extremely well--as well as I would have in my blade fins.
A few days later, I tried to teach back kicking to someone who was wearing different split fins, and it was hopeless. I saw in a matter of seconds that it could not be done.
The difference was the stiffness of the fin. The huge Atomics that I had used were very stiff, almost as stiff as a tech-styled blade fin. The fins the other student had used were soft and floppy, and they could not be manipulated the way you need to manipulate a fin for the back kick because they were flopping all over the place.
So, I prefer to use a back kick technique that relies on a good sidewall. If I have that, I can back kick with whatever is in between. If there is no good sidewall but the fin is stiff, I can still do it, although not as well. Give me a floppy blade fin, and I can do it, but it will be slow as Hell. Give me a floppy split fin, and I won't even try.
OP
I have Atomic splits. So maybe I actually will be able to back kick in them. 
OP
Oh, for heaven's sake, haven't you ever wanted to try something just for the attempt?
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