Practicing Skills

[H2Andy]

Skills dives are some of the most exillerating dives for me... unfortunatley I rarely find another diver who agrees.

well, any dive can be a skill dive ... for example, i practice all kicks on most dives
(including the dreaded backward kick, which doesn't make me look so spastic anymore).

i also practice center of gravity drills pretty much on every dive, as well as valve drills

i am lucky that my buddies are cave-trained, so we do s-drills on every dive.

of course, every ascent is a bouyancy excercise ... slow up, minute stops, slow up, and so on ... always working on trim and posture (throughout the dive, really)

about the only thing i don't do enough is lift bag drills, and i am determined to start doing those more often

so basically, i just try to incorporate the skills INTO the dive, so that there's no difference bewteen a "training" dive and a regular dive

 

[jeckyll]

UP: I'm not going into it to pass I'm sure that will change, but I'm trying to go into it purely to learn. We'll see how it turns out.

SeanQ: I don't think so. It's mostly instructors / DM's from the shop. I can check tomorrow, but I think we've got 2 teams of 3. If not I'll drop you a PM

Kidspot: Maybe you need to come up here and dive with Artino and I. I warn you though, you'll need loads of underwear with that nexgen

 

[TSandM]

You know, it's one of the hardest lessons to learn, I think, when to ask for help.

We all want to be self-sufficient. We read threads here that say that team thinking is weak, and that every diver should be self-sufficient. And you know what? I agree -- Every diver should be self-sufficient. If you can't solve your own problems, you are a weak spot on a team.

But solving your own problems may not be the team's best answer. It make take you more time. It may take you more gas. It may take your attention away from your team and your purpose. You may have a problem that is easily solved by your team members, but is a struggle for you. Or it may just be the best thing that your team KNOW you are working on something, and not 100% present.

None of us wants to be the weak link. None of us wants to be perceived as the weak link. None of us wants to inconvenience anyone else. None of us wants to cry wolf.

But a team is a team. When we go into the water together, we have a contract -- Each of us will do the best he can, for himself, and for the others. Something simple . . . My light cord's fouled. I'm futzing with it, and eventually I'll get it free. But my teammate can SEE what the problem is, and he can solve it faster, and get us all going on the dive we went down to do faster than I can. Is it self-sufficiency that keeps me fighting with it, or just pure pride? Do I aid the team in struggling alone, or do I impede it?

I adore and respect and trust the people I dive with. I am slowly learning to eschew pride and let them help, whether it's a fouled light cord or my balance issues getting out of the water. What we all get in the water for is a good dive . . . We want to go somewhere and see something and at the end, have accomplished the goals we had when we geared up. There's a give and take in the process. Each of us is stronger in something and weaker in something else. I can help a teammate with gas management calculations on shore; he can help me when I get disoriented in midwater on a night ascent.

But nobody can help me with anything unless they understand what the problem IS. The FIRST thing I should do with a problem is communicate it. If I solve it alone, that's great. It's done and we go on. If I let the team know what the problem is, and somebody else moves in and solves it for me before I can get it done, that's great. It's done, and we go on. If I don't tell anybody what the problem is, and we stop and dilly-dally while I try, and we waste time and gas, and we aren't doing what we went there to do, that isn't to anybody's advantage. And if there is a serious problem, and somebody gets hurt because nobody knew what to do to help, not only am I injured, but my teammates are injured, because they contracted with me to be there when we dove, and I didn't let them in.

It has been, and most likely will continue to be, a hard lesson for me to ask for help, or to accept it. But it is a huge part of diving as a team.

This is a little off UP's topic, but germane to other things that have come up in the thread. Practicing skills together gives you greatly increased faith in the ability of your buddies to come to your aid, and to be able to hear you when you speak underwater. The other night, my buddy knew I was cold before I said a word to anybody, because he knows me, and he knew the pattern of the dive, and he watched my body language at a familiar site. That kind of familiarity and, frankly, that kind of care comes from working together and building partnership over time. But it begins with the willingness to be human -- to admit error or issues and to accept assistance.

 

[Uncle Pug]

This is a little off UP's topic

Actually I think that it is right in line with this thread's topic. Your post is an excellent addition.

Practice in the context I had hoped to present it is more than just finning skills and OOA drills. For me, anyway, one of the most important skills is *buddy skills* or as some might call it: team diving.

Learning the skill of passive and active communication and team problem resolution is a foundational skill. These skills can be discussed on the internet and an awareness raised but they need to be learned in actual practice and they are forged through failure.

When a problem arises and the team handles it correctly from initial passive communication to active communication on through shared response confidence is built but that is not really where the lesson was learned.

It is when a problem arises and the team breaks down that the table is set for learnin'. If the team is composed of learners then learning will take place as the team discusses what went right and what went wrong... preferably over pizza (sometimes the most important aspects of practice take place out of the water.)

If there are those on the team who are not learners then the team learns something from that too.

 

[dsteding]

Actually I think that it is right in line with this thread's topic. Your post is an excellent addition.

Practice in the context I had hoped to present it is more than just finning skills and OOA drills. For me, anyway, one of the most important skills is *buddy skills* or as some might call it: team diving.

An interesting part of all of this is I find (in my very limited experience) that people who put an emphasis on team diving are easier to dive with. For instance, in Sechelt, I dived with a guy I'd never been underwater with before. We did our first and last dives of the trip together, the first was on a wall and ended with us working together to shoot a large bag. The last dive was one of the most relaxing, comfortable dives I've ever had. An hour long on this pinnacle with AMAZING visibility. We were working well together, communicating well, staying in view, and generally in sync with each other. So, I don't think people have to dive together a lot to be a good team, rather, the individuals need to work on team skills, and a new team needs to spend the time to make sure they are all on the same page before the dive.

Certainly, things are easier with regular team members that you practice with, but it is possible to form a good team of divers that have little experience together. To me that just means the individual has taken the time to build their own skills to get to the point where they bring enough to the table to make that happen.

preferably over pizza (sometimes the most important aspects of practice take place out of the water.)

Mmmmm, pizza.

 

[SparticleBrane]

Mmmmm, pizza.

I couldn't resist...

 

[dsteding]

I couldn't resist...

 

[Uncle Pug]

Doug... check your PMs.

 

[SparticleBrane]

Don't practice your skills with Homer...you'd probably die a horrible death.
edit: ...and he'd eat all the pizza, too.

 

[ArcticDiver]

ArcticDiver: I appreciate where you are coming from, but if someone I don't dive with regularly started 'helping' when I'm not ready to have them do so, I would at a minimum be displeased. At worst they'd make the situation first.

I think one thing that you can do is to discuss at the beginning of the dive how to signal. And I think you can be somewhat generic. I.E. this is what I'll do if I have an equipment problem. This is how I'll signal you you have a problem. etc.

I find for most new dive buddies I'm happy if they are close enough that they'd be able to provide air in an emergency and follow the dive plan we agreed on.
If on top of that they have good buoyancy skills, monitor not just their own air but also mine and are willing to practice an air share at the beginning of the dive, I'm downright impressed
But even with all that, I still think it takes time to work out how to dive well with someone, though I'd love to hear tips about how to shortcut that process

We finally got a few inches of snow. It is welcome but now I need to shovel the both driveways. So, I probably won't get to finish reading all the posts to this thread. But, yours deserves further amplification.

First, in a prior post I did, indeed, say that one of the most important things a person can do is get the problem/emergency signals straight before going in the water. I gave an example.

Don't build the incident up too much. This was an extremely minor incident that is being used to help explain a point. The two people I was diving with were very experienced and used to diving with each other. They wanted to keep the dive shallow and easy because they didn't know me. I wanted to keep the dive shallow and easy because I didn't know them. Plus, I was doing some gear experiments and having a shallow hard bottom makes that much safer.

So, this discussion is more about perfecting skills and procedures than it is about any real danger in the example incident. Although, as a traveling solo diver I have been deserted in the past I wasn't deserted in this case. We just didn't function as smoothly as a team as we might have.

There is a term from my past called "Crew Integrity". It means that everyone doing the task is fully trained and that communication and mutual understanding are clear and almost instinctive. This is obtained one of two ways. Either the people work together so frequently they truely understand each other. Or, there are common comprehensive checklists that allow people who are trained but strangers to work safely together. Think aircrews or military style small unit tactics.

As applied to diving that means that each of us must be proficient in our skills. Since there are no hobby wide checklists it also means that we can take nothing for granted when we dive with a new, to us, person. The person can be a fish in their skills but their mindset that has grown out of their experience can be substantially different than ours.

So, as I said before we need to put more emphasis on pre-dive briefing to include "I want some help" and "I'm here to help if you want it" signals. I know I will in the future.