How to Improve Air Consumption going live. Hope some find it useful:
Video: How to Improve Air Consumption
- Thread starter jagfish
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Good points
Rickk
Contributor
The metric that you measure and track will be the one that will improve.
I found that really works is to calculate my SAC after every dive. If I am higher than usual I look at the reasons, stronger current or some other factor on my dive that contributed to the increased consumption, conversely when I have a low consumption, I look at what went right. My average consumption is not about 20% lower than when I started religiously tracking it.
I found that really works is to calculate my SAC after every dive. If I am higher than usual I look at the reasons, stronger current or some other factor on my dive that contributed to the increased consumption, conversely when I have a low consumption, I look at what went right. My average consumption is not about 20% lower than when I started religiously tracking it.
OP
Totally agreed on your point.
However, one of the most boring dives I've had was one where I was having an air consumption "competition" with my DM in the Philippines. I saw so many cool creatures I wanted to go over and have a closer look at, but refrained cuz I knew it would use air to move off my line. I had my lowest measured AC on that dive (about 10L/min), but I learned the lesson that it's often best to just aim for good practices and not stress the air use.
Rickk
Contributor
I don't stress the air usage. If I have a reason to be higher than normal I will take that into account.
So if I do a nice drift dive where there is not much to see other than just watch the scenery as you float past, and the boat moves to pick you up, I have one set of targets. I want to be 9 or under that. Where I do a shore dive and have to swim against the current and drift back, I want to be in the 10s in a light current, if it is a strong current day I will be happy even if I go to the 12s. My first trip to 40 m I was at 18 but was feeling very anxious due to being narced, so I was not o9verly concerned. On subsequent deep dives I was much more relaxed and my consumption dropped back to the normal range considering conditions.
If I go back to diving cold water then I will establish a different set of targets. It is not to get the absolute best air consumption, it is to get the best air consumption considering the dive profile, conditions, my state of health, how much coffee I drank that morning etc.
I do like the idea though of seeing what I could do as an absolute lowest air consumption. Splash, drop to a nice sandy bottom, stick my lobster tickler in the sand and just stay there until I got to 100 bar or so.. Boring dive but I bet I could break 8 or even lower. ( I have done 8.1 as absolute lowest where I just drifted.)
alilawati83
New
Hey guys, just want to share my experience about my SAC rate in the middle east. My average is around 11.6 L/mnt , having in mind water temperatures in my country (Oman) are between 29-30 C nowadays and could drop to 19 C in cooler days (which definitely plays alot in having a better SAC rate. However, I have been reading alot about the link between obesity and SAC rates and all I got was that obese diver will by far have higher SAC rates than the fit ones (every article I have read concludes that) but in my situation I am still keeping up with the fit healthy divers when its about air consumption, although my weight is 130 KGs. Any valid explanation to that?! Having in mind that I never refrain my self from breathing neither I have symptoms of hypoxemia after any dive. Can all these articles be wrong , I bet they cant!
OP
I've thought about this a lot, as I gain weight
Some musings...
Biologically, it makes sense to me that more oxygen efficient folks would have a better SAC rate potential, all other factors being equal; relaxation, propulsion, etc. However, I've also anecdotally observed that some very fit people who also seem to have large lung capacity might be heavier air users than otherwise might be predicted. I speculated that this might result from filling the large lung capacity resulting in "wasted" air that is not absorbed/metabolized. It might also be that they like to be more "cardio" underwater.
I've also anecdotally noticed that many divers with low SAC are what I would consider heavy. I've also noticed in my swim training that skilled long-distance swimmers can often be heavy. None of this is statistical, but I've come to wonder that if there is not a great deal of heavy activity (underwater cardio) going on like fighting currents/heavy entries-exits, I'd imagine that being heavy might not be a net minus as much as it would be on land. Granted, there would be increased resistance to propulsion, but the less distance covered and lower the speed, the less of a disadvantage being heavy/big would be?
I speculate that being heavy in diving is less of a SAC disadvantage in relatively sedentary dives/entries, and overall possibly less disadvantageous than terrestrial movement due to relative lack of gravity.
That said, I'll never approach the microscopic SAC of a 70 lb, experienced female diver here in Japan
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