Vigorous exercise during surface interval?

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No, it’s not safe. Diving has its own exercise demands, and doubling up on exercise is setting you up for bad things.

SeaRat

The bubble/bends concern aside, what defines exercise might be dependent upon an individuals general fitness. For a person who is tri-fit, recreational SCUBA diving would be an activity but it would hardly be exercise for them. Unless you are in panic mode your heart rate is not going to be in the target zone. It does burn calories though as the body has to keep the core temperature up in the water. Walking to the mailbox might be exercise for some but I doubt a triathlete could get much benefit. I guess if the diver were to jump in and start swimming hard for 20 minutes, hard enough to get to the target BPM and sustain, well, that would count, but who does that? And in a quarry? N
 
The bubble/bends concern aside, what defines exercise might be dependent upon an individuals general fitness. For a person who is tri-fit, recreational SCUBA diving would be an activity but it would hardly be exercise for them. Unless you are in panic mode your heart rate is not going to be in the target zone. It does burn calories though as the body has to keep the core temperature up in the water. Walking to the mailbox might be exercise for some but I doubt a triathlete could get much benefit. I guess if the diver were to jump in and start swimming hard for 20 minutes, hard enough to get to the target BPM and sustain, well, that would count, but who does that? And in a quarry? N
I was thinking more about diving after having done rigorous exercise. Some diving is relatively relaxing. But in an emergency, both heart rate and exercise goes dramatically up. If one has exercised to the point where it benefits one for training in a triathlon, things like cramps could complicate the emergency.

SeaRat
 
I am just going to stay with what I said, SCUBA diving is not exercise, at least not for a person who is tri-fit. If anyone really counted SCUBA as exercise then they would have to take the general advice of not exercising after SCUBA diving which would then preclude further SCUBA diving after SCUBA diving! No, SCUBA diving is not exercise. Free diving might be, it is a little bit more athletic, but SCUBA diving I rate as a walk to the mailbox. Exercise and general fitness is good for SCUBA and diving a bunch is great for water comfort and skills development for sure. And doing things that keep a person active and enjoying life is a great benefit of SCUBA diving also.

What kinda cramps, I do not think I ever have gotten stomach cramps after eating or diving and am pretty much dismissive of "cramps" whatever that might be.

I know the OP said "vigorous" and I suggested "easy" instead. And I probably missed it but I still do not know what sort of dive(s) are being undertaken except that they are in a quarry. An easy swim in the quarry might be good since most triathlons are done in lakes, rivers, oceans, the bottom of the pool has stripes, it could be a good lesson in holding a straight line if nothing else.

I agree, there is some danger (of bends) possible with exercise after SCUBA diving and I have read much on it and I, just for myself, intend to continue my easy swims after diving when the opportunity presents. What others do will have to be upon them.

James
 
@Nemrod, although I agree with you in the sense that fitness level should be taken into account, bear in mind that decompression is something not necessarily related to that. So one can be super fit but still get bent if diving after too much exercise.

I personally wouldn't worry too much for a very shallow dive (<10m, <2h), except if the effort is massive. For anything else, I would carefully consider both the type of diving and the type of training.
 
Raced tri's for 10 years. 2 Ironman finishes. If your training schedule is not consistant, one more day will not make a difference. If it is good, one day missed will not matter as well. Plan you dive days as your "rest" days that should be in your schedule.
 

Hello,

Actually, no disrespect to Neal who is an old friend, extremely knowledgeable in the area, and trying to provide easy non-nuanced rules of thumb, I think your advice is more reflective of the current state of the literature. I am not sure when Neal wrote his DAN article, but there are three later human studies [1-3] in which aerobic exercise much closer to the dive (one [ref 3] and two hours prior [refs 1,2]) than the one he quotes (24 hours prior) [4] was also associated with significant reductions in post dive bubble formation. In case there is any confusion, the two Blatteau studies look very similar, but the write up for the second one [ref 2] suggests that they are separate experiments.

None of this is hard proof of anything with respect to DCS prevention, but there is strong evidence that pre-dive exercise quite close to diving reduces bubble formation. In respect of the OPs original question I would not consider it unwise to run in the morning, followed by a three hour drive to a dive site during which time he could rehydrate and then dive. I do agree that ridiculous amounts of exercise followed by diving are probably unwise on the basis of fatigue, but the general plan articulated by the OP is not unreasonable. Obviously there are never any guarantees, no matter what the circumstances in diving that DCS will not occur.

Everybody has commented accurately on the likelihood that exercise after diving increases risk. I would not recommend that. Interestingly, (and for balance) there is one human study that showed a reduction in bubbling during vigorous cycling early after a dive. [5] However, cycling is non-weight bearing exercise and things might be quite different with exercise like running, or especially exercise that involves lifting or straining and that might promote right to left shunting across a PFO when there are venous bubbles present in the right heart.

Simon M

1. Blatteau J-E et al. Aerobic exercise 2 hours before a dive to 30 msw decreases bubble formation after decompression. Aviat Space Environ Med. 2005;76:666-9.
2. Blatteau J-E et al. Haemodynamic changes induced by submaximal exercise before a dive and its consequences on bubble formation. Br J Sports Med 2007;41:375-9.
3. Castagna O et al. Endurance exercise immediately before sea diving reduces bubble formation in scuba divers. Eur J Appl Physiol. 2011;111:1047-54.
4. Dujic Z et al. Aerobic exercise before diving reduces venous gas bubble formation in humans. J Physiol. 2004;555:637-42.
5. Dujic Z et al. Venous bubble count declines during strenuous exercise after an open sea dive to 30m. Aviat Space Environ Med. 2006;77:592-6.
 
I’ve often wondered how dive professionals keep in shape, guess they have to work out very early before the customers show up.
 
After reading the title I thought this thread was going to be about having sex when off gassing from group K to group B on the dive tables...
 
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