Weights – Page 2 – Learn to Dive Today Blog

Scuba diving and fitness

A recent article from Shape magazine that has been breathlessly circulating in some of the scuba news circles I follow claims that scuba diving is the “new celebrity fitness trend” that “burns tons of calories while tightening and toning your body”. The rest of the article is a thinly-disguised marketing advertorial for PADI, but we’ll overlook that in favour of its ostensible main point: scuba diving will make you fit (and as hot as a Hollywood star).

I’m not a fitness expert by any stretch of the imagination, but I dive quite a lot (a few dives every weekend, weather permitting) and Tony dives even more (a few dives every day, weather permitting). I’d like to make the following observations:

One of the things I love about diving is that it can be done by people of almost any body shape and level of physical ability, provided you’re able to help yourself, put together and carry your kit to the water, and display a certain level of watermanship and stamina. As long as this base level of strength and fitness is there and you have none of the medical conditions that are incompatible with diving, nothing precludes you from being a scuba diver. The very regular scuba divers I know – those of whom it could be said that diving is their primary form of exercise – are by no means a uniformly lean and toned group of individuals. Clearly I’m missing something.
Diving – the underwater part, at least – is actually mostly about expending as little energy as possible. If you’re using your arms or kicking frantically, YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG! The whole idea is not to get out of breath or to elevate your heart rate (leading to panic). This doesn’t sound like fat-burning exercise to me.
Your body does expend energy keeping you warm on a dive – specially in the Atlantic in a wetsuit! The toasted sandwich, chocolate bar, bag of nuts or hot chocolate you consume after the dive, however, replaces all the calories you just burned, plus some. If being cold assisted with weight loss and made you fit, there’d be fewer treadmills and more industrial-sized refrigerators at your local Virgin Active.

Tony and I both had almost a month off diving in January, because he’d had surgery. He returned to work at the end of January, doing three shore dives that weekend. Afterwards, we were both quite stiff and more tired than we usually are after diving, because clearly regular diving does involve some level of conditioning. But what sort of exercise had we experienced? Could two and a half hours underwater really make our muscles feel this way?

The key, however, was that our muscles were stiff. One of the dives was at Sandy Cove, involving a bit of mountaineering. The other two were at Long Beach, and all three were with students. In each case, twelve cylinders and six boxes of dive gear had to be unpacked out of Tony’s divemobile, and at the end of the day packed away again (Tony insists on doing this – he has a “system” and I get in the way!). We had to lift our kit onto our backs, walk to the water, and – in my case – wrestle with a fellow diver’s new BCD and ill-fitting weight belt for 20 minutes while standing in thigh deep water in full kit. After the dive we had to return the way we came. All the exertion took place before and after the dives – the time underwater was extremely slow and relaxing.

If you’re going to get any conditioning from your scuba diving, I think it’ll primarily be in toting 20-30 kilograms of gear around on your back and around your waist, before and after you get in the water. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that diving will fulfill all your exercise requirements unless you’re actually working (e.g. as a commercial diver, a very active archaeologist or a fast-swimming map maker) underwater.

If, like me, you’re a weekend diver, rather than relying on diving to get you fit, it’s your responsibility to make sure that you are fit to dive. Keeping yourself fit to dive would involve doing other forms of exercise during the week to improve your strength and cardiovascular fitness. I’m not saying you won’t get some physical benefit from scuba diving, but it won’t make you look like Jessica Alba or Matthew McConaughey unless it’s your full time job (and even then, perhaps not!).

Accidental underwater photos

In a previous post I revealed that my camera sometimes has a mind of its own. My camera also occasionally takes pictures of its own while I’m underwater. In the background of this next photo you can see some juvenile maasbanker, swarming around me and Tony.

Accidental underwater photo at Long Beach

In the photo above, that’s the end of my weight belt intruding on the right, and my leg (I think) on the left. In the photo below, it’s one of the chest straps of my BCD that has seized the moment for fame.

Sometimes the underwater results are a bit vertiginous, like this shot of the sand (with my camera lanyard intruding on the right).

In general, however, I find the above-water accidental photos far more interesting. More to follow…

Handy hints: Transporting dive gear on a scooter

Perhaps you’ve wondered how you’re going to make it along the coastal road from Simon’s Town after a dive, with a bag full of dive gear. You’re worried that a strong gust of wind might catch your enormous dive bag and overbalance your bike. What’s more, maybe you have a passenger who also has a large bag of gear. What to do? Stay at home?

Fear not! Help is at hand, courtesy of Andrew and Oliver. Their solution is as follows:

wear your wetsuit, booties, weight belt and BCD
stow your regulators and masks under the seat of your bike
get the passenger to hold both pairs of fins
don’t forget the helmets!

I’m afraid if you have cylinders too, we can’t help you. A bigger bike might be required…

Dive gear maintenance: BCDs

Dive gear is expensive but looked after correctly it will give you many years of service. You are reliant on this equipment at depth and ensuring it is always in excellent condition means you never need to fear an equipment failure will spoil your dive.

BCD

When you buy a BCD make sure it is the right size. Too often a salesperson will tell you if it is a bit loose over your T-shirt it’s okay as a wetsuit is thicker… Don’t fall for that, your 7 millimetre wetsuit is not much thicker than 2 millimetres at 40 metres and an ill-fitting BCD at depth is not pleasant. The other important factor is that you may end up diving in the tropics, half naked, and a snug BCD is important.

Make sure you have tried a rental rear inflation as well as a side inflation before you buy. If you don’t know the difference, try it before you buy it. Side inflation BCDs with pockets are popular with training schools (instructors can pop weights in students’ pockets if they are too buoyant). It is a rugged style of BCD and it’s cheaper than most integrated weight BCDs.

Another important factor is the weight. If you will travel often with your gear consider a lightweight travel BCD as some BCD’s can weigh as much as 3-4 kilograms.

Cleaning

Rinse your BCD in the bath in warm water. Very often you will find there is water inside the bladder of your BCD. This happens when you hold the deflate button long after it is empty on your descent. Fill the bladder with a few liters of warm water by holding the BCD down in the bath and holding the deflate button. Then give it a good shake to swirl the water around and dissolve salt crystals (warm water dissolves salt quicker than cold water).

Invert the BCD and allow at least half of the water to run out by depressing the inflate button. This ensures the small valve and tiny opening on the inflation side is flushed. (Do this often and you will never have a sticky inflator.)

Drain the last water by depressing the deflate button, then orally inflate the BCD, drain it again, inflate it again and hang it up to dry, in the shade. Clip all the clips – a closed clip is less likely to break. Extend the straps so they are not folded over in the same spot constantly.

Dive sites: Blue Rock Quarry

We have had a lot of lousy weather lately resulting in the boat diving being cancelled almost every week since the beginning of the year. With a Deep Specialty in progress this has been a huge setback. With the prospects of a deep boat dive diminishing we decided to do a deep dive in the quarry.

Blue Rock Quarry is situated just outside of Somerset West and is so named for the blue rock harvested there years ago. When it fell into disuse, it was filled up with water and now plays host to a range of watersports and recreational activities.

We chose a spot that had a depth of close to 50 metres as we were looking for a maximum depth of 40 metres. The water looks clean and inviting from the surface and in fact the visibility is very good despite the total darkness that surrounds you from around 30 metres.

Cecil, Clare and I entered the water here, where a line goes down the wall to a ledge at about 25 metres. The water is clear providing you do not rub a fin, finger or bubble on the walls as this results in a cascade of silt and fine rock rubble which takes a fair amount of time to clear.

We had planned to stop at 20 and again at 30 metres on the way down but due to the poor visiblity we stopped a few more times just for me to make sure Clare and Cecil were still above me on the line.

At 30 metres we encountered a tree. The branches sticking out in all directions are a huge hazard in low visibility as entanglement is a real possibility. We moved away from the tree and picked up another cable that I reckon runs down to nearly 50 metres.

At 34 metres the water was very dark, and visibility was reduced to almost zero due to the silt dislodged by us on the cable. I stopped at 34 metres and shone my light down; directly below me was another tree.

We could move away from the line and descend further or turn the dive here. We did the skills required for the dive at this depth and started our ascent. Ascending was slow and deliberate, with planned stops at 20, 10 and 5 metres.

We did not see any life except for one small freshwater crab spotted by Clare. You don’t do this dive to sightsee!

Things to remember for a fresh water dive: weighting is critical, and you must remove weight for this dive. A good dive light, a back-up and cyalumes or strobes are also required plus a detailed dive plan. The quarry is also used for wake boarding and cable water skiing and a circular raised cable drags the skiiers around the perimeter so an ascent off the line is out of the question.

Dive date: 26 March 2011

Air temperature: 25 degrees

Water temperature: 12 degrees (much warmer on the surface, over 20 degrees)

Maximum depth: 34.4 metres (33.6 metres according to the dive computer, adjusted by 2.5% for fresh water)

Visibility: 4 metres

Dive duration: 23 minutes

As a facility for training the quarry is an option but having dived many quarries in my life I would much rather choose an angry dirty ocean to a quarry.

Octopus do not eat sweets

I am one of those people that believe interaction with marine creatures can be entertaining, educational and an amazing experience. Hurting, harming or gross interference on the other hand is not acceptable and there is a constant debate on the “touch or don’t touch” topic. I often spend several hours a day submerged in a world filled with the most amazing creatures and often find interaction with them irresistible.

A few weeks back, whilst conducting a peak performance buoyancy dive, my student had removed a few weights from the BCD pockets and placed them on the sand. At the time we were close to an octopus home and I watched with amazement as the octopus and several klipfish become interested in the different colours of the weights.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFMOo5BTxGY&w=540]

I decided to go back when I had time and on Tuesday, after the student dives were over, I went to visit this octopus armed with my camera and some brightly coloured sweets. I set the camera up close to the octopus, hit the “record” button and dropped a few sweets near his home.

I spent 30 minutes there mesmerised by the behavior of the octopus, klipfish and barehead gobies. From this video clip I can say with certainty, octopus don’t eat sweets… They taste them and then spit them out. You can be sure I will be back there soon with something more palatable to an octopus!

Diving with a buddy

During your Open Water course you are conditioned to dive with a buddy, and a part of the training is doing a buddy check. There are many benefits to a buddy check, but a quick once over of your buddy who does the same to you is not enough. A decent buddy check covering all of the elements of BWARF ensures you and your buddy are ready, have air, have no dangly bits and have all the required items (a mask is not part of a check but try and dive without one and see how little you see).

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yo_XsP1PbDs&w=540]

You both have octos. It’s important to test yours, but equally important is that you test your buddy’s – after all there is a good chance it’s you that will need it in an emergency. Equally important is that you know where everything is on your buddy’s gear. It is unlikely that everyone knows just how to ditch their buddy’s weights if they have an integrated weight system.

Often you will be allocated a buddy on the boat, on the way to the dive site, and you have no idea what kind of gear they are using or even what it looks like. Try and make sure you buddy is next to you on the boat. Once in the water find them on the surface first, and descend together; looking for a total stranger at depth can be a little difficult.

Agree beforehand what the plan is when the first one of you reach the stipulated low on air pressure. Decide who is going to lead, discuss who will navigate, what your dive time will be, your dive profile and so on.

Few people realise just how enjoyable diving is when you have the same buddy dive after dive. Clare and I have done close to 100 dives together and we are so set in our ways that we know exactly what the other is thinking , planning and how each of us will react in a given set of circumstances. For example, when we found a horsefish at Long Beach, I displayed an animated action of a horse being ridden. Clare understood what I was doing but the other six divers in our group thought I was a lunatic.

Know your buddy, plan your dive and dive your plan.

What it takes to be a Divemaster

Many divers dream of becoming a Divemaster or a Open Water scuba instructor. In reality it is a “dream job” as it is made up of 99% good stuff and only 1% of the bad. (More on this shortly.)

Sadly not everyone can be a Divemaster. Not because its difficult (it’s not – learning to be a Divemaster is easy and fun with the right mindset, and we can all learn something new if we want it) but something else needs to be there first, an intangible skill or demeanour for want of a better word.

There are lots of good Divemasters, people who scored 90% plus on all the exams, scored highly on their skill sets and have the right gear and proper diving habits. But there are fewer really exceptional Divemasters, who performed as well as the rest while in training but have that elusive ability to be exceptional Divemasters. These are people who you would be happy to trust in any situation. It is only in an emergency situation that this ability in a person shines through.

You need to be calm and authoritative to be a Divemaster

Being exceptionally good in the water is not all that is required. An active Divemaster will know the dive site, have exceptional buoyancy, keep divers together and ensure you all see the hidden beauty of the dive site. But will they cope when two people run out of air at the same time, or when half the group gets lost, or two people panic when their masks flood (90% of regular divers have not removed their masks since their Open Water course)? Will they make the right decision if the conditions are unsafe, or will they dive anyway because they need the money? What will they do if you see a shark and some of the group panic and some just freeze?

There is a lot more to being a Divemaster than completing the course. It is only once you have done the course and started working as a Divemaster that you start to learn, and only the right people stick it out. You need to have the ability to feel ”that was a good dive” despite a dive where things happen like an O ring pops on the boat, a regulator free flows, a diver loses a weight belt, someone gets lost , someone runs out of air and yanks your regulator out your mouth dislodging your teeth, the visiblity is lousy and the water is cold, the boat leaks and the weather sucks… Is this you? Yes? Then become a Divemaster and it will change your life… Diving is a way of life.

Thoughts on correct weighting

Most divers are overweighed, partly from the fact that their benchmark is the amount of weight they used when doing their Open Water course and more often due to their decision to add more weight after having a dive where they struggled to descend.

We are not all the same and different tissues have a different specific gravity, fatty tissues less than 1 and muscle and bone around 1.8-1.9 therefore not all 80 kg divers will wear the same weight.

Wetsuits, boots, gloves, mask volume, hoodies all have different buoyancy characteristics just as changing from a 10 litre cylinder to a 12 litre cylinder will also affect your buoyancy. As your comfort level in the ocean increases your breathing rate improves, your control over the inflator button improves (i.e. small bursts). All these factors contribute to achieving the real weight you require.

Tank weights are often used to ensure a diver is ”heavy” saving the instructor or divemaster the hassle of a buoyant diver floating on the surface whilst the rest of his divers are descending to unknown depths. Tank weights are promoted as being the reason a diver is balanced. Ankle weights are also often added to girls’ ankles as they are ”too light”. A huge factor in this is the material used in their fins: some cheap fins float like corks. I don’t like tank weights because if you are at 25 metres and run out of air you will be unable to ditch all your weights. A well trained diver will not be over weighted, will not run out of air at 25 metrees or have any other mishap… However correct weighting, proper training and a competent diver in the correct gear all go hand in hand. Mess with just one of these aspects and mishaps do happen.

Correct weighting is essential for comfort underwater

If you think you are correctly weighted, lie in 5 metres of water, take your weight belt off and hold it in your lap. Slowly remove one weight at a time: you will be surprised at how little weight you need to stay at the bottom. Another option is to place your weight belt on the bottom, hold it tightly and move your arms up and down the length of your body until you are perfectly horizontal. If you find you need all your weight on your chest..then look at a BC with integrated weight pockets. Moving your cylinder up and down in your BC strap also helps find the perfect balance. Remember adding a shorty wetsuit and a rash vest to keep you warm add to the buoyancy of your chest area. A hoodie that fills with air also affects your profile.

I love my BCD

I bought a SEAC Sub Muse (click on the British flag at the top right to change the language to English) at Andre’s shop in Simon’s Town earlier this year. I’m coming up for my 50th dive in it, and every time I wear it I am reminded of how much I love using it.

It has integrated zippered weight pockets, and I take full advantage of the opportunity that presents for fine-tuning my weight… From a shallow dive at Long Beach, to a deep dive, I can make quick adjustments during the course of a day. Having a spare weight pocket in my dive bag is a necessity – I have not lost one yet, but it’s possible that I could drop one when handing the weight pockets up onto the boat one day. The pockets click in and out quite easily, and it is very easy to feel when you’ve got the pocket seated properly.

The BCD comes standard with a whistle (black – not so easy to spot!) attached to the inflator hose, and a large pocket that actually expands at the pull of a tab to hang almost down to your knee, should you wish it to. It’s not very easy to put big things into the pocket when the weight pockets are full, but it’s perfect for an SMB, a slate and a knife, as well as any golf balls that you may collect during a dive. The pocket is not easy to see once the BCD is on (can’t twist your body much, because the weight pockets are quite rigid), so I had to practice finding the zip and opening it sight unseen. Gloves make everything harder!

Kitting up in Sodwana - me on the left, Tony on the right, Tami behind him

I don’t use the inflator hose to let air out of the BCD. I am not even sure if it works for deflation, to be honest! From day one I have been using the dump valve on the right shoulder – I just make sure that the little string is lying on top of all my clips and hoses so that I can reach it without looking down. I can also reach the dump valve near my bottom, but I don’t tend to use that on myself (only on others, when I think they need a hand adjusting their buoyancy… super annoying, I bet!).

This is a rear inflation BCD… I learned to dive using surround inflation, and found it very unpleasant. I don’t like the feeling of being squeezed, specially when I am already feeling a little out of breath or nervous. I don’t wear so much weight that the rear inflation causes me to tip face-down on the surface, and I am able to swim either on my back or face in the water quite comfortably.

Kitted up and ready to go on a night dive

Taking it off and putting it on is straightforward provided I loosen the vertical arm straps fully. This is easy – there are very large plastic rings to grip onto. It’s fully adjustable (I find that I am quite different dimensions depending on whether I am wearing one or two layers of neoprene, and depending on the rate of recent custard consumption). There is a lot of space for octo, camera and other clips, so my gear never needs to drag on the sea floor.

Finally, it has cute pink and purple SEAC Sub lettering on the pocket that’s girly without making me feel like a total naff. I love my BCD!