03/09/13 Peak Performance Buoyancy
Today is PPB or Peak
Performance Buoyancy dive. The second
dive of the expedition was one I was looking forward to as I was keen to
improve mine. Essentially I am a holiday
diver. The waters around the UK are too
cold for me (and I do not do cold very well). So I needed the practice.
The idea is to test
(and improve) our buoyancy control which would then deliver benefits when we
are hovering above coral and counting fish.
I hoped by the end of the expedition I will have automatic buoyancy, but
for now I will have to see how things go.
All the initial dives
take place in the shallow bay in about 6m of water. It started with a controlled hover in mid-water
and then we descended to the bottom.
There we all were on
the bottom in a semi-circle on our knees, as if paying homage to the
‘leader-deities’, of Brodie and Lee. For
them it must have been like trying to keep tabs on a group of small children in
a sweetshop. While you look at one the
others are getting into mischief. I bet
they often wish they had five sets of eyes and arms as we no doubt kept them
their toes.
I don’t know about the
others but I always seem to be kneeling quite comfortably until it was my turn
and then I would be caught off balance with a swell or unsettled by a surge, and
with all eyes on me I ended up floundering around like a paper bag in a
breeze. Everyone else seemed to be doing
so much better.
In my mind the hardest
exercise was to do an inverted hover, which basically meant you had to hover upside
down. It was really funny. As soon as you assumed the position the
current seemed to take hold and the poor leaders were like a couple of border
collies with a herd of wilful sheep as they chivvied and chased escaping
volunteers as they floated away with the current.
The whole scene
reminded me of a helium balloon vendor, who as soon as he released a balloon it
just wandered off into the distance. I
even lost sight of my dive buddy who disappeared into the by now cloudy water,
but as she was being chaperoned by Lee, I presumed all would be ok. Safely back
in the boat and with a newfound confidence my thoughts moved towards the next
dive.
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