| If you were to ask Mike Kane and others you may be told that you don't need to be prepared, after all its fundamentals and they would rather teach you from the start rather than you have to unlearn poorly practised skills.
Well I have to disagree with this, fundamentals is pretty intense, your taught to work as a three man team from the get go and if your bouyancy control, trim or awareness skills are lacking in anyway you're going to have a tough time.
My personal thoughts are that if you're comfortable in the water, comfortable with your equipment, happy with controlled ascents/descents etc then you'll take a lot more from the class then if you're struggling or overwhelmed by whats going on.
Don't get me wrong Porg, I'm not trying to scare you, this isn't Tech 1 and the instructor (No doubt Mr Walker in this instant) takes account of that, so errors are expected, failure to achieve tasks in the water is expected, but what I am saying is that you'll have a better chance of success if you are, to a certain extent, prepared.
I agree with the comment of getting in with some GUE divers, that way you shouldn't be practising anything incorrectly and you'll have a better chance of feeling more relaxed when it comes time to do it all for real in the class.
I'll go practise with you anytime you want mate, just gimme a shout and we'll get it on.
Don't worry about fundy, as Andy say's you'd have to be a proper gimp to fail completely, but you may get a provisional pass which just means go away and practise XY or Z and then we'll have an evaluation dive later on to pass you.  |