View Full Version : forward roll
welshbuddy
03-09-2010, 19:12
can anyone give me any hints on how to do a forward roll entry into open water? all I seem to be able to manage is a belly flop!
Ed Howarth
03-09-2010, 19:23
can anyone give me any hints on how to do a forward roll entry into open water? all I seem to be able to manage is a belly flop!
Hold your mask and reg as you would normally with one hand, but put your other hand behind your knees, in fact push really hard so that it's your forearm, or even elbow, that goes behind your knees. You'll notice that to do this, you have to crouch down, legs bent, and rolled into a ball, putting your face almost into your chest. Try it in the privacy of your home without gear on.
It then takes a slight lean forward on the balls of your feet and you are in, hitting the water with your cylinder. You actually don't need to do anything at all as you roll in, just wait for the buoyancy in your BC to bring you to the surface. (You did remember to inflate it, right?). Don't try and copy the clever dicks who stand upright and spring up and over..... It takes lots of practice, and you look a real pratt when it goes wrong!
After a bit you'll be able to stand slightly more upright and do it effortlessly.
Ed
OneDragons
03-09-2010, 21:50
I remember doing these during training but could never figure out the actual reason to use it.
Why roll when a stride entry would do it just as well and safer.
I remember doing these during training but could never figure out the actual reason to use it.
Why roll when a stride entry would do it just as well and safer.
If you carry a camera you want to protect it, holding it to your chest & landing on your back gives it optimum protection.
ChristianG
04-09-2010, 00:09
If you carry a camera you want to protect it, holding it to your chest & landing on your back gives it optimum protection.
Shudder! :eek: That, in my book, is "last resort" stuff. A camera is best handed to you once you're already in the water.
Apart from a backward roll and particularly if you're on a hardboat with rear entry/exit my preferred entry is giant-stride-with-twist so that I end up facing the stern with my bum/the tail of the tank hitting the water first. You can tell immediately whether the stern of the boat is going to belt you over the head and you're ready to grab that camera some kind soul is handing to you.
Shudder! :eek: That, in my book, is "last resort" stuff. A camera is best handed to you once you're already in the water.
Apart from a backward roll and particularly if you're on a hardboat with rear entry/exit my preferred entry is giant-stride-with-twist so that I end up facing the stern with my bum/the tail of the tank hitting the water first. You can tell immediately whether the stern of the boat is going to belt you over the head and you're ready to grab that camera some kind soul is handing to you.
I did wonder if a photographer would comment :). Yep, I think all photographers would prefer to have the camera handed to them where practical.
Dave Sydenham
04-09-2010, 17:27
I remember doing these during training but could never figure out the actual reason to use it.
More fun?.... ;)
can anyone give me any hints on how to do a forward roll entry into open water? all I seem to be able to manage is a belly flop!Pretty much as Ed says. I would only add that you don't need to hold your reg and I find both hands holding the back of the knees encourages people to look down at their fins.
Belly flops are caused by 'bottlinit' i.e. Looking up and forward at the vital moment.
So
1. Stand on edge
2. Bend knees a little
3. Hands holding back of knees
4. Look down at your fins
5. Lean forward
5.5 DO NOT LOOK UP
6. Sploosh!
Jobs a good un.
Try it in fins and mask first. Then pool kit. Then open water.
Great technique for getting all manner of things that need two hands to hold into the water. Including cameras and video cameras when it is not practical to have them handed down.
Belly flops are caused by 'bottlinit' i.e. Looking up and forward at the vital moment.
So
1. Stand on edge
2. Bend knees a little
3. Hands holding back of knees
4. Look down at your fins
5. Lean forward
5.5 DO NOT LOOK UP
6. Sploosh!
Yep pretty much sums it up. But point 4 is by far and away the most important. I always used to teach it as "put your chin on your chest". Those that did it could do a forward roll entry those that did not belly flopped.
Scoobie Diver
05-09-2010, 00:02
I did one on a boat load of PADI divers in Egypt. They though I had fallen of the boat, one of them even tried to bollock me for not entering the water correctly. They shut up when the guide/instructor did it as well. I like it its a variation:D
bythesea
05-09-2010, 08:17
I find if I roll forward I end up still on the boat as the water tends to be behind me ;)
If you carry a camera you want to protect it, holding it to your chest & landing on your back gives it optimum protection.
Isn't that a backwards roll :)
I have never done a forward roll at anytime other than in training.
Was helping out on an IFC 2years ago and was told we no longer teach it. It's been removed from the training altogether, so I havn't been teeching that entry for 2 years
Ed Howarth
05-09-2010, 19:48
Was helping out on an IFC 2years ago and was told we no longer teach it. It's been removed from the training altogether, so I havn't been teeching that entry for 2 years
I still teach it, and it's in my instructor manual in OS4.
Don't think this has been superseded.....
Ed
bythesea
06-09-2010, 08:25
I think you are the only one still teaching it Ed, to my knowledge....
Ron MacRae
06-09-2010, 08:44
I think you are the only one still teaching it Ed, to my knowledge....
No he's not.:)
Ron.
Ed Howarth
06-09-2010, 09:50
I like that momentary lapse of normality that you get (well, I get it) as you surface and you're facing the wrong way.......:)
If it's in the book, I teach it.
Ed
Ron MacRae
06-09-2010, 10:23
If it's in the book, I teach it.
Absolutely!! It's an easy enough course as it is without taking bits out.
Ron.
bythesea
06-09-2010, 10:53
If it's in the book, I teach it.
Ed
Even if there is no practical application?
In oodles of dives I have never done this for real, a couple of times for a laugh, sure... I have never weighed up entry options and had this as the only one...
Even if there is no practical application?It has practical applications. When you need to enter the water facing forwards holding something with two hands.
In oodles of dives I have never done this for real, a couple of times for a laugh, sure... I have never weighed up entry options and had this as the only one...I have seen lots of people messing up oddles of entries or faffing on the surface, when a forward roll would have been much easier in the circumstances, in my opinion.
Times I have used it for real have generally involved boats and quay sides where a backward role was not safe ans my hands have been full of video camera or surveying equipment.
Times I have used it for real have generally involved boats and quay sides where a backward role was not safe ans my hands have been full of video camera or surveying equipment.
Can also be useful when you want to go in forwards and you want to stay shallow
bythesea
06-09-2010, 16:10
my hands have been full of video camera or surveying equipment.
And no one could hand it to you?
I always end up with water down my neck when doing a drysuit forward roll. Have done one off a boat in a twinset once. It was very graceful.
Before I switched to using a CCR for most of my diving I regularly used to enter with the water with a forward roll, mostly for the fun of it.
They do say variety is the spice of life.
Gareth
2007 pool cards OS4 backward roll entry
Ed Howarth
06-09-2010, 21:29
2007 pool cards OS4 backward roll entry
Then come out, dekit and, with mask, fins and snorkel,.......Quote: "Enter deep water by forward roll. This entry (useful when carrying something such as a camera) expands the range of techniques that the students experience and leads in to the subsequent lesson where this will be repeated in full SCUBA
equipment."
This is then done in full scuba in OS5.
(Phew! Almost got away with it there.):D
Ed
And no one could hand it to you?Not easily, no.
bythesea
07-09-2010, 07:50
Not easily, no.
Fair enough, so if this was the case, what was your exit plan? If it was tricky for someone to hand stuff to you once in the water it must have been a bitch to get back out.....
micromouse
07-09-2010, 09:07
how about something like this method???
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QY4SkvKL1yM
MM
ChristianG
07-09-2010, 11:42
Then come out, dekit and, with mask, fins and snorkel,.......Quote: "Enter deep water by forward roll. This entry (useful when carrying something such as a camera) expands the range of techniques that the students experience and leads in to the subsequent lesson where this will be repeated in full SCUBA equipment."
Double :eek: :eek:
That's a potential camera "accident" waiting for somewhere to happen. What do these people think? That cameras are actually waterproof? Not so, never were, never will be.
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