Talk:Diving

There's a place in South America somewhere where people go "cliff diving" from a 30 metre cliff into a natural pool. Anyone know where it is?

• Perhaps the commenter is thinking of La Quebrada near Acapulco, Mexico on the Pacific coast? (Thu. 8/28/03 17:00PDT)

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Re: The dual meaning of "diving." Other western languages also use one word (eg, plonger, bucear) to denote both activities. Speculation: this dual meaning could have originated with Greek, as before the introduction of external air supplies the procedure used by sponge-gatherers in the eastern Med was to take a headlong flying jump off their boat while carrying a heavy rock. Once underwater at their desired depth they released the rock, which was hauled back up on a line, and went about their business as long as their breath held out, then swam for the surface to repeat the procedure. (Thu. 8/28/03 17:15PDT)

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Could we refer as "jumping" to disambiguate, e.g. "diving" to denote going underwater and "jumping" to denote the above-water part, e.g. if you just want to get the thrill of jumping off the 5m cement tower but not really get all the scuba equipment, etc., to dive under the water.??? Glogger 04:14, 9 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Boys Own

How can this possibly be fair use, assuming it isn't GFDL? Is it public domain? Toby Woodwark 02:14, 2004 Jul 28 (UTC)

Published late 19th century [1] (http://www.biblio.com/browse_books/author/u/10692.html), so it will be public domain. There's a copy on http://www.publicbookshelf.com/ from which this text was presumably copied. It could really do with rewriting into Wikipedia style though. sjorford 07:48, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)

OK, I've integrated some of the boys' own stuff into my attempted rewrite. Edit please! Also, someone can nuke this section of the chat. Toby Woodwark 13:48, 2004 Jul 28 (UTC)

Learning how to enter pool without hurting too much

I just learned how to swim recently (as an adult, around the same time I did my doctoral dissertation), but only gently climbed in by ladder, never jumping off the side. More recently I tried off the side (0m) and then the 5m height at Summerville (Toronto); they only have 0m, 5m, and 10m (they took out the flexible spring-loaded apparatus of 1m and 3m long ago because it was deteriorated).

The first time I tried I went head first which I thought might be as streamlined as possible but I could not seem to get my legs straight. I tried 4 times, but bruised, took 20 days for bruises to go away. So I tried feet first, which seemed to hurt less, actually, though it's counter-intuitive. Why would it hurt less to go feet first since there's more parts of the body that get hit? (Main pain seems to be genitals and nose perhaps because they're going the "wrong way" when going feet first.)

Also a lifeguard suggested I try to intertwine my legs in feet first (he called it "impact jump"). Can anyone confirm if this is a standard method of entry? I don't see many of the others going in that way.

I found there was a 1m, 3m, and 5m at the University of Toronto so I tried the 1m and 3m, but seem to have tremendous pain in ears even with 1m. It feels like landing in an airplane, when it descends fast. It doesn't matter head first or feet first, same amount of pain. I added my thoughts on ear plugs to the Wikipedia entry, but maybe someone more experienced than I can confirm if this is correct, e.g. that earplugs should be worn. For some reason, though, my ears never did hurt when I did the 5m at Summerville, but later even just 1m hurt like crazy. Could it be time-varying? (Some days hurt, other days not???). Or maybe it was just that my first few tries were so uncoordinated that I wasn't going deep, even from 5m up.

Thoughts on how to hold nose if going feet first? I added my own empirical findings (using second hand to hold first in), but would also welcome other input on this matter. I see alot of children go feet first without holding their nose. I tried this even from 1m, and was not able to blow out enough to keep water out enough. Is this learned or does it just happen naturally in certain people, e.g. 4 year old children who go off the 5m don't seem to have any problems at all. Maybe it could be explained why children have no problems at all, but adults bruise, have splitting ear aches that last more than 12 hours after impact, etc.. Some more introductory "how to learn" kind of info is what I'd really find useful in the Wikipedia. Glogger

• I have been competitively swimming for 10 years now. The key to keeping water out of your nose is experience and practice. Actually blowing air out of your nose is not ideal as it uses up your oxygen supply. When you hold your nose as you jump you push all the air out of it. If you don't hold your nose, but hold your breath instead, you should find that, so long as don't invert your head, the water will mostly be kept out of your nose by the air trapped inside it. The Olympic style divers hold their breath during their dives and usually release their air all at once as they swim back up to the surface. As for your ear problems... This is something that varies person to person. It is related to the pressure sensitivity of your ears. This pain is caused by a difference in pressure between the air in your ear canal and the pressure behind your ear drum. There is a way to equalize this by moving your jaw. So, "How to Learn": Place your fore and middle fingers, both hands, on your head just in front of your ears. You should feel the upper-back most part of your jaw. Keeping your fingers there, lower your jaw then jut it forward. This should give you some sense of how your jaw placement affects the volume of your ear canal, and therefor the pressure. You may be able to hear a muffled pop as you do this. That sound is the air pressure equalizing. There is a positioning of the jaw which allows for practically immediate and constant equalization to occur as you go down. This technique is used by abalone divers in Hawaii according to my marine science teacher. As for bruising, I really don't know what more I could tell you. The lifeguard's suggestion to intertwine your legs and feet—I assume this means something similar to crossing your ankles and straightening your legs—was probably because your legs and feet were coming apart as you fell. This could explain the pain in your genitals as there would be nothing breaking the water for them so they would receive the same impact as your feet. As you noted, reducing surface area is a positive thing. If you really want to pursue diving, or even just high jumping, getting a bathing suit which is tight fitting would probably solve the problem of genital pain. Most, if not all, of the divers I know wear a spandex or similar type of suit, even if it is under looser swimming shorts. If you are worried about appearances, these divers I'm referring to are by all accounts normal teenage boys. If they don't feel deterred in their hormonal quest to attract the opposite, then, in my opinion, we shouldn't have qualms about it either. I hope this was of help to you. If you have other questions or want a more detailed response, please feel free to contact me.WAvegetarian 06:05, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

clean up Learning section (explanation)

This section was written by someone who is/was still trying to learn how to dive (jumping off of high things). I feel that it could do with a rewrite from someone who is more knowledgeable about diving (competitor maybe) and would have some tips for people trying to learn as opposed to a collection of various methods tried by someone in the process of self teaching. It seems rather informal and unencyclopedic. I think it could benefit from a bit of a rewrite with more info. I realize that it's considered bad form to tag for clean up and not participate, but I don't really have expertise in the matter as I am a swimmer, not a diver. WAvegetarian 07:01, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)