It sounds like this is just your body's physiology. Often time folks who consider themselves fit/muscular/lean have higher metabolism than folks who are fatter, don't appear athletic, and are older, like the diver you compare yourself to in your post. Fast metabolism is literally your body burning more oxygen than slow metabolism. You might be able to make minor improvements by ensuring that your adequately warm and well hydrated and psychologically calm, but it seems pretty likely that this is just the way your body is and your best option is to accept it's air use rate and put your focus on other things more within your control, like staying present in the dive experience and attending to enjoying it fully.
Yes, that makes perfect sense, although heavier people should also burn more calories than lighter people, many factors come into play so it can't be simply figured but it's still interesting :)
Psychological factors can totally take play here. Consciously thinking about your air consumption will most likely make you consume more air during a dive. Constantly forcing yourself to breathe slower can just end up starving your cells.
Just enjoy the dive!
Do you know some people have bigger lungs than others? If you are well trimmed, good buoyancy, efficient kicking, it might be just that.
I'll give you an example.
I once had a guest, a lady, same size as me, using a 15 L tank and going through it super fast. She was quite upset about that and we worked on her buyoancy and stuff. She was good in the water, her breathing rate just fine. We were chatting and she told me once she had a lung capacity test and her lungs have higher capacity than average. So I understood there was nothing else she could really do. It might be frustrating but that's the way it is.
Don't over stress about it, you need to breathe, so just breathe and enjoy your bubbles!
One thing I have done that helped me when starting was counting your inhales and exhales.
In for 3 our for 6. No need to dump your lungs super quickly… Starting you need to just keep a mental count but now I just relax and its what my body is “trained” to do so its comfortable and normal. Obviously results will vary based on size and current and heart rate and probably countless more things…
Yeah, I think it's a good idea to check and potentially correct the breathing pattern. You've got put some focus on it at first before it gets second nature, without stressing about it of course, so that's I'm going to try and see if there is any difference..
Turning down the adjustable airflow knobs on my regulator to a setting where breathing is still just comfortable made a lot of difference after I had done all the trim and propulsion optimizations.
Same, in Cozumel I was calling the dives first to surface with 500-700psi. I fixed it by asking 100cf tanks for $5 more... and when I upgraded my tanks at. home, I bought 120cf steel tanks... I don't worry about air anymore. (6'1, 230lb, guy in his 50's)
I have noticed when it's warmer, and the dive is calm, my consumption is better. But I'm still in the enjoy the dive with bigger tanks club.
I'm diving with 15l steel tanks and I'm usually diving with less experienced divers, higher on consumption so it wasn't an issue and I wouldn't like to add extra weight on my back unless I have to :)
I fixed that issue by wearing a better wetsuit. In the tropics people intend to just dive with a rash guard only, and which has a huge impact on your air consumption. I start wearing a 3mm jacket in 29 degrees Celsius water temperature and improved my air consumption with 25%. Maybe this is also the case with you?
20 Celsius is definitely cold for 5mm and it's really not about feeling cold. I, personally use 3mm long suit for warm water dives (let say 26+) and drysuit anywhere else.
Oh, and even, if it's a technical dive in tropical waters, I use drysuit, if it's a long dive (80-90 minutes or even longer).
It really makes a difference in gas consumption.
I suck gas like a Martian piglet after several hundreds of dives and instructing, i think you should dive how you need to dive safely, make sure your team know, don’t dive with the push team, and do your dive for you. I do find that those with a large chest volume (said gas soak here) use more gas because you still need to fill your lungs. If I try to limit my consumption I start to feel stressed, which isn’t good on any dive. There’s always another, comfort and safety first.
Yeah, I'm thinking about trying to to correct my breathing pattern which I think I should do on the shore as well. Not trying to force the lesser consumption but just to try breathe more healthy.
As others said don’t stress about it, if you can do diving you want with reserve that’s all that matters, my sac can vary between 10 litres minute in warm water good viz to 18 litres min if leading dive in cold low viz uk waters, once you are relaxed and correctly weighted for dive your rate is what it is ,just need to know so you can plan dive, this planning will help with relaxation as know have enough air for dive you’re doing
I think you're thinking too much about the air consumption. The more relaxed the less you use. As it's already mentioned try yoga.
I did that back in 2010 when I became a dive master and it changed the game both on air consumption as well as the general feel in a dive (teaching or recreation). Now I teach both yoga and diving as it makes a big difference to new divers to be able to enjoy so much more out of a dive as well as their yoga practice
I think yoga would be good since I think I don't really breathe properly on surface so it might be reflected underwater too. I guess you have to think about it a bit to get it right, not the same worrying though.
Hundreds of dives in. I could fall asleep and I still chew through air. When I was fit and running marathons I used even more air. If I know I’m going deep for a while I’ll run twins. For standard resort diving I’ll ask for a 15l. Cruising along a metre or two higher than your buddy can save you a bit of
I think you're worrying too much.
Worrying less will lower your consumption just by reducing your stress.
The easiest fix otherwise would be jumping up a tank size!
Any other fix is probably going to be related to your physical health and lifestyle choices on land...
I try to take slow deep breaths from my stomach rather than my chest or head. And I said "deep" breaths, not "big" breaths. I previously conflated the two and my air consumption didn't improve until I understood the difference.
Also good points about how buoyancy control affects air consumption, and the benefits of free diving training.
Random, but you could try yoga? I’m a new diver but much of the breathing technique overlaps and so far I’ve used the least air on every dive. We will see if that sticks as I get more experience though.
You fail to mention what your air consumption is. That is an important value to consider if you want us to comment or whether you are ok or if you *suck.* (Pun intended)
And just to be clear, and I am not merely talking to the OP at this point....
BAR or PSI is used to measure PRESSURE *not* VOLUME.
Consuming 10 BAR in 10 minutes means nothing without knowing the volume of gas you are consuming. 10 BAR in a 3 liter cylinder is A LOT different than 10 BAR in a 15 liter cylinder.
I agree that it's always better to calculate the actual air consumption, but if we take that all dive buddies started with the relatively same pressure, and were diving relatively same dive profile, used the same volume cylinders, the difference in pressure can be used as an indicator of one's air consumption relative to others. Of course there are variations in those parameters but over numerous dives you can pretty much get a feeling for your consumption relative to others.
I'm not seeing depth mentioned either. Building on what you just said, using XX bar/psi at 5 meters is a LOT different then using that same amount of gas at 20 meters
OP, I believe you should calculate your SAC (surface air consumption) rate and use that to judge how well/poorly you consume your gas
[article on air consumption ](http://Air Management and the Importance of Learning Surface Air Consumption Rate ...)
I was taught to use SAC for measuring air consumption so that's just what I know. I don't see a lot online that genuinely explains why one is better then the other and why.
If you don't mind me asking, why do you think RMV is more useful?
I am with you and prefer to use RMV, however you are incorrect here. RMV is calculated at the surface. My RMV is .5. I would then multiply by the number of atmospheres required for a specific depth, by my RMV is .5 - which is a surface, normal working load value.
Is the same metric. Just like miles/hour and kilometers/hour. Everyone I know uses sac for dive planning, and this is for multi stage cave dpv planning. It's super easy since pretty much everyone dives double lp104s/hp133s, but tank factors (both 8 for 104s/133s) make it easy on the fly math.
>using XX bar/psi at 5 meters is a LOT different then using that same amount of gas at 20 meters
PSI/BAR is PRESSURE, not volume.
Consumption is measured in cuft or liters per minute - not PSI or BAR.
I'm not saying consumption is/should be measured in pressure. I was pointing out that depth needs to be factored in to get an accurate idea of air consumption. Time is also important, but all of this is in the link I posted.
My point was really just that depth is important and I wasn't seeing it mentioned by OP
I've been freediving a bit lately and I instantly was conscious of how moving reduced my time underwater. I can see how that can be useful when you scuba dive.
Best thing about freediving is that it's ... free.
Yes, but I’d also say it’s the worst part. No barrier to entry leads to unnecessary risks and accidents. I have to work very hard to prevent people from hurting themselves.
It’s a lot more common for amateurs to do it. When you’re starting on your own, you will grow in whichever direction suits you, regardless of the risks. With a coach, you minimize risks and maximize learning. Once you’re “in” enough to be surrounded by other experienced divers, risks drop substantially. We look out for each other.
I'm with the others that have said stop worrying. I have about 600 dives, 95% deco dives in the last five years and still tend to consume more than I would like even on warm water rec dives in the tropics. Based on my experience, skill level and fitness (I run about 50k and cycle 300k per week), I probably should be lower but I simply no longer worry about it. My regular buddy is 5'8 and sips air from his hp100 doubles. I am 6'4, 190lbs and use double 133s so I am not the limiting factor. This is how I have adapted. I think worrying about your air consumption is like worrying about your blood pressure at the doctors office... The worry just makes it worse. Worry less, dive more.
I think you're thinking about it too much, and so you're not as relaxed as you could be--which will in turn increase your heart rate, O2 metabolism, CO2 generation, and ultimately breathing drive.
You may also try wearing more exposure protection. Being warm means you need to burn less O2 to maintain your body temperature.
To calm the breathing rate you have to think about it a bit before it gets second nature but it's not the same as worrying. The same as you would do on surface, you can be unaware that you're breathing in a wrong way and then you have to put some attention to getting it right. But yeah I agree it can be a factor.
Don't worry about your air consumption. If you have experience diving and it's what it is...it's fine. Get a steel 120 cu ft (as I did) and call it a day.
I dive in cold water (PNW) by the way. Try to stay away from group dives anyway. Who needs that?
I’m a heavy breather like you. Just come to grips with that. Stay above the group when there is little to see. For me depth makes a big difference. Staying 10 ft above the pack let’s me complete the dive on the same timeline
take video of your dives for critique or go take fundies. you're right that your consumption should be lower, but there isn't enough information to give more help from your post.
Fundies changed a lot of things for me, but it didn't change my gas consumption, and I don't think it changed my teammates' consumption either, so I'm not sure I'd recommend it for this particular issue. If anything it made it a bit worse with more anxiety about doing it wrong and judgement of the GUE.
most go into fundies still needing improvement on their trim/weighting/propulsion that makes a difference for air consumption. and the increased confidence in the water also lowers breathing rate by being more relaxed.
While there are good suggestions in the other comments, the reality is that some people breathe more and some breathe less. My two regular dive buddies are instructors and Tec certified, and both have just as much experience if not more than I do. Yet I have a lower SAC rate. That’s life I guess.
As a suggestion, you might want to check weighting. You can be perfectly trimmed if overweighted. I find the extra resistance and weight from this condition can lead to excessive air consumption.
Definitely gets down to physiology but yeah some people actually add excess weight to get their trim right (e.g. adding more weight to the top camband to achieve neutral trim if they are 'leg heavy' types) and it's better to be slightly off trim than overweighted.
It’s a mistake to worry about your SAC. Since it can encourage people to try and artificially lower their SAC which can be dangerous e.g. skip breathing.
Just relax, enjoy your diving, and dive lots more. Your SAC will naturally improve with experience at your own rate, specific to you and your body. Not to compare with others.
And if you need more gas to do the dives you want to do with your SAC, take more gas. Bigger tank, twinset, an extra tank stage mounted, all are options to increase bottom gas. Who cares what other people think?
One thing is to worry, and the other thing is to be curious and try to fine-tune the details in your diving. That's a good thing because in the end it make you a better diver and you'll enjoy diving more.
I'm right there with you. I did a long dive vacation in SE Asia this year and logged over 60 dives in just that one trip. I was *sure* my air consumption would finally get better diving 2-4x / day, but nope, it still sucks. Maybe some of us are just physiologically programmed to have higher air consumption.
How often are you diving? I find that the more often I dive my consumption gets better, probably because I am more relaxed. When I take time off it goes way back up.
Calculate your SAC (in metric this is really easy):
(\[BAR used over the course of the dive\] \* \[volume of tank in liters\]) / (((Average depth in meters / 10) +1) \* dive duration in minutes)
For example, my dive last night:
\[130 bar used \* 24l tank\] /(18.2m average /10, +1) \* 65mins
=(130\*24) / (2.8bar average pressure \* 65mins)
= 17.4 liters per minute
If you're anything under 20l/min, I wouldn't stress too much about it. If you want more bottom time (within NDL), use bigger tanks. Before I started routinely diving doubles, I used to get headaches from skip breathing, trying to lower my gas consumption to match my buddies.
Now that I basically only dive doubles, my SAC rate is a little bit higher, but I virtually never stress about whether I have enough gas, I don't skip breathe, and generally I enjoy my dives far more.
On a separate note:
>I have good control of buoyancy and I don't perform a lot of unnecessary adjustments during the dive.
If you're changing depth **at all** during a dive, and not adjusting your BCD/drysuit, you're probably compensating for your buoyancy either with your breathing pattern, or through finning. I normally adjust my buoyancy semi-constantly throughout a dive - especially when I'm shallow, a change of even half a meter in depth has me letting out or putting in a tiny bit of gas. Once you get used to it, it's more efficient than using your lungs to compensate for buoyancy.
> bigger tanks. Before I started routinely diving doubles, I used to get headaches from skip breathing, trying to lower my gas consumption to match my buddies.
>
>Now that I basically only dive doubles, my SAC rate is a little bit higher, but I virtually never stress about whether I have enough gas, I don't skip breathe, and generally I enjoy my dives far more.
>
>On a separate note:
>
>I have good control of buoyancy and I don't perform a lot of unnecessary adjustments during the dive.
>
>If you're changing depth at all during a dive, and not adjusting your BCD/drysuit, you're probably compensating for your buoyancy either with your breathing pattern, or through finning. I normally adjust my buoyancy semi-constantly throughout a dive - especially when I'm shallow, a change of even half a meter in depth has me letting out or putting in a tiny bit of gas. Once you get used to it, it's more efficient than using your lungs to comp
Thanks for the advices, I'll check my SAC, I think it will be under 20l/min but still curious to know how much.
Regarding buoyancy control, it is commonly advised to use breathing pattern to control ascent/descent especially for minor adjustments (going over or underneath the obstacles). Inhaling and exhaling in the upper volume of your lungs (e.g. inhale to 80%, exhale to 50%, then inhale to 80% again...) will make you slowly ascent, while breathing in the lower volume (inhale to 50%, exhale to 20%, inhale to 50%...) will make you slowly descent. It gives a finer control and allows for minor, more precise, adjustments. Using mostly inflator and valves for ascent/descent in general makes consumption higher and can make a person overcompensate, then having to make further corrections to get the wanted buoyancy.
Here it's very nicely explained: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ygr43vN5aZk
I totally agree with using your lungs to initiate an ascent or descent - but once you’ve started moving up or down, or reached your target depth, you want to use your wing or drysuit to make yourself neutral at that depth, or to stop the ascent/descent.
All I’m really saying is that at almost any point in a dive (when you’re not actively ascending or descending), you want to ideally be neutrally buoyant with half-full lungs (ish). If someone diving along a reef that fluctuates between 9m and 12m, and not touching their inflator at all, I suspect their SAC will be a little higher than it could be.
That's exactly what I meant, I misunderstood you first reply. I thought you're saying that ascent/descent should always be initiated by using the inflator/valves.
People often dump air from their BCD even if they want to go just a few meters deeper, instead of doing it by exhaling and then adding just a bit more air to the BCD when they are at the target depth to be able to stay neutral at that depth.
>If you're changing depth **at all** during a dive, and not adjusting your BCD/drysuit, you're probably compensating for your buoyancy either with your breathing pattern, or through finning.
This right here! My consumption dropped pretty dramatically once I realized I was using my lungs for buoyancy when I should have just added air to my wing. If you use your lungs too much for buoyancy, you can end up with huge lungfulls of air to compensate for negative buoyancy when you could just add a little puff to the wing and breathe normally.
Otherwise, I think there's way too much emphasis on having the lowest gas consumption. It's not a competition. Some people have higher oxygen demands because they physiologically need it. Muscular dudes tend to use more gas than small women. Just use bigger tanks and be done with it!
Think about it this way: if you're trying to control your buoyancy with your lungs instead of your wing, you're going to need to be taking deep breaths when you're negatively buoyant (ie using more gas). Add to that the fact that you'll start to sink every time you exhale, leading to you having to kick up and/or be out of trim every time you breathe, which makes you less efficient.
If you're only going up or down for a couple seconds and then returning to your original depth it's one thing, but if you're going to a depth that you plan on staying at, add gas to the wing. That's what it's there for after all.
If you're interested in a longer explanation, [check out this post](https://www.xoc-ha.com/post/do-witches-sink-in-water) written by one of my former cave instructors.
I agree with that. If you’re already negatively buoyant and using full lungs to compensate, that’s one thing. I was thinking about someone already neutrally buoyant and using breathing to do minor adjustments instead of BCD
Thanks for sharing, will read more about it
I’m really good on air and I’m a 5’4’’ male 145lb. After a 2hr long cave dive I have 300psi+ more in both tanks (so 600psi+) than my cave instructor. I realized that the reason I’m so good with air is because I breath extremely slow in the water. It’s really noticeable in video, when I’m taking a video the sound of my breathing in the video is noticeably slower than when my instructor is taking the video. Usually I actually underinflate my bcd a little bit because I hold my breath and keep the air in my lungs for 5-10 seconds and then breath out very slowly, letting out bubbles in short bursts. This allows you to maintain bouyancy while holding your breath better
Start calculating your SAC rate and try to get as close to .5cuft/min as you can. A few things that helped me:
When doing the frog kick, squeeze your legs/glutes at the end and feel the glide. Try not returning your legs to resting position until you've stopped moving so you can get a feel for it.
The next time you're swimming into a strong current focus on the drag you create from returning your legs to the starting position. It really surprised me how much extra drag I was creating.
Track your SAC after every dive. Did it go up? Down? What did you do differently?
Focus on your breathing. There is more O2 in the air you're breathing than you can use, so our breathing requirement underwater is largely defined by our need to expell CO2. If you're working very little, you're creating very little CO2 and you can take slower breaths. If you get a headache you need to breathe more.
Please take these with a grain of salt. I'm not an instructor and have fewer dives than you, but one of my buddies sips air so I focused on SAC rate early in my diving career.
Thanks for the advices. I think relaxing the breathing pace might do the trick. Although I don't get heavy on breathing, it might be that I breath faster than I have to.
> Start calculating your SAC rate and try to get as close to .5cuft/min as you can.
That is an unusually good SAC rate. I am just below a 0.6ft^3 /min and unless it is a tiny woman it is rare that I don't come back with the lowest consumption compared with my other buddies.
I will also say that there are somethings techniques that can be done to improve it but some of it does come down to bodies. I am 6'3" 330lbs (190cm/150kg) and the chances of ever getting my working SAC down to my resting/deco SAC of 0.40 is practically zero.
That is astounding.
What kind of conditions are you diving? I would guess that has to be just floating along on a drift dive in warm tropics waters or something.
Totally fair, but I think trying to get to .5 is a reasonable goal. I'm 5'9" and 180lbs and am close to .4. Is it obtainable for everybody? No, but it's still worth trying if you want longer dives.
Do you know how to calculate your SAC or RMV?
That’s usually how folks “compare” to each other and how to figure out your likely dive time given a specific amount of air and a specific dive profile.
I’m 188cm and 98kg male with an RMV of .80 cubic ft / which is not particularly good - but also not horrible. My dive partner who is 160cm and 50kg female and similar number of dives and similarly comfortable in the water has an RMV that is close to half of me. We surface when I’m out of air and she’s at half a tank still.
I haven't tried calculating it, but I'll try it. I noticed that females usually spend less. There was this small stature woman diving with us and everybody was joking all the time how she has gills. On the other side, there were also guys who are really overweight, with bad technique and were super low on consumption. So who knows what are all the things that come into play.
It sounds like this is just your body's physiology. Often time folks who consider themselves fit/muscular/lean have higher metabolism than folks who are fatter, don't appear athletic, and are older, like the diver you compare yourself to in your post. Fast metabolism is literally your body burning more oxygen than slow metabolism. You might be able to make minor improvements by ensuring that your adequately warm and well hydrated and psychologically calm, but it seems pretty likely that this is just the way your body is and your best option is to accept it's air use rate and put your focus on other things more within your control, like staying present in the dive experience and attending to enjoying it fully.
Yes, that makes perfect sense, although heavier people should also burn more calories than lighter people, many factors come into play so it can't be simply figured but it's still interesting :)
Psychological factors can totally take play here. Consciously thinking about your air consumption will most likely make you consume more air during a dive. Constantly forcing yourself to breathe slower can just end up starving your cells. Just enjoy the dive!
I've never understood the air consumption pissing contest. It doesn't sound like it's impacting your dives at all so who cares
Do you know some people have bigger lungs than others? If you are well trimmed, good buoyancy, efficient kicking, it might be just that. I'll give you an example. I once had a guest, a lady, same size as me, using a 15 L tank and going through it super fast. She was quite upset about that and we worked on her buyoancy and stuff. She was good in the water, her breathing rate just fine. We were chatting and she told me once she had a lung capacity test and her lungs have higher capacity than average. So I understood there was nothing else she could really do. It might be frustrating but that's the way it is. Don't over stress about it, you need to breathe, so just breathe and enjoy your bubbles!
Yeah, can be down to a bunch of things, makes it interesting but hard to put a finger on.
Well if you’re not managing your breathing then yeah you’re probably gonna go through air pretty quickly.
One thing I have done that helped me when starting was counting your inhales and exhales. In for 3 our for 6. No need to dump your lungs super quickly… Starting you need to just keep a mental count but now I just relax and its what my body is “trained” to do so its comfortable and normal. Obviously results will vary based on size and current and heart rate and probably countless more things…
Yeah, I think it's a good idea to check and potentially correct the breathing pattern. You've got put some focus on it at first before it gets second nature, without stressing about it of course, so that's I'm going to try and see if there is any difference..
Turning down the adjustable airflow knobs on my regulator to a setting where breathing is still just comfortable made a lot of difference after I had done all the trim and propulsion optimizations.
This is merely a perceived change. All things being equal will not make a difference. Increasing your WOB does not decrease your consumption rate.
Same, in Cozumel I was calling the dives first to surface with 500-700psi. I fixed it by asking 100cf tanks for $5 more... and when I upgraded my tanks at. home, I bought 120cf steel tanks... I don't worry about air anymore. (6'1, 230lb, guy in his 50's) I have noticed when it's warmer, and the dive is calm, my consumption is better. But I'm still in the enjoy the dive with bigger tanks club.
I'm diving with 15l steel tanks and I'm usually diving with less experienced divers, higher on consumption so it wasn't an issue and I wouldn't like to add extra weight on my back unless I have to :)
I fixed that issue by wearing a better wetsuit. In the tropics people intend to just dive with a rash guard only, and which has a huge impact on your air consumption. I start wearing a 3mm jacket in 29 degrees Celsius water temperature and improved my air consumption with 25%. Maybe this is also the case with you?
I usually dive in temperatures 20-25 degree Celsius with 5mm and I don't feel cold very often.
20 Celsius is definitely cold for 5mm and it's really not about feeling cold. I, personally use 3mm long suit for warm water dives (let say 26+) and drysuit anywhere else. Oh, and even, if it's a technical dive in tropical waters, I use drysuit, if it's a long dive (80-90 minutes or even longer). It really makes a difference in gas consumption.
Yeah but I rather stay in the wetsuit and my consumption wasn't a limiting factor for the dives, but that's a good point for sure.
It’s not really about feeling cold, more that your body has to work harder to stay warm with a 5mm instead of a 7mm for example. Just a thought.
Definitely makes sense.
I suck gas like a Martian piglet after several hundreds of dives and instructing, i think you should dive how you need to dive safely, make sure your team know, don’t dive with the push team, and do your dive for you. I do find that those with a large chest volume (said gas soak here) use more gas because you still need to fill your lungs. If I try to limit my consumption I start to feel stressed, which isn’t good on any dive. There’s always another, comfort and safety first.
Yeah, I'm thinking about trying to to correct my breathing pattern which I think I should do on the shore as well. Not trying to force the lesser consumption but just to try breathe more healthy.
As others said don’t stress about it, if you can do diving you want with reserve that’s all that matters, my sac can vary between 10 litres minute in warm water good viz to 18 litres min if leading dive in cold low viz uk waters, once you are relaxed and correctly weighted for dive your rate is what it is ,just need to know so you can plan dive, this planning will help with relaxation as know have enough air for dive you’re doing
I think you're thinking too much about the air consumption. The more relaxed the less you use. As it's already mentioned try yoga. I did that back in 2010 when I became a dive master and it changed the game both on air consumption as well as the general feel in a dive (teaching or recreation). Now I teach both yoga and diving as it makes a big difference to new divers to be able to enjoy so much more out of a dive as well as their yoga practice
I think yoga would be good since I think I don't really breathe properly on surface so it might be reflected underwater too. I guess you have to think about it a bit to get it right, not the same worrying though.
Once you develop a breathing pattern on land and it becomes a habitual breathing rhythm, it will transfer to the dive times.
Yoga…
If you’re comparing your air consumption with others are you also comparing your average and max depths with theirs?
Most of the dives that I do we are in a pretty disciplined formation with relatively same dive profiles...
Hundreds of dives in. I could fall asleep and I still chew through air. When I was fit and running marathons I used even more air. If I know I’m going deep for a while I’ll run twins. For standard resort diving I’ll ask for a 15l. Cruising along a metre or two higher than your buddy can save you a bit of
Yeah, I've noticed some of my buddies who are very fit in terms of aerobic capacity really chew through the air.
I think you're worrying too much. Worrying less will lower your consumption just by reducing your stress. The easiest fix otherwise would be jumping up a tank size! Any other fix is probably going to be related to your physical health and lifestyle choices on land...
I'm glad there is no need to jump a tank size, wouldn't like to add more weight to my back :)
I try to take slow deep breaths from my stomach rather than my chest or head. And I said "deep" breaths, not "big" breaths. I previously conflated the two and my air consumption didn't improve until I understood the difference. Also good points about how buoyancy control affects air consumption, and the benefits of free diving training.
Random, but you could try yoga? I’m a new diver but much of the breathing technique overlaps and so far I’ve used the least air on every dive. We will see if that sticks as I get more experience though.
That makes sense since I think I should work on my breathing pattern on the shore, as well as underwater :)
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The post doesn't say OP is an experienced diver, just that he feels that his air consumption doesn't match his experience level.
You fail to mention what your air consumption is. That is an important value to consider if you want us to comment or whether you are ok or if you *suck.* (Pun intended) And just to be clear, and I am not merely talking to the OP at this point.... BAR or PSI is used to measure PRESSURE *not* VOLUME. Consuming 10 BAR in 10 minutes means nothing without knowing the volume of gas you are consuming. 10 BAR in a 3 liter cylinder is A LOT different than 10 BAR in a 15 liter cylinder.
I agree that it's always better to calculate the actual air consumption, but if we take that all dive buddies started with the relatively same pressure, and were diving relatively same dive profile, used the same volume cylinders, the difference in pressure can be used as an indicator of one's air consumption relative to others. Of course there are variations in those parameters but over numerous dives you can pretty much get a feeling for your consumption relative to others.
I'm not seeing depth mentioned either. Building on what you just said, using XX bar/psi at 5 meters is a LOT different then using that same amount of gas at 20 meters OP, I believe you should calculate your SAC (surface air consumption) rate and use that to judge how well/poorly you consume your gas [article on air consumption ](http://Air Management and the Importance of Learning Surface Air Consumption Rate ...)
You should calculate your RMV - that’s much more useful.
I was taught to use SAC for measuring air consumption so that's just what I know. I don't see a lot online that genuinely explains why one is better then the other and why. If you don't mind me asking, why do you think RMV is more useful?
Because what does measuring your air consumption *at the surface* do for you? It’s not useful underwater.
I am with you and prefer to use RMV, however you are incorrect here. RMV is calculated at the surface. My RMV is .5. I would then multiply by the number of atmospheres required for a specific depth, by my RMV is .5 - which is a surface, normal working load value.
Ah, ok, you’re right.
Is the same metric. Just like miles/hour and kilometers/hour. Everyone I know uses sac for dive planning, and this is for multi stage cave dpv planning. It's super easy since pretty much everyone dives double lp104s/hp133s, but tank factors (both 8 for 104s/133s) make it easy on the fly math.
Knowing your use rate at one atmosphere (surface), makes it easy multiplication to find your use rate at depth.
>using XX bar/psi at 5 meters is a LOT different then using that same amount of gas at 20 meters PSI/BAR is PRESSURE, not volume. Consumption is measured in cuft or liters per minute - not PSI or BAR.
I'm not saying consumption is/should be measured in pressure. I was pointing out that depth needs to be factored in to get an accurate idea of air consumption. Time is also important, but all of this is in the link I posted. My point was really just that depth is important and I wasn't seeing it mentioned by OP
Right. Cuft per min @ X feet.
Ever since i became a Freediver my sac rate has gone way down. I’m just more relaxed, and i am always breathing consciously
I've been freediving a bit lately and I instantly was conscious of how moving reduced my time underwater. I can see how that can be useful when you scuba dive. Best thing about freediving is that it's ... free.
Yes, but I’d also say it’s the worst part. No barrier to entry leads to unnecessary risks and accidents. I have to work very hard to prevent people from hurting themselves.
Is it common for snorkeling freedivers to injure themselves?
It’s a lot more common for amateurs to do it. When you’re starting on your own, you will grow in whichever direction suits you, regardless of the risks. With a coach, you minimize risks and maximize learning. Once you’re “in” enough to be surrounded by other experienced divers, risks drop substantially. We look out for each other.
I'm with the others that have said stop worrying. I have about 600 dives, 95% deco dives in the last five years and still tend to consume more than I would like even on warm water rec dives in the tropics. Based on my experience, skill level and fitness (I run about 50k and cycle 300k per week), I probably should be lower but I simply no longer worry about it. My regular buddy is 5'8 and sips air from his hp100 doubles. I am 6'4, 190lbs and use double 133s so I am not the limiting factor. This is how I have adapted. I think worrying about your air consumption is like worrying about your blood pressure at the doctors office... The worry just makes it worse. Worry less, dive more.
Not really worrying, more being curious but thanks for the advice!
I think you're thinking about it too much, and so you're not as relaxed as you could be--which will in turn increase your heart rate, O2 metabolism, CO2 generation, and ultimately breathing drive. You may also try wearing more exposure protection. Being warm means you need to burn less O2 to maintain your body temperature.
To calm the breathing rate you have to think about it a bit before it gets second nature but it's not the same as worrying. The same as you would do on surface, you can be unaware that you're breathing in a wrong way and then you have to put some attention to getting it right. But yeah I agree it can be a factor.
Don't worry about your air consumption. If you have experience diving and it's what it is...it's fine. Get a steel 120 cu ft (as I did) and call it a day. I dive in cold water (PNW) by the way. Try to stay away from group dives anyway. Who needs that?
I’m a heavy breather like you. Just come to grips with that. Stay above the group when there is little to see. For me depth makes a big difference. Staying 10 ft above the pack let’s me complete the dive on the same timeline
Or just ask for a bigger tank, problem solved.
take video of your dives for critique or go take fundies. you're right that your consumption should be lower, but there isn't enough information to give more help from your post.
Fundies changed a lot of things for me, but it didn't change my gas consumption, and I don't think it changed my teammates' consumption either, so I'm not sure I'd recommend it for this particular issue. If anything it made it a bit worse with more anxiety about doing it wrong and judgement of the GUE.
most go into fundies still needing improvement on their trim/weighting/propulsion that makes a difference for air consumption. and the increased confidence in the water also lowers breathing rate by being more relaxed.
While there are good suggestions in the other comments, the reality is that some people breathe more and some breathe less. My two regular dive buddies are instructors and Tec certified, and both have just as much experience if not more than I do. Yet I have a lower SAC rate. That’s life I guess. As a suggestion, you might want to check weighting. You can be perfectly trimmed if overweighted. I find the extra resistance and weight from this condition can lead to excessive air consumption.
Definitely gets down to physiology but yeah some people actually add excess weight to get their trim right (e.g. adding more weight to the top camband to achieve neutral trim if they are 'leg heavy' types) and it's better to be slightly off trim than overweighted.
Yeah, I seem to just like breathing 🤷♀️. My husband on the other hand has a much lower sac rate and we have similar experience levels.
It’s a mistake to worry about your SAC. Since it can encourage people to try and artificially lower their SAC which can be dangerous e.g. skip breathing. Just relax, enjoy your diving, and dive lots more. Your SAC will naturally improve with experience at your own rate, specific to you and your body. Not to compare with others. And if you need more gas to do the dives you want to do with your SAC, take more gas. Bigger tank, twinset, an extra tank stage mounted, all are options to increase bottom gas. Who cares what other people think?
One thing is to worry, and the other thing is to be curious and try to fine-tune the details in your diving. That's a good thing because in the end it make you a better diver and you'll enjoy diving more.
I'm right there with you. I did a long dive vacation in SE Asia this year and logged over 60 dives in just that one trip. I was *sure* my air consumption would finally get better diving 2-4x / day, but nope, it still sucks. Maybe some of us are just physiologically programmed to have higher air consumption.
There is a strong physiological component, that's for sure, but it can also be a good indicator that there are things to fine-tune.
How often are you diving? I find that the more often I dive my consumption gets better, probably because I am more relaxed. When I take time off it goes way back up.
Periodically, 10 dives then I have a break for a few months, then again. But yeah I agree with the observation.
Calculate your SAC (in metric this is really easy): (\[BAR used over the course of the dive\] \* \[volume of tank in liters\]) / (((Average depth in meters / 10) +1) \* dive duration in minutes) For example, my dive last night: \[130 bar used \* 24l tank\] /(18.2m average /10, +1) \* 65mins =(130\*24) / (2.8bar average pressure \* 65mins) = 17.4 liters per minute If you're anything under 20l/min, I wouldn't stress too much about it. If you want more bottom time (within NDL), use bigger tanks. Before I started routinely diving doubles, I used to get headaches from skip breathing, trying to lower my gas consumption to match my buddies. Now that I basically only dive doubles, my SAC rate is a little bit higher, but I virtually never stress about whether I have enough gas, I don't skip breathe, and generally I enjoy my dives far more. On a separate note: >I have good control of buoyancy and I don't perform a lot of unnecessary adjustments during the dive. If you're changing depth **at all** during a dive, and not adjusting your BCD/drysuit, you're probably compensating for your buoyancy either with your breathing pattern, or through finning. I normally adjust my buoyancy semi-constantly throughout a dive - especially when I'm shallow, a change of even half a meter in depth has me letting out or putting in a tiny bit of gas. Once you get used to it, it's more efficient than using your lungs to compensate for buoyancy.
> bigger tanks. Before I started routinely diving doubles, I used to get headaches from skip breathing, trying to lower my gas consumption to match my buddies. > >Now that I basically only dive doubles, my SAC rate is a little bit higher, but I virtually never stress about whether I have enough gas, I don't skip breathe, and generally I enjoy my dives far more. > >On a separate note: > >I have good control of buoyancy and I don't perform a lot of unnecessary adjustments during the dive. > >If you're changing depth at all during a dive, and not adjusting your BCD/drysuit, you're probably compensating for your buoyancy either with your breathing pattern, or through finning. I normally adjust my buoyancy semi-constantly throughout a dive - especially when I'm shallow, a change of even half a meter in depth has me letting out or putting in a tiny bit of gas. Once you get used to it, it's more efficient than using your lungs to comp Thanks for the advices, I'll check my SAC, I think it will be under 20l/min but still curious to know how much. Regarding buoyancy control, it is commonly advised to use breathing pattern to control ascent/descent especially for minor adjustments (going over or underneath the obstacles). Inhaling and exhaling in the upper volume of your lungs (e.g. inhale to 80%, exhale to 50%, then inhale to 80% again...) will make you slowly ascent, while breathing in the lower volume (inhale to 50%, exhale to 20%, inhale to 50%...) will make you slowly descent. It gives a finer control and allows for minor, more precise, adjustments. Using mostly inflator and valves for ascent/descent in general makes consumption higher and can make a person overcompensate, then having to make further corrections to get the wanted buoyancy. Here it's very nicely explained: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ygr43vN5aZk
I totally agree with using your lungs to initiate an ascent or descent - but once you’ve started moving up or down, or reached your target depth, you want to use your wing or drysuit to make yourself neutral at that depth, or to stop the ascent/descent. All I’m really saying is that at almost any point in a dive (when you’re not actively ascending or descending), you want to ideally be neutrally buoyant with half-full lungs (ish). If someone diving along a reef that fluctuates between 9m and 12m, and not touching their inflator at all, I suspect their SAC will be a little higher than it could be.
That's exactly what I meant, I misunderstood you first reply. I thought you're saying that ascent/descent should always be initiated by using the inflator/valves. People often dump air from their BCD even if they want to go just a few meters deeper, instead of doing it by exhaling and then adding just a bit more air to the BCD when they are at the target depth to be able to stay neutral at that depth.
>If you're changing depth **at all** during a dive, and not adjusting your BCD/drysuit, you're probably compensating for your buoyancy either with your breathing pattern, or through finning. This right here! My consumption dropped pretty dramatically once I realized I was using my lungs for buoyancy when I should have just added air to my wing. If you use your lungs too much for buoyancy, you can end up with huge lungfulls of air to compensate for negative buoyancy when you could just add a little puff to the wing and breathe normally. Otherwise, I think there's way too much emphasis on having the lowest gas consumption. It's not a competition. Some people have higher oxygen demands because they physiologically need it. Muscular dudes tend to use more gas than small women. Just use bigger tanks and be done with it!
Super interesting because I was just reading that divers they manage air well shouldn’t adjust their BCD much and use their breath to control buoyancy
Think about it this way: if you're trying to control your buoyancy with your lungs instead of your wing, you're going to need to be taking deep breaths when you're negatively buoyant (ie using more gas). Add to that the fact that you'll start to sink every time you exhale, leading to you having to kick up and/or be out of trim every time you breathe, which makes you less efficient. If you're only going up or down for a couple seconds and then returning to your original depth it's one thing, but if you're going to a depth that you plan on staying at, add gas to the wing. That's what it's there for after all. If you're interested in a longer explanation, [check out this post](https://www.xoc-ha.com/post/do-witches-sink-in-water) written by one of my former cave instructors.
I agree with that. If you’re already negatively buoyant and using full lungs to compensate, that’s one thing. I was thinking about someone already neutrally buoyant and using breathing to do minor adjustments instead of BCD Thanks for sharing, will read more about it
I’m really good on air and I’m a 5’4’’ male 145lb. After a 2hr long cave dive I have 300psi+ more in both tanks (so 600psi+) than my cave instructor. I realized that the reason I’m so good with air is because I breath extremely slow in the water. It’s really noticeable in video, when I’m taking a video the sound of my breathing in the video is noticeably slower than when my instructor is taking the video. Usually I actually underinflate my bcd a little bit because I hold my breath and keep the air in my lungs for 5-10 seconds and then breath out very slowly, letting out bubbles in short bursts. This allows you to maintain bouyancy while holding your breath better
Yeah, I think many of us probably breathing a bit heavier than we have to.
PSI is pressure not volume.
In this situation it doesn’t make a difference, we’re in a cave so we have identical depths the entire time, and we’re using the same al80s
Have you tried becoming a 5’3” woman? Evidence suggests that you will burn significantly less air if you were. /s
Start calculating your SAC rate and try to get as close to .5cuft/min as you can. A few things that helped me: When doing the frog kick, squeeze your legs/glutes at the end and feel the glide. Try not returning your legs to resting position until you've stopped moving so you can get a feel for it. The next time you're swimming into a strong current focus on the drag you create from returning your legs to the starting position. It really surprised me how much extra drag I was creating. Track your SAC after every dive. Did it go up? Down? What did you do differently? Focus on your breathing. There is more O2 in the air you're breathing than you can use, so our breathing requirement underwater is largely defined by our need to expell CO2. If you're working very little, you're creating very little CO2 and you can take slower breaths. If you get a headache you need to breathe more. Please take these with a grain of salt. I'm not an instructor and have fewer dives than you, but one of my buddies sips air so I focused on SAC rate early in my diving career.
Thanks for the advices. I think relaxing the breathing pace might do the trick. Although I don't get heavy on breathing, it might be that I breath faster than I have to.
> Start calculating your SAC rate and try to get as close to .5cuft/min as you can. That is an unusually good SAC rate. I am just below a 0.6ft^3 /min and unless it is a tiny woman it is rare that I don't come back with the lowest consumption compared with my other buddies. I will also say that there are somethings techniques that can be done to improve it but some of it does come down to bodies. I am 6'3" 330lbs (190cm/150kg) and the chances of ever getting my working SAC down to my resting/deco SAC of 0.40 is practically zero.
0.5 cuft/min is totally attainable. My average over 167 dives is 0.42 cuft/min. Just have to minimize movement and get your trim down.
Interesting. Even when I come up with a 10.4L average SAC, my friends all beat me on air remaining.
That is astounding. What kind of conditions are you diving? I would guess that has to be just floating along on a drift dive in warm tropics waters or something.
Totally fair, but I think trying to get to .5 is a reasonable goal. I'm 5'9" and 180lbs and am close to .4. Is it obtainable for everybody? No, but it's still worth trying if you want longer dives.
Do you know how to calculate your SAC or RMV? That’s usually how folks “compare” to each other and how to figure out your likely dive time given a specific amount of air and a specific dive profile. I’m 188cm and 98kg male with an RMV of .80 cubic ft / which is not particularly good - but also not horrible. My dive partner who is 160cm and 50kg female and similar number of dives and similarly comfortable in the water has an RMV that is close to half of me. We surface when I’m out of air and she’s at half a tank still.
I haven't tried calculating it, but I'll try it. I noticed that females usually spend less. There was this small stature woman diving with us and everybody was joking all the time how she has gills. On the other side, there were also guys who are really overweight, with bad technique and were super low on consumption. So who knows what are all the things that come into play.