13 replies to this topic

[finGrabber]

I know how to do helicopter turns and I'm not the best at a modifed frog kick, but how do you back up? Finning, I mean!

[WVMike]

I know how to do helicopter turns and I'm not the best at a modifed frog kick, but how do you back up? Finning, I mean!

Hey FG,

That would be a Back Kick, the hardest of them all.

It is sort of a reverse frog kick, I have a couple of AVI files that show it. PM me your email and I will send them to you.

VW

[Walter]

I think finning should be against the law, it wastes most of the shark.

To back up, simply reverse your frog kick.

[finGrabber]

Oh Walter!!!

[Dennis]

That's my brother.

[Walter]

What's funny about finning? It's a horrible practice.

[finGrabber]

I know...finning is horrible

but, all I want to figure out is how to reverse my frog kick...

[ScubaDadMiami]

The thought never occurred to me to kick backwards before I started hearing about it from all of the people that were taking the DIR Fundamentals classes. When I tried it for the first times, it felt quite abnormal. The day after, the muscles involved were tired and achy from never being used like this before. Thank goodness nobody saw me trying to figure it out at first.

After plenty of practice, I got through it in doubles for my Fundies class, and I can now do it (and actually get somewhere) in double 120s with two 40 deco bottles while remaining at a set depth. So, I guess you can say that I figured it out. So will you after enough practice.

I still practice it when on dives where I am practicing other skills dives, or during deco stops to pass the time away. I think that it is a nice thing to be able to demonstrate. However, I really don't see much use of it. (Shall I duck the DIR lightning bolts that are about to strike? ) Inside any kind of tight area, it is pretty ineffective and it will silt the place out. Out in open water, one can certainly move faster by simply turning around and then moving forward in the desired direction.

About the only time I can think of any use for it is when needing to stay face to face with someone when the current starts to push you toward that other person. Perhaps this kind of thing would happen while instructing a student or something. I think it is really more of a demonstration skill, and I wouldn't make a big deal of it if it takes a while to get the hang of it.

Having said all of this, I can also tell you that you can watch all of the video you want. However, you won't know what you are watching unless you know what to look for.

Step one: While in a normal frog kick position, your upper legs are straight and parallel to your body. Your knees are bent at 90 degrees, and your fins are also parallel to your body (90 degrees from your shins).

Now, think of rowing a boat. The first thing you need to do is to get your fins to where they are going to pull your stroke. You need to get them there without having them push you forward, the opposite of the direction you are trying to go. So, to accomplish this, you need to slice your fins through the water by keeping them so that the blades move to a position where your legs are completely straight with your fins pointing straight behind you as well.

This means that your fins must move from above your body to the same level as your body while also moving back. Think for a second: What will happen if you try to move your fins down to where your body is from up above your body, where they are at the beginning of the stroke? Right! Moving your fins down will make the blade kick your lower body upward (and possibly your entire body forward). So, this can't work.

Position two: What you need to do is to open your knees. This does not mean to drop you knees! Just open them while keeping your upper legs parallel to your body. While opening your knees, keep your feet and fins touching each other, trying to press the bottoms of your feet together. Don't allow them to separate from each other. This is key! In fact, while your knees open, you will find that instead of your ankles touching each other, the farther your knees go apart, the more that the bottom of your feet will roll toward each other. When you finish this step, your uppper legs are still parallel to your body, your knees are wide open, and the soles of your feet are touching each other (not flat against each other completely, but I hope that you are getting the idea). Because of the position of your feet, your fins should now be forming a V-shape between each other rather than being perfectly parallel to your body. This V-shape is going to slice through the water without propelling you forward or lifting your lower body upwards as you move into position number three. One last thing about the fins, the sides of the blades should also be touching each other the entire time you are doing this first step. So, your fins are still touching each other from the end of the blade to your heel after opening your knees.

Position three: Keeping your fins in the V-shape, you want SLOWLY to push back your fin blades, stretching out your fins as far back behind you as you possibly can until your legs are straight. This will naturally cause your knees to come back together, and, once you get to your full stretched capacity, your fins will go back to being parallel to the ocean bottom instead of being in the V-shape. You should end out with your legs totally straight and your fins pointing straight back behind you in line with your straight body. Congratulations! You have gotten your fins into position to do your power stroke without conteracting the direction you are trying to go.

Position four: Make sure you are totally stretched out with your fins as far back as they can go! If you are just a little short of this, you will lose all of your power when you do the kick part. So, I am making a position four to let you know just how important this is (even though you are really supposed to be there at the end of position three).

Position five: You want to use your fins like boat oars in a row boat. You don't want to just bring them back toward your head in a straight line. You want to sweep them outward while also sweeping them toward your head. You want to move them fast enough to get the maximum power out of them while also getting as much traction with the water as possible.

What do I mean by this? If you are in a car, you can press the accelerator so much that your tires spin. That is too much. You can lightly press on the accelerator, not giving your car (assuming an automatic transmission for our example) enough power to move forward when you are on a steep incline. What you are shooting for is to press the accelerator to the point just before the wheels lose traction and start to spin.

In addition to sweeping the fins out and toward your head, you are going to spread your knees to use your whole leg to push the fin in this sweep. However, you do not want to let your knees drop while doing this. Your upper legs must always stay in line with your body. You are also going to use your foot and ankle to make sure that the blade of the fin is now at 90 degrees of your body as it sweeps, so that it can really grab the water.

Position six: When you have moved your fins as far as you can, you need to relax and glide a bit. Again, think of the row boat. When you take the first couple of strokes, the boat does not want to move. After it gets going, momentum helps move you faster. So, don't expect to move far on the first stroke. Also, if you have done this right, you are not changing your depth (a common mistake is to move backwards and upward due to not bringing the fins as far back as possible before starting the stroke).

Position seven: Move your fins back together into position two. You knees are already apart but your fin blades are back together in the V-shape, ready to stretch back for the next cycle.

I might have broken it down differently than the way some others do this. I also exaggerated some of the points until you get a feel for what it is like to do the stroke efficiently. However, I think that if you now watch the video of this kick, you will see more because you will know what to look for in each step.

When you start practicing, you will sometimes kick too hard and sometimes not enough. You will forget to stretch back all the way before making the power stroke. Sometimes, you will nail in for only one stroke. Keep trying! You will get better at it.

Good luck! Be sure to load your demonstration quality backward kick up on the web for all to see when you have mastered it

[ScubaDadMiami]

Here is some video footage of basic skills. I like it because you can see that it is not perfect demonstration quality in many respects, which gives you an idea of what typical issues are when working on these skills. It's a long video . . . .

http://homepage.mac....eTheater12.html

[ScubaPunk]

Another possible use for the back kick would be for underwater photographers who need to back away from their subject matter while taking pictures, so they don't drift into it. I think I read that on another thread on this board.

[Walter]

I back up quite a bit. I'm always poking my head into holes. Rather than reach out & push, I usually swim backwards out of the hole. If you teach, it's handy when watching students from time to time.

[Sophia]

Leave it to finnie to ask a fin-ing question.

[WVMike]

Hey ScubadadMiami,

Real nice description. It can be hard to put muscle movements into words, you did a good job. Your description with the video clips works well.

Mike

[steelemagnolia6]

ok finning sounds a bit ummmm kinky to a non diver I bet.... I haven't mastered it yet so I do a sort of interesting backward swipe with my hands... but then again.. it does look rather like a spasam of some kind...

I am trying it... if I ever get all my other issues under control first.. I am sure that backing up witll come in time