What’s The Flipping Issue With Fins? Annoying Brad By Wanting To Buy Stuff!

So you’ve decided to have a go at snorkelling. You’ve got your mask, you’ve navigated your way through the ordeal of buying a snorkel and now you just need to pick out a pair of fins for your feet and you’re ready for that first snorkelling trip. Here, however, is where the problems really begin - beads of sweat begin to bloom on your forehead at the thought - you’ll need to decide between adjustable heel and full foot. Then you’ll need to decide if you want paddle, split, channelled or classic, short or long, light or heavy and you’ll have to try them on to make sure they fit and this means - the beads of sweat are now forming torrents down your face - you’ll need to visit a diving shop and discuss the matter with the incumbent Brad: diving instructor, commando, helicopter gunship pilot and all round adventuring guru who just happens to be working in a dive store this week.

  

In normal circumstances popping into a shop and buying something you want is a simple and sometimes pleasurable experience (men excluded) but you know, face-to-face with a Brad, you might do something unforgivable, something heinous, something so shocking in the world of diving that even inviting your friend’s wife to an orgy in Brighton pales into moral insignificance. You might just inadvertently refer to fins as flippers! And you know that should you commit this most odious faux pas, the response will be swift and violent. Brad will go red in the face; the veins at his temples will throb, dribbles of saliva will froth at the sides of his mouth and in a sudden explosive outburst he will scream. ‘Flipper is a bloody dolphin – they’re called fins!” You will then be unceremoniously asked to leave and your interest in the sport of snorkelling will end in a single, ego-crushing, encounter. For members of the club, the act of turning a Brad red-faced with indignant anger has become a rasion d’etre in itself. In fact we often seek out a Brad and take bets on how quickly one of us can reduce them to a puce coloured, screaming ball of rage. Nevertheless we know that many newcomers to the sport are often intimidated by the snotty attitude of the Brad clique so here’s what you need to know before you buy those all important underwater foot propulsion accessories you need and how to handle the Brad that’s selling them to you.

Published in 1960

Let’s start with the name. Certain divers (those we call Brads) call them fins and there is a reason for this, they have no sense of humour! You see in the early days fins were in fact called flippers – even the demi-god of diving, Jacques Cousteau called them flippers. Way back in the 1950’s and 1960’s Hollywood films and TV shows which dealt with diving also referred to them as flippers and then in 1964 an aquatic Lassie called Flipper arrived on the scene. Brads the world over never seem to wonder why the dolphin was called Flipper. Nevertheless what they did wonder was why suddenly everyone kept pointing, as they donned their frogman outfits, and shouting “don’t forget your flippers” before falling about laughing and making squeaking noises. In short diving wasn’t being taking seriously and Brads were getting fed up with having their frogman’s foot paddles jokingly called flippers. Something had to be done and quicker than you can say “get a life Brad” divers were calling them fins. Fins, as far as Brad is concerned, aren’t funny and neither is diving and to reinforce that fact anyone who dared enter the world of Brad and called them flippers was subjected to a counter offensive of mirth and derision.This could of course just be supposition on our part but it’s as good a reason as any. For having searched the internet high and low, browsed through a small mountain of diving manuals and consulted a couple of men in a bar – who claim to know about these things – we couldn’t find any other legitimate reason why Brads insist on calling them fins. In nature, fins and flippers are pretty much the same thing it’s just a question of semantics really. So all you newcomers out there can be content in the knowledge that calling them flippers is as justifiable as calling them fins. And, should you be the victim of a Braddy rebuke, simply raise a disdainful eyebrow and with professorial condescension reply that if it is good enough for Jacques Cousteau it is good enough for you. That’s true by the way; Cousteau did call them flippers. 

Now that we’ve dealt with the fact that you can happily call them flippers or anything else you feel like, what type do you really need? Flippers come in many guises and are designed for varying purposes, many of which have no relevance to snorkelling, so let’s stick with the fundamentals.Flippers are either open heel pockets with adjustable straps or full foot pockets. Open heels are really designed to be used with neoprene boots in cooler environments so for warm weather snorkelling we recommend you go for a full foot design – they are much more comfortable and if needs be, can be used with thinner neoprene socks. Now we come to the blade and things get a lot more complicated.The type of snorkelling you are going to do will dictate the blade length. For the most basic snorkelling, in calm sheltered waters of a coral reef, the snorkeller will benefit from using a short blade to avoid damaging marine life and stirring up sediment. If however, you are looking to snorkel in deeper, more turbulent waters, a short fin will be useless and a longer blade will be necessary otherwise you’ll find yourself kicking like mad with little or no effect. Remember as well, that the longer the blade the more effort will be needed to move the blade through the water. So what about the blade design? Should you go for the more rigid paddle or split? Each has its pros and cons and much will rely on individual preference and the type of snorkelling activity you are intending to do.

Split blades are often claimed to be 40% more efficient than paddle designs. As the blade moves through the water, the two wing shaped surfaces create lift and forward propulsion like a propeller. Water travelling over the blade is forced into and out of the split allowing the snorkeller to use low amplitude “flutter kicks” thereby reducing exertion without any loss in performance. Split blades also benefit from the fact that the design itself almost adapts to the wearers kick, compensating for the more erratic style without loss of forward motion. Snorkellers who have knee, joint or back problems will benefit from the reduced effort the split design offers. 

As we have said a lot relies on individual preference and we know some people who flinch at the thought of split blades. They argue that although splits reduce effort they are no good for the real power needed in rough water and that nothing beats a traditional paddle blade. Paddle design makes use of a flat flexible blade that as the name suggests, acts like a paddle, pushing water down and behind thus propelling the snorkeller forward. The blades efficiency can be improved by channelling which creates a U shape that captures and contains more water as it is moved up and down. The power argument for paddle blades does of course suffer from a significant problem, it simply doesn’t add up. No blade will give you more power - that comes from you. Paddle blades simply provide more resistance to the water and therefore the harder you kick the more water is moved and the quicker you go…. And the quicker you become exhausted. More power means more effort and that means your muscles and particularly your ankles will have to do a lot more work. Feeling like you’ve just run a marathon after twenty minutes in the water is probably not what a lot of recreational snorkellers are after. So now you know you can call them flippers and the types of design that are out there but which one should you buy?

As we said the best starting point is to decide what type of snorkelling you are going to do, what will the conditions be like and what are your individual physical capabilities, Then make a decision on how much you want to spend. Cheap does not mean good, it simply means cheap. Don’t think the items on sale are a bargain often they’re just the stuff that doesn’t sell! And stay away from snorkel set packages. Buying a package is like ordering from the set menu in a restaurant, you never really get what you want. Equally don’t think that splurging the cash on a set of all singing, all dancing flippers is the answer. If you don’t go cave diving why buy a set of flippers designed for cave divers? And of course avoid anything that has “military grade specifications or materials” highlighted in the advertising – just like Brad you are not a commando, no matter what he says! Keep things simple, practical and cost effective and you can’t go far wrong. To put our money where our mouth is here are the flipping fins we use

 

Split design 

TUSA X-Pert Evolution

Most of the club use the TUSA X-pert evolution full foot pocket. Regardless of the conditions these flippers have performed superbly. The minimal effort needed to propel yourself through the water increases the amount of time you can spend in the big blue and at around £30 these are lightweight, stylish and hard to beat for price.

 Paddle design

Cressi Rondine Palua

Several of us use the Cressi Rondine Palua open heel. Cressi have been making diving and snorkelling equipment for a very long time and rarely get it wrong. The Palua has an elasticated heel strap made from soft elastomer (whatever that is) which makes it easy to put them on in or out of the water. The flexible blade provides excellent propulsion without all the strenuous effort needed with some other paddle designs. Lightweight, easy to pack and at around £20 these really are great travel fins – sorry flippers!

  

 

 And here’s one we got wrong

 

Why?

U.S Divers Trek fin: like a bad smell, no one in the club will admit to having anything to do with these awful things. Yet there they are, tucked away in their own little travel bag, a visible reminder that even we are occasionally victim to the sales pitch of Brad. They are designed for the backpacking snorkeller who might suddenly happen upon a deserted beach or lake and fishing around in their pack (avoiding all the soiled underwear) pull out a pair of very short, very rigid paddle flippers and dive in. The sales pitch was something about short and inflexible being nothing to worry about as they have been engineered to give you the power to get you through the water due to the wider than normal blade. Err… That might be true but they are also incredibly uncomfortable, incredibly ineffective and the straps break with worrying ease. At around £15 they are also cheap and we have noticed that they are often sold as a package – we should have known!

 

So that’s it. Call them flippers, don’t listen to Brads sales pitch and remember to make sure the flippers, fins, frogman’s shoes, diving paddles or underwater foot extensions you buy actually fit…… It really isn’t that hard is it?

Sport Diving Needs A Hero: It Ain't You Brad

In the editors letter in the March edition of Sport Diver (the official publication of the PADI diving association in the UK), the editor, Mark Evans, reflects on the sad death of the “First Lady of Diving” Lotte Haas in January of this year and asks: where are all the new diving heroes? 

Mark Evans writes: Lotte, together with her husband Hans, pioneered scuba diving adventures on the silver screen in the 1950’s and along with charismatic Frenchman Jacques-Yves Cousteau, were responsible for getting entire generations actively involved in our sport by bringing a whole new world to an excited audience. Mark goes on to say: We desperately need modern day heroes’ of this calibre to bring the underwater world to the masses.  

Mark highlights that there are the likes of Steve Backshall, Miranda Krestovnikoff and Monty halls (and before you ask, we don’t know either), who are all doing their bit to raise the profile of diving through more-mainstream channels, but the likes of Lotte, Hans and Cousteau were mega-stars of their time whose appeal spanned the globe and captured the attention of young and old alike.

Mark then makes a final appeal: going forward, we also need Hollywood to splash diving all the cinemas again, but in a positive, engaging and exciting fashion – no more Open Water rubbish thank you!

Mark’s lament, first got us raising our glasses in a last tribute to the late, great and gorgeous Lotte Haas and then putting them down again as we ruminated on his words. Is he right? Does diving lack modern heroes? And if so, why?

Lotte Haas

Our first thought was, that to a degree, Mark has answered his own question. Lotte, Hans, Jacques-Yves Cousteau et al, were exactly what he said they were: pioneers. They broke new ground, they invented and then developed their own equipment, they often risked their lives and like others of their ilk (Ron and Valerie Taylor anyone?) they brought the diving world to a whole new audience. They were definitely heroes, but more to the point they were heroes of their time. In the fifties and sixties the ability to travel to exotic locations and then plunge into the azure ocean in search of adventure were limited to a wealthy few. Back in the 1950’s, World War Two was still a deep, dark scar on the world. In Britain for example, a holiday adventure in 1950 was little more than a camping trip to a damp field in Cornwall or a dreary weekend in a rainy seaside town – grandparents included. Diving back then was something few people outside of the Navy had ever even heard of and even if they had, we bet they had very little money to squander on unproven diving equipment and, as often as not, unproven airlines. The underwater adventures of Lotte Haas were therefore pure escapism, something that captured your imagination in the local cinema rather than something you got involved with on your local beach. Nowadays of course, anyone with a passport and a few pounds in their pocket can pop on a plane and in less than a working day be walking barefoot on an idyllic sandy beach. The escapist world of Lotte and Hans is no longer something that you can only dream about on a wet night in Scunthorpe, but something you can actually do yourself. The world of diving is now, more than ever, open to far more than any of the early pioneers could have imagined. Perhaps, though, that is part of the problem. If every paradise isle is jammed packed with divers, all doing exactly the same thing, with exactly the same GoPro camera, where is the originality? To be a pioneer you have to do something that someone else hasn’t done before.

Then we thought about Mark’s plea to Hollywood: We also need Hollywood to splash diving all over the cinemas again, but in a positive, engaging and exciting fashion.

So Mark wants Hollywood to make a film all about diving, but not one that shows any of the inherent dangers of going into an environment that evolution has singularly made you unsuitable for. Instead he wants Hollywood to make a film that is inspiring, engaging, exciting and well, just bloody jaw-dropping tremendous, that even the most aqua-phobic among us will dive head first into the sea at the first opportunity. No sharks though, we can’t stress that too much, there must definitely be no sharks, and absolutely no moray eels hiding in crevices. So no remakes of Jaws, The Deep, Open Water, Deep Blue Sea, or any of these films that Diver Magazine (the North American Publication) calls the best diving movies of all time.

Mark, it seems, has a very different opinion about what makes a film engaging or exciting from the rest of us and we suspect doesn’t understand that Hollywood makes films in order to make money, not to support the diving industry but that aside, there is a fundamental problem with such an appeal – it requires someone else to do something! That’s not particularly pioneering Mark!

The old version of GoPro lacked portability

Can you imagine Lotte and Hans or Jacques or Valerie or Ron or even Monty Halls (and no we still don’t know who he is) sitting around and wondering when someone else is going to film all the stuff they were doing? No of course you can’t, pioneers don’t wait for other people to do things they get on with it, that’s what being a pioneer is all about and a quick perusal of the list in the Women Divers Hall of Fame, shows that there seems to be a great deal of women doing exactly that.

So what’s going on here? Diving has had it’s pioneers, it has had it’s movies so why does Mark Evans think that the it still needs someone of high calibre to bring the sport to a whole new audience? Then we thought about our own early diving experiences and why we prefer snorkelling and we had an answer. It’s all down to Brad.

You see our sport has many advantages over diving. You don’t need a lot of expensive equipment. You don’t need to join PADI or BSAC. You don’t need to know how to correctly spell Cousteau and more importantly, and this is the crux of the matter, you don’t have to spend time with Brad. 

The diving world is full of Brads; you meet them in every dive shop, every dive operation and dive club around the world. Brad of course comes in different shapes and sizes but the Brad species all have one thing in common – he has an unbelievably over-inflated opinion of himself. You would think that you might be able to avoid an encounter with Brad but you would be wrong. The diving world it seems, insists that anyone’s first foray into the sport must begin with a meeting with Brad. Yep, Brad is your diving instructor and he is adamant that he is going to make you look a complete berk while he teaches you the basics of diving in a hotel swimming pool. Of course Brad doesn’t normally teach people to dive, as he will explain ad nauseam. Brad’s real job (the one he’s taking a break from in order to train you hapless tourists ‘not to kill yourself out there’ in the deep blue) is a fighter pilot or a Navy commando or mine clearance expert or, and this is becoming more prevalent in Braddy world, a Green peace defender of the earth. Yep Brad is taking a year off from all the stress of being a Top Gun, storming beaches, disarming mines with toothpicks and smuggling whales out of Japan in his board shorts, just to make sure you know the difference between a fin and a flipper. Flipper is a dolphin according to Brad. According to the rest of the world, Flipper is a fictional character in a TV series portrayed by a variety of Cetaceans’ or those things that you put on your feet that helps propel you through the water. Brad is the antithesis of all that Mark Evans wants. Far from being engaging, charismatic, exciting and likeable; Brad is annoying, obnoxious and soooooo boring that most people who encounter him and his egocentric ilk are deterred from ever getting involved in diving again. So Mark Evans is wrong when he laments the lack of modern diving heroes. You see, the real legacy of Lotte Haas and the legends of her time is that diving no longer needs a modern hero or a Hollywood blockbuster to bring the sport to the masses – that’s already been done! What the sport of diving needs is to stop Brad and his gormless, mind-numbingly dull brethren ruining that legacy for millions.

An afterthought. Several beers later, we suddenly realised that there are no real snorkelling heroes – apart from The Dangerous Snorkelling Club of course. Then we found this picture of Top Gear presenter Jeremy Clarkson. He may be fat, have bad teeth and be offensive to Argentinians and Mexicans but we’d rather have a beer with him than Brad. Cheers Jezza and very a big cheers to you Lotte – the underwater world, has indeed, lost a heroine.

 

Who are you looking at Brad?