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Back in March of 2010 I enrolled in and completed the FII Level One freediving course . I was extremely happy with the course content and the outcome (check out the SpearView ). Unfortunately for me, I'm not a professional freediver, so as with many people, life gets in the way and complicated which in turn keeps you from building a true regimen that reinforces all the good behavior learned in the course. Needless to say, I forgot some of the basics, fell back into many of my old bad habits...
Over the weekend of March 27 th & 28 th I took the Level 1 Freediving course offered by FII (Freediving Instructors International) at their Headquarters in Pompano Beach FL. FII was started by Martin Stepanek, a multiple time freediving world record holder. The Level 1 curriculum is taught over a 2 day course. The first day is classroom and pool based and spans almost 9 hours. This course is designed for beginning freedivers and is supposed to get novice divers to a depth of 66 feet.
Throughout my relatively short history in spearfishing (as of this writing), I have only used a few different spearguns. Now obviously, my opinion in this matter is not one of extreme trial and error. Mostly it consists of recommendations made to me by those I spearfish with along with some of my own common sense. In the beginning (early 1990's), I used one of my brother-in-law's extra guns. Specifically, a 38" Arbalette. Now this gun had already seen finer days by the time I started using it....
Over the winter I looked into and purchased a couple of sets of Reef Runner Gear's fin skins. I had contemplated having my own manufactured but when I came accross these, it just didn't seem worth the hassle. You can create your own custom design for a few bucks more and although you can run into some small snags when doing so (I'll elaborate later on), Jon from Reef Runner Gear is an awesome guy to work with and he will do everything he can to make things right.
The summer had been busier than I would have liked this year and I honestly hadn't had as many opportunities to post much less given much thought to writing a new SpearView, but after having time to really reconsider, I realized that I had actually had multiple opportunities to try out new equipment this year (not all of it successfully). Further to that point, when I took the PFI Freediver course back in March I had decided to invest in a new mask and ended up deciding on the Omer Zero Cubed...
This review is actually long overdue as I've had this mask for well over a year now and I honestly don't know why I hadn't done it before now. After trying multiple masks over several years (and several hundred dollars), some were good (Mystic, Star, Nano), and some were bad (Zero Cubed). Before this, I had actually decided upon the Cressi Nano as "the one". I thoroughly enjoyed the fit and volume of the Nano, but there were a couple of VERY minor issues with the fit. I'm convinced that the...
Winds: 5-10 variable Seas: 1-2 feet Surf Temp: +/- 73F Viz: 15-25 feet The viz was actually better than we had hoped for, but the water was pretty chilly. The moon was also wreaking havoc with the tides. Fortunately for us, it was the good kind of havoc. We jumped in expecting to have missed slack tide altogether and were able to dive for another 1 1/2 hours. Unfortunately, we had to cut our dive short not due to the tides, but due to a little run in with a couple of the locals I'm always...
Seas: 1-2 feet Winds: 10-15 E/SE Viz: 20-25 feet Temp: 84 F This weekend was looking really good from the forecast all week. Winds were supposed to be no more than 10-15 ESE with seas holding up at 1-2' inside the reef and a not-too-terrible 2-4' outside the reef. Unfortunately, as good as that sounds, it's not always the only determnining factor in having a good (or great) spearfishing weekend. Even though all the signs were pointing at another picture perfect weekend, we would be reminded...
I won't even bother putting up any stats about this weekend's weather because it would only remind me how bad the past 3 weekends have been due to the fact that the Atlantic has just remembered that it's hurricane season and we have had (and will continue to have for at least the next couple of weeks) tropical storms and hurricanes wreaking havoc with the seas and weather. After having one of the best visibility summers I can remember, it has all come to a crashing halt! From what I could see,...
Winds: 30 east Seas: 5-8 feet Surf Temp: ?F Viz: 0 feet Unfortunately, even the weather people have to get one right every once in a while. This weekend was everything just as advertised. The winds were howling at about 25-30 mph from the east which made it for very rough going for those brave few that even attempted to get on the water this weekend. We ended up breaking out some frozen fish and lobster and cooking up a big meal for everyone. While the company was great, the fishing was...
Winds: S 5 Seas: 1-2 ft Surf Temp: 86 F Viz: 35-40 ft Saturday was not a good day... I mean, the weather was fine but I just wasn't having a good day. We went back to a spot we had found the week before in about 40-42 feet of water. Last week the viz was absolutely incredible, but unfortunately so was the current. We were fighting what felt to me like a 2-3 knot current. It was an incredible amount of work just to stay put. We spotted about a 10-12 lb mutton but the second I broke the surface...
Winds: 8-10 West Seas: 2-4 feet Surf Temp: 83 F Viz: 10-15 feet Today we went to some of our closer spots, due to the lack of visibility at our offshore patch reefs. Visibility was minimal to nil at most locations deeper than 15 feet. To make matters worse, we missed the tide and were only able to shoot fish for about an hour and a half. The entire days catch amounted to 1 grouper and 1 hogfish. I was glad to finally catch a grouper. It seems like Jewfish (Goliath Grouper) have moved in and...