Today was open water training day with Nick and Vanessa completing the Deep, Wreck and the Multi-level adventure dives of the Advanced Open Water with Andy and Paul.

Then Cathy and Vanessa completed Open Water Dive 1, and Cathy and Nick completed Open Water Dive 2 with Phil and Mark. Much credit must go to Phil and Mark who carried out their two training dives in 8mm wet suites at Dosthill Quarry today. Good work guys.

Friday night at the Leeds International Pool saw Guy and Jodi experience the 5 meter diving pit for the first time.  Rather than carrying out lots of skills we decided play a game of under water Frisbee instead, , to work on their buoyancy control.

Iain and Luke worked hard to get Graeme and Bethan through Open Dive 3. The group are working very hard in preparation for their upcoming trip to Malta.

In the Training Pool Chris worked with Justine and Lynn on their Discover Scuba Diving Experience.  This was also the first time Mark had joined the Diving Leisure Team during a training session.  We would all like to wish Mark luck with the rest of his Divemaster program.

Paul and Andy have carried out their PADI Drysuit Specialty at Blue Lagoon near Darington with the help of Yvette and Andy. Alex guided the students through their Dry Suit speciality dives 1 and 2 and the Under Water Navigation Dive towards their advanced Open Water.

Graham and Bethan came along to the Centre to complete some more of their Open Water Theory.  Getting great scores on their Open Water Theory.

Wednesday night pool Session at Tong Recreation Centre. Paul and Andy completed their dry suit orientations in preparation for their PADI Drysuit Specialty at Blue Lagoon tomorrow. Alex had the guys working on fin pivots, hovers and also removing and replacing the scuba unit and weight system at the surface.

The session was not quite as dry as it should have been for Andy though as his suit leaked! Quite badly!!

Cathy and Vanessa helped Phil, Mark and Karen through Open Water Module 3 in preparation for Saturday’s Open Water dives at Dosthill Quarry and Declan gave Dave a run for his money while completing Open Water Module 2 in the pool.

Today, we seperated the Michael Schumacher from the Driving Miss Daisy!  And what fun we had finding out.

17 drivers started the race, 11 of them were from Diving Leisure Leeds and 14 finished the race.  The 580m track with a 100m tunnel which runs under the raised pit lane is the start the race.  Accellerating to top speeds of 45mph (which trust me is very fast that close to the ground) you arrive at the first hairpin bend leading into the schicane and into a sweeping left hand bend over the bridge.

As you drop over the bridge at ever increasing speeds, you have to be fast on the breaks for another hairpin...
Too heavy and the back end is out and you spin into the wall!!

James gets the black flag from the officials and is brought into the raised pit lane. Alex (Bowser) with a late brake point, desperate to pass Sarah, gets undertaken by Allistair (King Cooper), a dirty but effective tactic.

Nick and Aaron came into the dive centre and kept Alex busy for most of the day.  Working on the final aspects of the PADI Digital Underwater Photography specialty program Nick developed some fantastic photo's from his dives in Capernwray.

With some useful hints and tips about how to manipulate images in Photoshop, Nick has ended up with some great shots.  (See Gallery - DUP Spec Jan 07)