Prospective military service members should devote a significant amount of time to physical and mental preparation for military training. Adding tactical skills such as shooting, land navigation and scuba diving is useful. Still, it could be detrimental if you learn these skills the wrong way, creating bad habits and forcing you to relearn them the way the military teaches them. Here is a question about scuba diving before diving training:
Does getting scuba qualified before military dive school training help? I have heard yes and no, similar to shooting guns and developing bad habits that you must break and re-learn, versus learning the first time. Is that right? Thanks, Liam
Liam, I have not heard that comparison with shooting and diving. I will say, I started scuba diving five years before Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL (BUD/S) training. I found it more useful than not because BUD/S wasn’t the first time I’d been breathing underwater with compressed air. You will also get a head start on learning dive tables, emergency procedures, equalizing ear pressure and clearing a mask underwater. For me, it made the diving phase at SEAL training much easier. However, many in my class had never dived before and did fine. In fact, a few people in the class had never seen the ocean before arriving in Coronado, California, for SEAL training, and they made it.
At best, a civilian scuba course will provide familiarization with military dive training. You will learn different procedures, perform tactical applications and use different dive tables. All will be similar, but they’ll be different enough that you’ll still be learning how to dive scuba, even though you’ll have been diving before training.
Your comment about shooting is valid. If you go into training with an open mind, you will do well with the new coaching you receive. Once again, you will be re-learning to shoot if you know how to handle weapons. The class is typically split into people who have hunted or shot guns and those who have never touched a gun. The best shot in our class had never touched a gun before, but he was a quick learner. He competed against another guy in the class who grew up hunting and did well with the rifle but not well with the pistol. In other words, it can go either way for you during training. If you have bad habits you need to break, it may take longer to succeed in tactical training. If you are a beginner, it depends on how quickly you can learn and adapt to new skills and feedback.
If you can take an orienteering course and learn how to use a compass, walk in the woods and use a map to guide yourself through the terrain, you may find it helpful later in your military training. These are valuable skills regardless of whether you decide to serve. I suggest that you experience as much as you can before joining. You could jump from planes, shoot guns, learn land navigation, scuba dive and even do military exposure events. These experiences will either cement your resolve to serve or make you realize you want to do something else in life. The more you learn about a potential profession, the better, in my opinion, and that goes for military members, police, firefighters, first responders and civilians alike.
Check out more Ask Stew articles in the Military.com Fitness Section. There are hundreds of common tactical fitness questions answered on the fitness pages. If you have a question, send it to Stew Smith at [email protected].
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