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The Real Reason I Want You in Tech: It’s Not Just Dark and Deep

Benjamin Hadfield   Dec 08, 2025

You know that feeling when you finish a dive and think, “That was fun… but I know there’s more”?

More depth. More time. More confidence. And definitely more understanding than just, “Well, the computer said it was fine, so I guess I live another day.”

That’s where technical diving—and especially courses like Advanced Nitrox / Decompression Procedures (AN/DP) as well as Heliotrox—come in. Even if you never plan to dive to 300 feet on trimix or scooter through a cave like some sort of underwater Batman, tech training can completely upgrade your diving life.

And yes, it’s fun. It’s also a little humbling, occasionally brain-melting, and serious… often all in the same dive. Honestly, that’s exactly how I think good diving should feel.

Here at Stuart Scuba, we absolutely love this side of diving. I’m Benjamin Hadfield – Technical Diving Instructor Trainer, which is a fancy way of saying I spend a lot of time in that magical zone where science, skills, and calm, controlled decision-making all come together.

So let’s talk about why tech diving should be in your future—what you’ll learn, what you should have under your belt before AN/DP, and a few of my favorite “little secrets” that make both recreational and technical diving smoother, safer, and a lot more fun.

 

Why Tech Diving Belongs in Your Future (Even If You’re “Just” a Recreational Diver)

Tech isn’t just about going deeper. It’s about doing better.

Technical training makes you:

  • Calmer in the water
  • Sharper with your planning and awareness
  • More in control of your buoyancy, trim, and gas
  • More useful to your buddies and team
     

If recreational diving is like learning to drive a car, tech is like learning high-performance driving. You might still drive the speed limit… but you understand what’s going on under the hood, and you stop doing dumb things like riding the brakes all the way down the hill.

From “Procedures Diver” to “Resource Diver”

This is one of the biggest mindset shifts in tech training.

  • A procedures diver knows what to do:
    • “At 1,000 psi, we go up.”
    • “Computer says no-deco, so I’m fine.”
    • “We follow the guide.”

  • A resource diver knows why and how:

    • They understand gas planning, not just “I start with 3000 psi.”

    • They can calculate the minimum gas/rock bottom, not just hope it’s enough.

      • They understand decompression theory, not just “my computer beeped, and I went up.”

      • They bring skills, tools, and a calm brain to the team, instead of just being another person to manage.

In tech training, you become the diver other people are glad to have in the water—because you bring solutions, not just problems.

 

Things You’ll Learn in Tech Training That Make You a Better Diver (Everywhere)

Here’s what really changes when you go tech.

1. The Art of Relaxing in the Water

One of the first superpowers you gain:
You learn to just hang there.

No sculling. No bicycle kicks. No hands. Just… existing in the water column.

Little Secret #1: If your fins are always moving, you’re not really neutral—your legs are doing the work your buoyancy should be doing.

Tech training drills this into you with:

  • Long midwater stops

  • Skills performed without touching the bottom, the line, or your buddy

  • Hovering while thinking and doing, not just posing for photos

Once you’ve done a 20-minute deco stop without kicking, holding depth within a foot or two… that safety stop at 15 ft on a reef feels like a vacation.

 

2. Thinking Through Situations (Instead of Reacting to Them)

Technical divers are taught to:

Stop – Breathe – Think – Act

You’ll work through simulated failures:

  • Valve shutdowns

  • Lost gas scenarios

  • Lost deco gas plans

  • Team member issues
     

You don’t just learn “if X, do Y.” You learn:

  • Why that failure matters

  • What your options are

  • How to prioritize problems under stress
     

That same mindset works wonders when your mask floods on a shallow reef, your buddy suddenly rockets to the surface, or the current picks up unexpectedly. You stop being surprised by surprises.

Little Secret #2: Most “emergencies” feel way smaller when you’ve already practiced much worse ones on purpose. I also like to teach “The best way to fix a problem is to not have it in the first place”.

3. Buoyancy, Trim, and “Stop Playing Elevator with Your BCD”

In tech, sloppy buoyancy isn’t just ugly—it messes with gas usage, deco, and most importantly… your and others' safety. So you get relentless about:

  • Horizontal trim

  • Slow, controlled ascents

  • Micro-adjustments with lung volume instead of “inflate/deflate chaos.”
     

Little Secret #3: If your ascent looks like tapping the elevator button (“up, oops, down, oops, up”), your body is paying for it in microbubbles and stress.

Once you tune this in, your recreational diving becomes smoother, less tiring, and way easier on your body.

4. Gas Planning and “Why” Your Algorithms Matter

You’ll learn:

  • How to plan gas for the whole dive, not just “turn at 1500.”

  • How to calculate minimum gas to safely get two divers up from depth after a problem.

  • The logic behind gradient factors, decompression stops, and ascent rates.
     

Instead of blindly trusting a computer, you’ll understand what it’s asking from your body. That understanding alone makes you a more deliberate, safer diver.

Not Quite Ready for Full Tech? Intro to Tech Is Your Launch Pad

Now, if you’re reading this and thinking,
“Benjamin, this all sounds awesome… but my hover looks more like a slow-motion elevator ride,” don’t worry—you don’t have to jump straight into AN/DP.

That’s exactly why we run Intro to Tech.

Intro to Tech is where we slow things down and focus on the core in-water skills and equipment understanding that make technical diving feel natural instead of overwhelming. Think of it as the “tech foundations” course:

  • We refine your buoyancy and trim so you can just hang there without finning like you’re late for a meeting.

  • We dial in your propulsion techniques—back kicks, frog kicks, and all the fun ways to move without destroying the reef or the viz.

  • We work on stability and control during skills: mask removals, gas sharing, basic drills—all done midwater, not kneeling on the bottom.

  • We introduce tech gear configuration: long hoses, streamlined setups, doubles or sidemount (depending on your path), and how to make all that hardware feel like a natural extension of you, not a Christmas tree gone wrong.

It’s the perfect step if you’re a solid recreational diver but not quite confident enough yet to hit the ground running in AN/DP.

I’d much rather see you over-prepared for tech than hanging on by the skin of your teeth. Intro to Tech gives you the time, space, and coaching to build those fundamentals so that when you do step into AN/DP, you’re ready to actually enjoy the challenge instead of just surviving it.

 

Before You Take AN/DP: What You Should Already Be Able to Do

Advanced Nitrox / Decompression Procedures is not a “fix my basic skills” course. It’s a “take my good skills and sharpen them” course.

Before you show up, you should already:

  • Be genuinely comfortable in the water (not just tolerating it).

  • Hold a stable hover without sculling or finning constantly.

  • Maintain horizontal trim most of the time.

  • Handle mask removal, gas sharing, and basic emergencies without drama.

  • Have solid buoyancy control on ascents and safety stops.

  • Be able to follow a plan, manage your own gear, and stay aware of your buddy.
     

Little Secret #4: If every dive still feels a bit like survival, fix that in intro to tech training before you go tech. You’ll learn way more and have way more fun.

Also smart to do before AN/DP:

  • Log plenty of recent dives in the conditions you’ll be training in

  • Get genuinely comfortable with nitrox use and labeling

  • Dial in your gear configuration (especially if going to doubles or sidemount)

  • Work on general fitness and hydration—your body will thank you
     

If you’re not sure you’re ready, that’s literally what we’re here for. We can help you build a path from where you are to where you want to be.

“But I’m an Instructor Already…”

Why Every Instructor Should Take a Tech Class

If you teach, this part is for you.

A technical course—even if you never plan to teach tech—gives you:

  • A much deeper understanding of decompression theory

  • Real-world appreciation of gas planning (beyond “be back with 500”)

  • Insight into why we teach certain skills and protocols, not just how

  • Better demonstration-quality trim, buoyancy, and control

  • A calmer, more systematic way to handle student issues
     

You’ll start to see your entry-level courses differently:

  • Why slow ascents actually matter for the first 3 ATA

  • Why buoyancy fundamentals are not “nice-to-haves”

  • How poor habits at 40 feet turn into big problems at 140
     

Little Secret #5 (for instructors): If you can hold a 10-foot stop in midwater while doing a valve drill with zero fin movement, teaching a brand-new diver to hover at 20 feet becomes… much less stressful.

Plus, students notice when an instructor moves like a tech diver. It silently says:
“I know what I’m doing, and I understand why this matters.”

 

One Tech Dive vs. Multiple Rec Dives: Stress on Your Body

Let’s talk about the “stress” thing in plain language.

The biggest pressure changes happen near the surface:

  • From 0 to 33 ft, you go from 1 ATA to 2 ATA — that’s doubling the pressure.

  • From 33 to 66 ft, 2 ATA to 3 ATA — still big changes.
     

Each time you bounce up and down through those shallow zones, your body is:

  • Loading and unloading nitrogen

  • Forming and clearing microbubbles

  • Dealing with repeated pressure swings
     

Multiple short recreational dives with lots of ups and downs in that first 2–3 ATA can be surprisingly stressful on your tissues—especially if you:

  • Ascend too fast

  • Skip safety stops

  • Get cold, dehydrated, or tired

  • Stretch your no-deco limits repeatedly
     

A properly planned and executed technical dive, on the other hand:

  • Uses slower, more controlled ascents

  • Builds in decompression stops to let your body catch up

  • Is gas-planned to avoid “oops, I’m low, time to bolt up” moments

  • Puts the emphasis on control, not “squeeze one more minute in”
     

Is a long tech dive automatically safer than a short rec dive? Of course not. Planning, training, and discipline matter a lot.

But from a stress-on-the-body standpoint, one well-planned tech profile with controlled ascents and deco can be easier on you than multiple sloppy yo-yo rec dives bouncing through the first 3 ATA all day.

Little Secret #6: Your body doesn’t speak “number of dives.” It speaks “pressure changes, ascent rates, and time at depth.”

Little Secrets to Success (In Tech and Rec)

Sprinkled summary time:

  • Practice hovering every dive.
    Spend 3–5 minutes just holding depth in the water column. No reef, no distractions. That’s where the magic happens.

  • Slow down your ascents.
    Think “glide” not “elevator.” Let the water move around you, not past you.

  • Plan your gas.
    Even on rec dives, calculate a real turn pressure and a real minimum gas. It’s not just for techies.

  • Standardize your gear.
    Same place, same clips, same routing. The more your gear is “boring,” the more your brain can focus on the dive.

  • Do pre-dive checks like you mean it.
    S-drills, valve position checks, long hose deployment—if you do it casually on land, you’ll be scrambling when it matters.

  • Train your brain, not just your body.
    Visualization, mental walk-throughs, talking through “what ifs” with your team—this is tech gold even in 40 feet of water.
     

Why We Love Teaching Tech at Stuart Scuba

For us, tech isn’t about being macho, collecting depth numbers, or impressing anyone on social media.

It’s about:

  • Building confident, capable divers

  • Sharing the why behind the what

  • Giving you tools to enjoy diving for longer, safer, and with more options
     

With Stuart Scuba and Benjamin Hadfield – Technical Diving Instructor Trainer leading our program, we’re serious about standards, but we still remember that this is supposed to be fun. You’ll work hard, you’ll probably laugh at yourself a few times, and you’ll come out the other side wondering how you ever dove any other way.

Ready to See What’s Next?

Whether you’re:

  • A recreational diver who wants more control, more time, and more understanding

  • An instructor who wants to level up your teaching and truly grasp the “whys.”

  • Or a future tech diver eyeing AN/DP and beyond
     

Tech training might be the next right step.

Come chat with us at Stuart Scuba. We’ll take a look at your current skills, your goals, and help map out a path—from your next fun dive… to your first deco stop, and beyond.

 

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