Dive with us!

If you are already qualified (certified) with any diver training agency, you can join Marlin Sub-Aqua Club and dive with us without doing any further training.

The club meets every week and you’ll find a warm and sociable welcome at our bar in the Griff and Coton Sports Club.

You will have free of charge access to the pool at Pingles Leisure Centre every other week for testing new kit, or simply going for a swim.

We have equipment for members to rent.

Our dive management team arranges diving around the coast of the British Isles and abroad. Diving with the club provides you with a cohort of like-minded people to dive with – no more pairing up with an ‘instabuddy’ on the dive boat!

Technical diving

Marlin Sub-Aqua Club is setup to welcome and support technical divers on open or closed circuit. We promote team diving and are especially keen to integrate GUE divers into the club environment.

We promote safe, adventurous diving, with efficient decompression strategies. The practical result of this is that our open circuit divers (for example) favour a standardised manifolded twinset/primary donate configuration, with helium containing breathing gases (trimix) below 40 metres, and 50% or oxygen during decompression. Uniquely in the midlands our Gas Shed can provide nitrox and trimix to members at affordable prices making this philosophy extremely easy to implement.

We do not allow solo diving within the club.

Project diving

Diving projects allows teams of divers to accomplish tasks together, and give purpose to a sequence of dives. Projects may be exploratory in nature, or may aim to monitor a site (such as a wreck) over time, or to collect marine life data through surveys.

Marlin Sub-Aqua Club flagship project:

Project Baseline Midland Pools

Members have also volunteered with the following projects:

Furthering your training

The club’s nationally qualified instructors are able to deliver the complete British Sub-Aqua Club (BSAC) Diver Training Programme including Dive Leader (Dive Master) and Advanced Diver qualifications. If your current qualification is not from BSAC you will be able to cross-over and continue your training at the next level up without repeating a course.

We can support your diving goals through Skills Development Courses (SDCs), including Buoyancy & Trim Workshop, Drysuit Diver, Nitrox Workshop, Wreck Diver, photography etc. We have specialist instructors who can teach courses such as Twin-set Diver, Primary Donate Workshop, Advanced Wreck Diver, Compressor Operator and Mixed Gas Blender that are not routinely offered in diving clubs.

Each course is a mix of theory and practical sessions where skills are first taught in the swimming pool and then practiced again in open water. For example, our second-level Sports Diver course (equivalent to Rescue Diver offered by other agencies), qualifies you to dive to 35 metres. An average of one hour in the pool will have you ready for your open water training, but you will not be rushed though the pool training if you need to refresh skills and so the duration will depend on your progress and attendance at training sessions.

The course is a mixture of:

Classroom (theory) lessons, which can be done face-to-face on alternate Thursday evenings from 8pm to 10pm at the Griff and Coton Sports Club, or as e-learning if you prefer to study at other times
Sheltered water training in the swimming pool at Pingles Leisure Centre on alternate Thursday evenings from 8pm to 10pm, and
Open water training at Stoney Cove inland dives site during two full days either at the weekend or during the week to suit you.

A typical training schedule is shown below:

ID	Title	Type	Location
ST1	Sport diving	Classroom	Griff & Coton
ST2	Diver rescue	Classroom	Griff & Coton
SP1	Basic life support (BLS)	Dry practical	Griff & Coton
SS1	Rescue skills	Sheltered water	Pingles
ST3	Equipment and techniques	Classroom	Griff & Coton
ST4	Deeper diving	Classroom	Griff & Coton
ST5	Breathing gas systems	Classroom	Griff & Coton
ST6	Going diving	Classroom	Griff & Coton
SP2	Assistant dive manager	Dry practical	Griff & Coton
SO1	Diver rescue	Sheltered water	Pingles
SO1	Use of SMB	Open water	Stoney Cove
SO2	Simulated decompression dive	Open water	Stoney Cove
SO3	Compass navigation / DSMB deployment	Open water	Stoney Cove
SO4	Dive leading / basic skills review	Open water	Stoney Cove

How much does it cost?

During your training the club provides almost all of the scuba equipment you need so there is no need to buy kit yourself. The cost to get you started on the Sports Diver course (for example) after you join the club starts from:

Sports Diver training fee £139 (includes two days open water instruction), or
Sports Diver training fee £214 (includes kit loan and two days open water instruction)
Course pack fee (varies depending on format)

Once you move to the open water part of the course there are additional costs that are charged per day and are not included in the above fee. We suggest you budget for two days of open water training:

Your entry into Stoney Cove (per day) £27
Hire of thermal suit and boots from Stoney Cove (per day) £18 (correct as of January 2023)

How old do I need to be?

Marlin Sub-Aqua Club is currently able to offer membership to new members (who are medically fit to dive) from 18 years of age.

Children between the age of 14–17 are able to join providing that a parent/guardian is a member of the club (subject to assessment by the Diving Officer). The parent/guardian must take full responsibility for the supervision of the child at all times.

Do I need to be fit to dive?

Diving is a physical activity but you don’t need to be super fit to dive. You need to be able to answer No to the questions on the BSAC Medical Form. If you have answered Yes to any questions that doesn’t mean you cannot dive, but that you will need to get a certificate from a specialist diving doctor.

The most cost effective way of obtaining a fit to dive certificate is to book a telephone consultation with DDRC Healthcare, who are a charity that run the hyperbaric chamber in Plymouth. They may sign you off over the phone, but if you require a face to face consultation the nearest facility is at the Midland Dive Chamber in Rugby.

Please contact us for further guidance before joining the club.

How do I join?

We run one Sports Diver training course per year over the winter. Dive Leader and Advanced Diver training can be commenced in response to member needs. We recommend that you join the club immediately so that you don’t miss the course start date – you can also dive with us and receive full member benefits.