tips for a new AFF student

[awdordie 0]

Ive done a tandem in the past and was hooked instantly. Finally paid for my AFF course this year as a birthday gift to myself. My tandem was over 2 yrs ago, and i have the jitters as bad now if not worse. I think its mainly to do with ill not be strapped to a "pro" this time. Any tips for my level 1 jump to help relax and help with body positioning? My level 1 jump will be this afternoon actually.I finished ground school yesterday and was suppose to jump but wind wouldnt allow. Thanks and I look forward to sharing the sky with you all.

[bdawk 0]

Let your instructors know. They will most likely tell you to take some deep breaths on the plane and visualize it going well. They may have some other tips.

I recently went through AFF (10 yrs since previous AFF 1-3). I was more nervous out this time for sure. But it gets a bit easier to try to relax with each jump.

AFF 1 is not a release jump - meaning you will have 1 if not 2 instructors holding you belly to the earth for the entire free fall. So you will have a pro or 2 with you through free fall.

Good luck.

[dthames 0]

I tried to focus on what mattered, "If I don't do well, I have to pay more money". That worked well for me.

Instructor quote, “What's weird is that you're older than my dad!”

[zcohen13 0]

I recently finished my AFF too and I'm working towards my license now. What my instructors told me which helped a lot was to just focus on your dive flow and picture everything going perfectly. Go through the dive flow in your head over and over on the ride up. Focus on your circle of awareness and seeing the thumbs up every time and remembering the hand signals in case you see something other than a thumbs up. Good luck and blue skies!

[wmw999 2,439]

Lots of good advice in this thread. It's a scary thing. Remember that the main point of AFF1 is to relax enough to be aware. The circle of awareness and pulling for yourself are evidence that you're aware.

It's not a failure if you don't, it's just an indicator of something to work on. Really.

But ground practice, talking, remembering that there are still instructors holding on, and having some time with your AFF1 instructors (i.e. The ones for the actual jump) will all help you to feel as though you've already mastered a lot. The only other thing to really master is sensory overload.

Enjoy it. You're doing something most people wouldn't even consider, and now you're doing it again.

Wendy P.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[shorehambeach 9]

Awordie

Welcome. We've all been there so the feeling is normal ..... But that won't mean much now.

A lot of your apprehension will fade once you've started the AFF course as you'll start getting the knowledge you need which will answer a lot of your inner thoughts.

Keep us upto date with your progression.

Blue Skies.

[JohnMitchell 16]

zcohen13

I recently finished my AFF too and I'm working towards my license now. What my instructors told me which helped a lot was to just focus on your dive flow and picture everything going perfectly. Go through the dive flow in your head over and over on the ride up. Focus on your circle of awareness and seeing the thumbs up every time and remembering the hand signals in case you see something other than a thumbs up. Good luck and blue skies!

Perfect advice. Esp. the visualization of "perfect".

[EvilGenius 0]

Smile!

No seriously, smiling leads to decrease in the stress-induced hormones that negatively affect your physical and mental health. So I suggest grinning like a loon on your ride up!

[paparker21 0]

Just be teachable and enjoy it! Listen to your instructors and make sure you let them know (honestly) how you're feeling about everything. If you're stressing and anxious you'll definitely be more rigid and that's going to be problematic so make sure you find what works for you and stick with it!

For me, I've asked instructors to quit reviewing the dive flow with me by 12k so I have a few seconds of closed eye deep breaths and conscious relaxation of all my muscles. I hear the door open, take a couple more deep breaths, open my eyes back up and get ready to check my spot / climb out.

[rehmwa 2]

Listen to your instructors (take the training seriously)

Talk to your instructors (don't be shy to ask questions or let them know if you think something might work for you)

Don't go to goofy websites for skydiving advice

...
Driving is a one dimensional activity - a monkey can do it - being proud of your driving abilities is like being proud of being able to put on pants

[awdordie 0]

Thanks for all the responses! So yesterday was a lot of waiting aroubd and getting more anxious. Instructors finally showed up and had me go through the dive with each of them. Once on the plane the nerves were definitely there until we started reviewing again. One thing that especially set my nerves on edge before my jump was the fact that two fun jumpers nearly collided on a landing, and then another on my load was a littke anxious to get out before a green light until someone stopped him. Once up to the door I checked in, checked out and totally forgot to give a up down prop count. Immediately on exit the instructors were giving me the relax sign and after the initial "drop" feeling I did. I didnt get that signal again the entire dive. Repeated the coa twice and would get told to straighten my legs out a bit. At 6k locked on to my altimeter and forgot to wave at 5500 and started to pull... realized and went back to wave off and pulled. Afterba count of 3 chute deployed and all the adrenaline still going I totally forget to check if its there and if its sqyare and steerable. When I do look up I see about ten twists in the line. Now im panicked but thinking to myself to keep calm. Evaluate which way the twist was and start to pull the risers apart and kicked out. Took maybe 10 seconds to do so. There was no wind at all on my approach and I had forgotten which pattern we were coming in on but luckily the student landing zone is seperate from everyne else and I was the only student that load. Came in extremely fast compared to what I thought my speed would be and flared... feet touched slid for about ten feet and went into a forward dive but caught myself. Didnt get injured or anything just totally forgot I now had legs instead of wings and should have ran it out and stuck my first landing. Instructors said I did exceptionally well in what I needed to do and said my positioning was good until I pulled and my feet needed work on positioning. They said the line twist was a result of not arching reaching and then pulling and that I looked down and tucked a foot in a little. I was still passed even though I knew I made tons of mistakes and need to work on those things.

[dthames 0]

It sounds like you had a good time.

I messed up the count on one of my early jumps (AFF on a C-182). I tried to start the count over and the AFFI just went ahead and exited us. I remember thinking, Okay we got that cleared up...or some similar thought.

Welcome to the sky.

Instructor quote, “What's weird is that you're older than my dad!”

[London86 0]

Congrats on level 1!

I done mine 2 weeks ago, and know what you mean. I'm on Level 4 next weekend. Don't worry, it honestly gets easier from here, despite having the nerves every ride up and whilst you're waiting for the wind to die down, they gradually become less and less.

I managed to land on my feet on Saturday, no greater feeling than doing that for the first time :D

[paparker21 0]

London86

Congrats on level 1!

I done mine 2 weeks ago, and know what you mean. I'm on Level 4 next weekend. Don't worry, it honestly gets easier from here, despite having the nerves every ride up and whilst you're waiting for the wind to die down, they gradually become less and less.

I managed to land on my feet on Saturday, no greater feeling than doing that for the first time :D

Sure there is - doing it a second, and third time to prove yourself that it wasn't a fluke is pretty great too! Congrats all around to the people learning :)

[raftman 12]

I still can't believe no one has brought this up yet:
Tip #1 Bring beer!

[Divalent 131]

dthames

It sounds like you had a good time.

I messed up the count on one of my early jumps (AFF on a C-182). I tried to start the count over and the AFFI just went ahead and exited us. I remember thinking, Okay we got that cleared up...or some similar thought.

Welcome to the sky.

I did a similar thing on my AFF level 6, where a single instructor exits with you, but not linked, I messed up the agreed upon count, by kind of double clutching it and then deciding I'd pause and redo. Only problem was, the instructor thought my double clutch was me letting go, and he jumped off. A few seconds later I'm in the air looking for my instructor and see him way down and way over there. (I caught up with him, and everything went fine after that.)

[radical_flyer 0]

Caught up with him or he caught up with you? Because unless you'd done some tunnel time you wouldn't have known about fast fall at that stage. Or maybe you were already a sky god by then so that was nothing. I mean I haven't even done any coached jumps yet and I'm just a noob but surely he must have done slowfall.
Disclaimer: I suck and I don't think I'm special, I'm just wondering how you managed to catch up.

[FlyingRhenquest 1]

Heh. Relax more. I did the same thing with forgetting to wave off on a couple of my AFF jumps. You get in the habit quickly enough. If you have a vertical wind tunnel nearby, you can always book 10 minutes in and work on holding a heading and practicing the pull move so that you're more comfortable and less line twisty when you do that. If you don't, well you'll get the hang of that pretty quickly too.

I'm trying to teach myself how to set things on fire with my mind. Hey... is it hot in here?

[JohnMitchell 16]

Sounds like solid B+ work on that jump; you pass.

Next jump concentrate a little more, shove the fear back in the corner, and stick that jump.

I know how you feel, the desire to jump fighting the fear of leaping from a plane. Keep going. Soon it will be the new normal and your life will be more fantastic than you ever could have imagined.

[websean 0]

I was very much the same way during AFF. Actually the earlier AFF levels made me so nervous that I questioned why I even wanted to skydive. It gets much more comfortable though!

I learned the more I relaxed and smiled in freefall, the better my arch would be and I had far less tension in my body which made maneuvers easier to control.

[FlyLikeARaven 0]

EvilGenius

Smile!

No seriously, smiling leads to decrease in the stress-induced hormones that negatively affect your physical and mental health. So I suggest grinning like a loon on your ride up!

This helped me a lot. I was nervous up until Cat C, and when my main instructor released me, he came around to face me and he has the biggest grin I've ever seen I couldn't NOT smile back, and I immediately relaxed.

The other thing that helps me (I am a tense person by nature and relaxing is hard for me), is remembering "slow is smooth, and smooth is fast." When you're nervous you tend to do everything super fast, even though doing it right only takes a second or two longer--and during AFF they build in those extra seconds so you can get used to the pace of doing things slow and steady.

Long, slow deep breaths on the plane and visualization both on the ground and in the plane will help. Close your eyes on the ground before the jump, and visualize it. You may think you look stupid, but everyone will know what you're doing because we've all done it too. Hell, I still do it on a challenging dive where I'm doing something new.

Good luck and blue skies!

I'm not a lady, I'm a skydiver.

[awdordie 0]

Keeping you all updated, I skipped a week to take care of some business but got back up for my cat b jump the following. I had two different instructors and im not sure why but they changed my lock wave and pull altitudes by 1k ft. They raised them to 7, 6.5, 6 from the cat a jump of 6, 5.5, 5. Is this normal? Any ways we briefed and I had another cat b in briefing with me which always puts me at ease a little more, and gives me a sense of competition to do better ha. So on to the jump.

Door opens and im focused on everything I did wrong on my cat a jump. Gave a count and went out. Soon as we left the plane things went skewed. As soon as we came out I was thinking of having my legs straighter. Doing so caused me to feel the wind on my feet as you should. At this point the radio somehow flew out of the helmet and came zipping by my face. With the increased wind on my feet my brain I guess associated the black object as one of my shoes. Now for some reason im like "dang my shoe my shoe what do I do now" it wasnt until halfway through the freefall I realized nothing I can do. Forgot the coa and practice touches. When I went to pull we all became very unstable, I pulled and started the count, and the pc stayed in tow in my burble for a good 6 seconds, so much so one instructor had to assist it. With us all being very unstable I was slammed in the head by a part of the instructors body. Needless to say I failed even though I pulled for myself I did literally nothing else and even my practise turns the instructors didnt realize what I was doing and I did not extend legs fully to track either.

When we reviewed the video the instructor was actually struck in the face by the radio. I knew what had flown out once under canopy because I had no instructions lol but I did perfect once under canopy.

Now for the good news and funny part. After my jump I was beating myself up pretty good. I just wanted to go home. This is when the experienced guys came together and motivated me to get back up do it again. One guy also was like lets do it im going with you we are gonna be the same load. As im waiting the other aff student goes. I dont like to make fun of his misfortune but he freaked out the door and pulled at 12.5 and almost entangled an instructor so everyone was saying see you didnt do so bad lets go again... second time up and I nail it. I had the confidence I needed and felt like one of the other guys who has been doing it for yrs. I again had a new instructor and he gave some very good advice for relaxing. He said once we get out on this jump 3 touches turn right turn left track and have fun its your jump. He didnt make it into a super complex procedure. Tracking was definitely the funnest part of the jump. Once I locked my legs it pitched me dow. Way more than I anticipated and I could immediately hear and feel myself gain forward momentum and speed. My bpdy position was excellent when pulling, no line twist at all this time. Canopy flight was awesome had a bit of fun really pulling one toggle down and spiralling.

Took another week off because of a family emergency and got back to the dz today. Couldnt jump due to winds unfortunately. And once again having that feeling of wtf am I doing here. Im hoping this feeling goes away soon. Should I start tryng to get to the dz more than once a week like maybe on a friday and saturday?

[radical_flyer 0]

What are you talking about dude? You're there to do something fucking awesome. Every time I see FB posts from the DZ of people having had a sick day/weekend of jumping I'm like wtf am I NOT doing there. All my skyfriends are progressing and I'm not. I'd say get down whenever you can, depending on how far it is.

[SICness 0]

I'm getting ready to do my first jump this week. Did my ground school 2 weeks ago and couldn't jump due to winds, came back a week later and couldn't jump because it started to rain. So I'm hoping this week is the week to make my first AFF jump. The thing that I'm most nervous about is setting up my landing pattern correctly and having a smooth landing. I'm sure my nervousness will be in overdrive on the plane ride up. I've done 6 tandems up to this point so I'm hoping that experience will help calm my nerves, but it must feel very different not having someone on your back. Sounds like you're doing good, though.

[Xhaustin 0]

Surprised nobody has said read the SIM... learn as much as you can about the sport, EP's, etc. Before my AFF it actually made me much more confident reading the SIM, watching malfunction videos, and getting stoked on the entire reason I even wanted to jump in the first place.