DrewEckhardt 0 #26 April 13, 2005 QuoteQuoteHow about symetric front risers in various degrees, 15,30,45,60,75, and then 90? How does a pilot do that? Do you mean "steer" with the risers? or Come X degrees of the windline, turn those X degrees, and then apply Double Fronts? Straight in for a bunch of jumps in different conditions. Get comfortable turning after planeout. Put a flat 75 degree kink in your base leg and turn 15 degrees for a bunch of jumps in different conditions and get comfortable flying near the ground with the added speed. Repeat for 30 and more degrees. Learn to use both front risers and harness input to finish where you want so you can get away with less precision in the rest of your approach and not become a statistic when you do the same thing in the wrong spot. Learning is easier with less speed. With a gradual progression people should be less likely to turn into unguided swoop missiles and more likely to know what looks wrong before they need to use that information. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
LilZilla 2 #27 April 14, 2005 That advise sounds a lot better, and safer, than some of the stuff I've been told! Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
AlexJ 1 #28 April 14, 2005 Ok, to address Tonto's question directly - One should be taught to swoop, as early as one asks for it. In fact, senior jumpers should watch out for low time jumpers who are starting to get the itch and offer advice and coaching from that point on. If dissuasion is neccessary then so be it, but evaluate the jumpers desires and dont ignore them if they really want to learn. If that's jump 50, then so be it. A couple of quick stories: I started at a hundred jumps or so (maybe less) to play with my canopy. A 170 I think it was. I bumped in a few times, but nothing too serious. I then moved to a 150 at a couple hundred jumps which I really liked due to the steeper dive characterristic so really started playing with it. I roughed myself up a bit, but again nothing too serious. I never asked anyone for help. All I knew then (or thought I knew) was that one needed to do a big turn to get speed. Setups, conditions, outs etc, etc were not part of my vocab. One day while trainign 4-way. after each jump, I did a 180 turn and attempted to land in the pro rating pit that we had at that stage. No science was implemented here, so I missed it almost every time. Back on the ground my team was making fun of the fact that I could never land in the right spot. In fact so much so that I decided to show them. I had a few hundred jumps I think. I went out to the airplane and the pilot quickly took me up to a few thousand feet. Dusk was on us and my team plus a bunch of others lined up at the landing area to see me attempt the target. It has to be said that some of these jumpers had thousands of jumps. Needless to say my 180 was done at an insufficient height since I really wanted the horizontal distance to be correct. I thumped hard enough to scare some people of course. Some told me that the turn was stupid. In hindsight of course it was. You all knew it was going to happen the minute I said I walked out the airplane. I imagine the spectators did too. Why didn't any of them say something? Still no advice or mentoring came forth. I still didn't ask for it. After time I started learning more stuff, and occasionally asked for info. Most of the time I didnt get any help. In hindsight again maybe I asked the wrong people. One day I did a turn to land, as did my teammate, and we almost collided - In fact our canopies did collide and when the dust settled he had a broken femur. Again, some indirect comments but nothing constructive and no advice offered. No post accident review. Anyway, at over 1000 jumps on my 150 hurricane I thought I had it figured out a bit. One day I did 270 turn and as I came out I carved to the left. Unknown to me our camera flyer happened to be swooping past me on the left at a much higher speed to to higher WL. He struck the top of my canopy. I was out for 8 months with various injuries and he is still in a wheelchair today. I was accused of being negligent. This was mainly due to the fact that I had thumped in a couple of times, had a collision in the past, was deemed aggressive in my attempts to learn, and now someone was in a wheelchair, I was roasted. There were a lot of I told you so's, we saw it coming's and it was a matter of time's. Funny that - never once were these phrases mentioned to me. I am not exagerrating here. I never received instruction, safety briefings/reviews, coaching etc. Even after I had incidents under canopy, nothing was said. In hindsight again I am to blame for not seeking help out. Hell, I was young and thought I could do it all. There is obviously a great deal more to these stories than I can tell here but my point is this: I was never given advice on the aspects of swooping and canopy piloting that mattered, and that could have saved me a lot of bruises, broken bones and torn muscles. I was going to learn one way or the other, but my path could have been entirely different, had the attitude on the DZ been different. I am not passing the buck here. I created my own path and accept the ramifications of my decisions. I consider myself fortunate to be jumping today and if ever asked by a low time jumper will immediately offer advice as best I can, since I know what it is like. If I am not asked but I see someone out there trying stuff I will also offer advice, even if I am construed as being arrogant or nosey. Better that than see someone hurt themselves when you could have helped avoid that. Let's give the jumpers the best tools possible from jump 1. It's up to them from there, which is the way we want it right? Alex Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tonto 1 #29 April 14, 2005 I agree with you. Some people are just going to do what they do - and will benefit more from coaching than from being ignored. In fact, their education will probably benefit those around them too. For a very long time I'd wanted to help people, but I was stuck in the "toggle whipping time warp." I toggle spanked 1000's of safe and relatively impressive swoops, but knew enough not to teach others what I did. I couldn't teach safe landings. Even though my landings were safe for me - those whom I would need to teach had not gone through the 1500 jump progression from 220 sq ft F-111 7 cells to 100 sq ft ZP elipticals. I had learned the same way you had learned. I was taught nothing - and had broken my own femur in learning my limits at 150 jumps. The collision you mentioned was the catalyst to get me to continue to learn. I quizzed SkymonkeyOne and Hookitt on front riser swoops, and sought guidence from Chris, a former AFF student of mine, on how to do front riser turns. I bought newer gear, better suited to front riser input, and now 2 years and 800+ riser turns later, I'm feeling I'm getting over the increased risk of learning something new and have been rewarded with much better swoops. Placing Gates at the DZ has also helped indicate potential shortcommings in set-up and technique and has allowed me to be more critical of my performance. It's also allowed others to comment more accurately on my performance as my objectives are more clearly defined. Half the desire to teach comes from believing you know. I never got my instructors rating till 1800+ dives because I was too busy learning. There comes a time though, when you realise that you'll never be "ready" and it's prudent to look behind you and help those on the curve you've already travelled to do so safely... even if others tend to place some of the blame for an incident at the feet of the coach, and not at the feet of all those other jumpers who were so quiet prior to the incidents, and so vocal in their "I told you so!" after it. I think you and I have learned a lot in the past few years. It would be great if we could spread some of that knowledge around a bit more, but I think that process has already begun. tIt's the year of the Pig. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
dharma1976 0 #30 April 21, 2005 QuoteDO NOT SEND YOUR CRASH LANDINGS VIDEOS TO "REAL-TV" OR ANY OTHER "YOU GOTTA SEE THIS" TYPE SHOW! We don't need that kind of exposure! AMEN!http://www.skyjunky.com CSpenceFLY - I can't believe the number of people willing to bet their life on someone else doing the right thing. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
justaflygirl 0 #31 April 21, 2005 This post offered alot of insight for me. One of my many goals as a skydiver is to eventually compete in swoop competitions. I lurk in the forum alot and really enjoy reading what everyone has to say! Any extra advice or anyone willing to take me under their "wing" would be so awesome! Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
