bradp

Its going to be 2 X 10ft tunnels

They are truly amazing! These kids totally rock! Wish one day I could fly like that. Very inspiring! Just out of curiosity. How many hours of tunnel time do they each have?

Great news for anyone interested. Found a bunch of news articles and videos about a new tunnel opening up in Singapore in mid 2009. It is apparently going to be the same size as Paraclete (16.5ft). Check the links below. Anyone who knows more info about it please post it :-) http://youtube.com/watch?v=3byP-XhTJ-U http://travel.asiaone.com/Travel/News/Story/A1Story20080515-65377.html http://www.truveo.com/iFly-Singapore-Breaking-News/id/1089282878 http://www.youth.sg/content/view/5014/63/ http://forums.vr-zone.com/showthread.php?p=5300287 http://www.rsi.sg/english/discoveringsingapore/view/20080611164353/1/.html

Malaysia is a lot of fun for freeflying for smaller people (70kg or less, I weigh about 70kg). I have done 10 hours in the tunnel in Malaysia. Working on back, belly, and extremely slow maxed out sit and it was a blast. and considering it cost about US$300 per hour it was definately worth while for refining slow speed positions. learning to fly on back, belly and sit at the same speed has done wonders in the sky. But if you are not able to fly at such slow speeds, then the malaysia tunnel is only going to be frustating. The Malaysia tunnel does not enforce the IBA progression, and none of the tunnel instructors are skydivers. They pretty much let you do what ever you want in there. Which is fine if you already have tunnel experience. But not good if it is your first time. You also wont get coaches in Malaysia, and I think its essential to have a good coach in the tunnel to make the most of your time, at least for the first 10 hours. I have also done 18 hours in the US ( Arizona, Perris, SF Bay). Arizona is by far my favorite. The air is smooth and powerful. and the tunnel is gigantic. The coaches are awesome there as well. They are strict on the IBA progression which is really good. I highly recommend you go to the US and get some good coaching there. And the tunnels are more powerful for freeflying at freefly speeds. Its worth going to the Malaysia tunnel at a later stage to play around.

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Hi, I am not originally from LA, so I dont know any riggers around here. I need to get my reserve swapped to a new container and cypress installed. Can anyone refer me to a rigger who might be available to do it. If not I will just get it done at Elsinore or Perris. Thanks! Brad

Hi, I bought a camera condom for my Canon EOS 350D through a local company that make jumpsuits and other skydiving accessories here in New Zealand. And i love it. Mine cost me NZ$60 (so thats about US$40) They will ship anywhere in the world. check there website for contact details. Although they dont list it on there website they do make them. Drop them a mail http://www.deepseedskydiving.co.nz Hope that helps Later, Brad

Trust me I know all about mercer and their great prices.

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Hi, Which dropzones in the northern hemisphere have the best jump prices or best bulk jump package deals? Are there any dropzones that offer season jump passes? ie. jump all you can for a fixed price. Specifically dropzones with turbine aircraft going to 13K+, that have long operating hours 7 days a week and have regular and constant loads going up as well as semi reliable weather. I'm looking for a dz to jump at during the northern hemisphere summer..May 2007 - Oct 2007 to do about 1000 - 1500 jumps during that period. The 2 dz's that I've heard about that seem to be just that are Lodi and Aerograd Kolomna in Russia. Your advice and opinions would be appreciated. cheers brad

Double spock pic from outside view

Unfortunately not. The more expensive heart rate monitors have a detailed log which you can download onto computer and displayed as charts of your HR over a period of time. A friend of mine told me she did it a while ago on her really expensive advanced heart rate monitor which records altitude as well and her HR peaked at deployment altitude.

Its a Polar F6 Heart rate monitor.

Yesterday i decided to do little experiement by wearing my heart rate monitor on a jump and was totally shocked by the results. My resting heart rate is around 60bpm. While boarding the plane it was fluctuating between 100 - 120bpm. 1 minute before exiting i turned the excersize logger on. just before exit my heart rate was 145bpm (74% of Max HR). Just after deployment my heart rate was 175bpm (89% max HR). Exited 16000ft and deployed at 3000ft. My heart rate remained at around 170bpm for the remainder of the canopy ride until landing. i turned off the excersize logger 1 minute after landing once my heart rate had dropped to below 140bpm. During that 6 minute period. My max HR was 175bpm. average heart rate was 148bpm. And calories read 78 calories. I was quite amazed by these results, as I am quite fit and excersize regularly. And while excersizing i find my heart rate is usually between 140 - 160bpm. I also consider myself to be a fairly relaxed skydiver and was not nervous on this jump. What physical effect do these readings have compared to similar readings recorded by doing something such as running? Are you burning fat skydiving? Or does it have a different effect on your body?

I dont think anything can properly prepare you for being tunnel fit, besides doing lots of tunnel time or skydives. But there are a few things that will definately help alot. I think stretching and excersizes such as what you would do in yoga would be the the most beneficial. I have done 45 minutes in the tunnel, 2 days in a row. 25 mins the first day. then 20 minutes the next day. After the first day i was stiff and sore in my shoulders and arms. But not the kind of stiffness that you cant move. I found that getting back in the tunnel the next day actually got rid of the stiffness. But i felt it for a few days after that. Ive booked 5 hours tunnel time for dec. Which ill do over 25 day period. and broken up into 20 mins a day (rotating the 20 mins over and hour period). I gotta admit I am quite nervous about whether im going to be completely physically trashed by this. and be able to handle this. and jump as well during that time. I've been doing yoga the last few months several times a week, and i can definately see how this is going to benefit me. Being disciplined enough to stretch before and after your tunnel time will definately benefit you. and will reduce some of the stiffness. Have fun! The tunnel rocks!

Go out and do a bunch of solos and get used to seeing the world upside down...it can be quite disorienting at first. Learn to fly with your legs and not with your arms. Too many people fly with their arms because it is easiers to hold yourself in a head down position that way, but take away their arms and they will be all over the place. Your arms should be freely movable so you can easily take docks. Feel the wind on your body. Do you feel the wind hitting your back...or your front of your body? Chances are the first few attempts you will probably be in more of a steep track than a vertical position. If it feels like a struggle to hold the position you are probably not doing it right. You will know when it just clicks and you get it. Best thing to do is to ask an experienced freeflyer at your dropzone to show you the correct head down body position and go and practice the position on the ground. I find headstands are a pretty good way of getting a feel for the position on the ground. Trying to explain to you in words what the correct body position is, probably wont be too effective. Its something you should rather be shown. I would also highly recommend getting video footage of your jumps or coaching every couple of jumps. Constant visual feedback will help with your progression immensely and will speed up your learning curve. Just be patient through the process and keep at it. However, I do agree with Pendragon about spending alot of time on your feet before going on your head. I did about 500 head up jumps before i ever attempted to learn to fly head down. Head up is easy to get the basics. But takes along time to master. But I definately recommend going to get some coaching. And persevere and do the mental ground work. Just as important as the airtime.

Im not implying you hold your front risers until you hit the ground. Just temporarily reducing your glide ratio so you dont glide over the target. Cutting off people behind and below you? How are you going to cut someone off behind you? Use common sense when there is alot of traffic. Be alert and dont do anything that will cut people off. But i totally agree with you. If you have open space in front of you and you are not trying to avoid hitting an obstacle, then rather land over the target. There is no point in killing yourself or anyone else for the sake of accuracy.

By changing your angle of attack using double front risers

Good job in handling a stressful situation like this and walking away alive.

Heres a link to the video of it that I uploaded to skydivingmovies. http://www.skydivingmovies.com/ver2/pafiledb.php?action=file&id=3942

It appeared to be deploying normally while its was snivelling and the slider was still up. and then suddenly spun 720 degrees around into line twists (due to the 1 toggle being released) when the slider came down. Apologies. I may be using the term line stretch incorrectly here. Do you want me to send you the video so you can see for yourself?

I deployed my main (Crossfire2 105) and it appeared to deploying beautifully. I already had both my hands on rear risers as I always do to steer the canopy if needed. But just as it was about to reach full line stretch, the canopy spun 720 degrees into line twists and started to go into a viscious horizontal spiral. It had spun up so much that my right hand fingers got caught in the riser twists. I had to rip my hand out of my glove to get it loose, leaving my glove behind. Luckily in this case it was just my fingers stuck and only took me about 2 seconds to get my hand free. The reason for this malfunction was due to my left toggle prematurely releasing. The riser needs to be sent to a rigger to make the pocket that the toggle slots into a bit tighter so this wont happen again. BUT...this experience has made me think about a few potential scenarios. What could potentially happen if one could not free their hand from the risers? If you had to cutaway with one of your hands still stuck in your riser could that potentially rip your arm out of its socket? I would imagine in most cases releasing the pressure by cutting away would just cause the risers to unravel and release from your hand. If the riser twists were entangled around your hand which has an altimeter on that could potentially worsen the situation. Has anyone heard of many incidents like this happening where people have gotten their hands stuck in riser twists? Please share your thoughts on this topic. Every experience is part of the learning curve. Blueskies Brad

Symmetry around all axis is what its all about. However, you do get right symmetry, and wrong symmetry. Much of what Im going to say is a repeat of what has already been said. And possibly some more to ponder. 1. Your upper body You are leaning forward too much. Your torso needs to be more upright and inline with your ass, and you need to have your chest proudly presented and not slouched forward as you will have a slight backslide with a slouched upperbody. 2. Your legs Your legs should be a bit wider. Try flying with a 90 degree angle between your legs. This will change your symmetry so that you do not need to have your arms so far back to keep balanced. Also your left leg is pushed down further than your right leg. Make sure your feet are level and the bend angle at your knees is equal on both legs. This will stop any unintentional side sliding. Also, always make sure that your shins are always perpendicular to the ground, even when adjusting speeds. When your shins are perpendicular to the ground there is less drag on the lower halves of your legs trying to push them up. Also, if you had to fly with your shins tucked under your thighs that could also cause a slight backslide with the wind deflecting off your shins. 3. Your arms Your arms are way too far back. Ideally you want your arms next to you, or only a slight bit behind you. Try flying with a slight bend in your arms, and roll your shoulders back a tiny bit so that your elbows are pointing downwards. This gives you a wider range of motion with your arms in order to make it easier to take hand docks. But the best advice I can give you is to continue getting video footage or stills of your skydives and keep on analysing them, as often as possible. And going out there and making a concious effort to correct all the mistakes you are making. Otherwise you end up ingraining these mistakes and bad habits into your muscle memory, which will be a lot more difficult to change later. Keep it up! You are doing styling up there! Cheers, Brad

I would definately not recommend using weights ever in freeflying. You need to learn to fly your body in any position and at any speed that is required to keep up with whoever you may be jumping with at that moment in time, without relying on weights to do the work for you. I would recommend jumping a relatively (not ridiculously) tight jump suit with minimal drag. That can definately increase your fall rate considerably. I'm 67 kg's and have no problems flying with people 30kg's more than me. Weight is definately not as big an issue in freeflying as it is in belly flying.