AZ 100+ Ways

But First, Let Me Proselytize About Something Else

Before I start yammering about skydiving, we need to deviate from the usual programming for a few moments. It took me a few days to sit down and write this because I’ve been down in the dumps this week. Absorbing the information about the leaked decision on Roe v. Wade hurts my heart; it weighs down my soul and makes me fear for where we are headed. As a woman who tends to be drawn towards male-dominated activities, I’m a devout feminist. I consume a lot of media about women and how we navigate the world. While I have come to harbor a lot of beliefs based on all the feminist non-fiction literature and podcasts I devour, I deeply believe that bodily autonomy and education for women are two of the largest tenants that allow not just women, but societies to succeed. This heartbreaking, egregious attack on the rights of women is going bad places very fast; a dark, looming cloud has hovered over me all week because of it.

Okay, Big Ways:

So, Did We Succeed?

Well, that’s a really great question. What are your bars for success? How do you measure whether we went out there and “Did the Thing”? Honestly, I would say there were huge elements of success. 1. There were no major injuries that I’m aware of. 2. We had no cutaways. For an event that had approximately 115 jumpers each skydive and did 10 skydives, that’s 1150 total skydives. No cutaways or injuries seems like a success to me on a very important level.

Did we build a 115ish way? Hell no. One the jump we got the closest, I would estimate that 10 or 20 people still had not touched the formation. I’m happy to have been a part of it and quite pleased to have done my first 100+ ways (beer!) but I don’t think I can unequivocally post any pictures or videos with the sentiment, “Yay! We did it!”. But wait! Before you let your blood boil and the muscles in your neck tighten, ready to aggressively defend your social media posts from this week, I’m not saying that the weekend wasn’t worthwhile. In fact, I think this weekend was exceptionally important.

1. Learning the Cadence. During my 4way and 8way belly teams, coaches constantly reminded us to move together as a unit. When we would have long, hard days of training, moving together through the process of creeping/walking/jumping/hydrating/debriefing/eating helped strengthen our team mentality. We made sure we supported each other in keeping up energy level and keeping up motivation. Learning the cadence of a team creates a togetherness that’s important. Learning the cadence of your own needs, to make sure you’re drinking water, eating and caffeinating around the pack jobs, debriefs and walks gives you a taste of what the cadence at the record will be like. We need people prepared on every facet of bigways to succeed at this 200way, not just being prepared to touch a big formation.
2. Mental and Physical Tenacity and Fortitude. Again, I thank my team training for this. I’ve trained several summers in Eloy and Perris, sprinting from back to back loads in a hot belly suit and heavy weight belt. After three back to back otter loads, you only have 20 minutes to drink some water, pee, shove food in your face, and walk the next 3 skydives. Learning how to stay focused mentally and perform physically when you’re hungry, or tired, or you have to pee, or the temperatures are hitting the high 90s, has built my tenacity for pushing through the bullshit. On Saturday, we did a 6th jump even though a lot of people didn’t want to. I wanted to. Because even though I didn’t think it would be successful, the team needs to have the experience of forcing themselves to bring their best on that skydive despite the fact that they’re exhausted. (It was my best skydive of Saturday, fyi.)
3. Patience. I hope this camp taught people patience. For us to achieve this record, all 200 people have to do their job all at the same time. You may do your job every single skydive, but you also need to develop patience so you don’t start getting frustrated while you wait for other people to figure out their job; frustration will only make you fly worse. Instead of getting frustrated or impatient, choose to fly your most excellent (especially when other people are sorting out their shit). By adding calm and stability to a skydive, you can counteract some of the nerves and noise that other people bring. At the camp, a friend mentioned that an organizer called them out for noisy legs, despite the fact that everything else was going fine: good levels, still arms and torso, good looking across. My only thought, on that is “Well, if you’re doing everything else right, how hard is it to add one more thing? Quiet down your legs.” Have patience. Practice being perfect.
4. Introducing Bigway Realness. This bigway season, a lot of us are new to head down bigways. Even if we’ve seen the sight picture for a 40way or a 60way, that’s much different than a 100way. Getting the realness of the 100way only prepares all of us noobs more.
5. A Wake-Up Call. Before going to this camp, a lot of people sounded very confident that we’d build the 100+ way. We didn’t. I think this camp was a great wake-up call to remind us that nothing can be taken for granted. Just because you’ve done it before, doesn’t mean you can do it again. Just because you have an invite, doesn’t mean you’re ready. Just because you’re a shredder, doesn’t mean you can coast. This 100way should be screaming “Wakey, Wakey, Eggs and Bakey” at people, reminding them to bring their A game this August.

So it was worthwhile, what else?

How did I do?

Honestly? Crushed it. I started out with pretty uninteresting slots with a lot of waiting, for things to build in front of me. As a late arrival and not being part of either the CA or AZ sector, I wasn’t surprised. I went into last weekend with the mentality: “Just happy to be here.” Before I even arrived, I moved from a left-hand first stinger on the outermost pod, to being a right hand second stinger in the outermost pod. But as Saturday progressed, I got moved into the podcloser for the 2nd pod. On my second attempt at pod closing, both second stingers docked and I wrangled, closed, and shaped out the pod! I was pretty proud of that flying.

Sunday, I was a left hand stinger on a pod on a bridgeline. Mostly, I flew alright. I can always do better, but I drove away mostly pleased.

Mostly, the weekend held mental challenges. I worked hard to overcome my nerves and to stay focused. I know it’s corny, but I always think about this platitude Jillian Michaels said on one of her workout tapes that I did a lot in college. “Think of all the things you want for yourself, all the reasons you’re doing this.” Mostly, during college, I’d curse at the TV, because that quote came in the middle of a vicious abs section. I hate doing ab workouts. But I can’t help hear it waft into my brain when I need to focus on the why and put my nerves to bed. And why do I want to do this? Do I want a world record? Honestly, I just want the respect that comes with it. I want people to know that I can fly any position, any time. That they can count on me to do the job. I’m still getting there, but that’s the reason I’m doing all this.

Walking and visualizing my eye movements

During this camp, I attempted to visualize my eye movements during the skydive, and to do those eye movements during the walk. I think it helped. My belly coach, Christy Frikken, always recommends the “texting while driving” strategy to look at your dock or grips. As we walked, I would look across, but practice those rapid peeps at my grip, then at where I was presenting my hand to be docked on. I think it helped.

Being on level

The number of excellent, experienced flyers not flying on level at the camp baffled me. Am I perfect? No. So should I be criticizing? Maybe not. But, seriously, bruh. A lot of people who are a lot better than me kept goofing it. Seriously. Fly on level. It may take a bit to figure out where on-level is, but once you find it, why would you ever go back? Do it once, then just bask in the goodness of flying in clean air. See the sight picture know what you’re aiming for, then choose only to ever live the good on-level life again.

Complacency

Doing 100ways is straight up dangerous, compared to your average skydive. There are just So. Many. More. People. It just multiplies all the things that can go wrong. Adding altitude and oxygen creates another set of potential challenges. Landing amongst 100 other people? Congested. 100ways demand that you vigilant; you should double down on keeping your head on a swivel. You should pour your energy into visualizing, preparing. So, (and I know this will be a touchy subject but here I go) I am baffled by the number of phones I see on the airplane riding up to altitude.

Phones???

What would Dan BC say? (I know. So many skydivers don’t care what Dan BC says. But I like his bend towards safety.) I am shocked that so many people fuck around on their phones: Wordle, reading, other games. Are you that bored? Are 100ways that easy for you? Can you not stay focused for a 30-45 minute ride to altitude? I believe that by NOT being on my phone, I am showing respect to the skydive, respect for these 100ways and the increased complexity and danger they carry. I’m respecting the other skydivers, the money they spent and the time they are taking to do this event. When I’m load organizing, I will read a book on the way to altitude because those jumps are less complex, less costly, less demanding. But at 100ways, I am putting every effort in to do my part on this skydive. Look. I get that some people are good enough to read a book on the ride to altitude and ace it everytime. But a lot of people on phones are not that good, not on this kind of a skydive.

Oh you’re bored on the ride to altitude? You are letting yourself be bored; you are not channeling your focus into something. You’re not being curious enough. In meditation, you are challenged to observe each breath, noticing, watching the changes in the length of the inhale, the exhale, the depth, the feel in your nose and your lungs. Mindfulness encourages us to be curious about our surroundings, the smells, the feels, the sounds. If you are bored, you are not paying enough attention to your inner and outer experience. If you find yourself bored on the ride to altitude, get curious: about your mental state, your physical state. I’m all about mindlessly entertaining myself with my phone sometimes, but riding to 18k with 100 people? Nah. Wrong time.

Another Note on Patience

Lastly, I want to tie in that curious attitude I mentioned before and patience. Above I mentioned waiting for people to sort out their shit; I said to be patient. Instead of landing from the skydive and bitching about how you did your part and everyone else was slow/crappy/not amazing, I encourage you to get curious about what you can do better, how you can challenge yourself. Challenge yourself with each dive. What can you do better? There’s always something. Be aware of your legs the whole time, keeping them dead still while waiting for the pod in front of you to build. Push yourself to take a second off your dive, or perfect your track. Improve your 180 from center at breakoff; do it faster and more precisely. Or you can choose a challenge of attention: Pay attention to who arrives at the skydive in what order. Try to improve the amount of thing that you remember about each skydive. Whey I was belly load organizing, I went on many, many jumps that did not challenge me. So I made an effort to find a challenge on each one. I would focus on impeccable body position, pointing my toes and engaging my muscles. I would focus on awareness, noting who made it to the formation at what altitude and being able to remember that when I landed. Only the boring are bored. Get curious about your skydives and you’ll get better.

Finally. Don’t fart in the airplane, please.

Okay that’s it. Bye y’all!