Author: admin

So, while at Fly 4 Life, I was talked into buying a new canopy. Not really talked into it, more like fate gently nudged me. I swung by Fluid to say hi and distract Kolla from getting things accomplished. In the midst of general bullshitting about books and travel and nonsense, the “So when are you getting a Gangster?” came up again.

Last year, I demo’d the Gangster 96 and really, really liked it. I’m not particularly discerning about canopies; most of my focus has always been on freefall. Last year, I was all-in on bigways and really not into the market for a new canopy. I told myself that my Crossfire 109 suited me just fine. It did. To me, pretty much as soon as I started jumping it, I decided it was about as exciting and sporty as my Sabre 2 120, but with better flare.

I feel very fortunate that I’ve gotten to know the crew at Fluid while dating Richo. They’re wonderful, lovely people who are passionate about making great canopies. And, I just got the opportunity to buy the very perfect Gangster for me! While popping into Fluid over Fly 4 Life, it just so happened that they had the perfect canopy for me: this baby. She was used, but only had about 50 jumps on her. Clearly, she was meant for me.

I had been hemming and hawing about upgrading my canopy for a while. I was bored of my Crossfire, but I’ve been working on some baby swoops. I tortured myself about whether to learn 90s and 270s on the canopy I was already familiar with, or whether I should change wings before I get too far in the learning process. No one gave me particularly good advice; several people recommended the Katana. After some googling, I found that the Katana came out in 2006? Maybe this isn’t a particularly discerning opinion, but I just don’t want to be learning on a wing that feels so outdated. It’s probably fine. I just don’t wanna jump a Katana. I leaned towards buying a Gangster, but just was sitting on my hands because inertia sucks you in and holds you tight. Plus, if you’d really like to be annoyed and irritated, I recommend selling your canopies on the internet. I hate it. So, I just kept jumping my crossfire, until this canopy fell into my lap.

And I’m really excited to announce that I’m going to a Tam-Bassador for Fluid!

After deciding I wanted the canopy, Kolla asked if I wanted to be an ambassador! It was an easy decision; I already had gotten to know the people and they’re all lovely, competent, smart, and dedicated to Fluid. I already knew they made good wings. I got a taste of their great customer service through the demo program. I am really excited to tell people that I jump Fluid and that I love my Gangster! So if you have questions about Fluid, or just want to hear me talk about how awesome they are and how awesome the Gangster is, just let me know.

But Speedflying?

Yes! I sped-fly! I speed-flew! I went speed flying. Honestly, what I was doing wasn’t exactly speedflying (I was on the 17m wing, which meant I got A LOT of lift and didn’t really have the knowledge or skills or confidence to try to make it hug the terrain), but I still got to fly the Loki 2 for several days with some Fluid peeps, and it was so rad!

I truly did just luckily stumble into this opportunity as well. The conversation went something like this: Richō Butts “Want to go do some speedflying in Utah with some Fluid peeps?” Me “Yeah!” (No other details were given to me. I had no idea if this was a course, or if I should show up with prior experience, or if I needed to be a canopy-whiz-kid to go. All that only crossed my mine when Richo bailed to go rally car racing and I ended up going alone.

It was great! I showed up, really nervous and concerned about how much I needed to know. Additionally, I showed up a day or so after everyone because I had work, and felt pretty bad about that too. But it was amazing! Kevin has just this encyclopedic knowledge of weather, specifically related to paragliding and speed flying. It was super fun to hang out with all the other attendees too; some of them I’d already met through Richô mostly, some were new to me. Meeting people without him always boosts my self-confidence a little bit; it’s very easy to find my mind wondering if people like him, and tolerate me by proxy. It’s really nice to build friendships as Tam, and not just as Richó’s girlfriend.

I’ve taken some paragliding courses, which helped a lot with the launches and kiting, but this course really, really impressed upon me that speed flying and paragliding is way more about reading, understanding, and making decisions related to the weather, than actual flying. As a skydiver, it’s so easy to not make your own weather decisions. The plane isn’t flying? You’re not jumping. The plane is flying? You’re jumping. Yes, wind limits. Yes, dust devils. Yes, iffy industrial haze. But those are really, really big signals. We were sitting at the top of a hill assessing puffs of air.

Literally. It was pretty still wind towards the end of the day and we hiked to the top of Cherry in SLC. The weather had been so iffy, precipitation falling out, winds, that it was really a crap shoot whether we’d be able to fly. It was cooling off and we were watching out for katabatic winds, which roll downhill, usually at the end of the day. I had the mentality that we were going on a hike with speed wings in our backpacks, so if we didn’t fly, I wasn’t disappointed. But as we hiked, a patch of sun rolled across the valley. We were sitting at the launch site as it reached the bottom of the hill and we felt puffs of upward drafts. We actually got to fly! It was awesome! But analyzing that tiny, tiny change in weather, in winds, is such a vast difference from the way I make go/no-go decisions in skydiving.

Loki 2

I am so lucky to have gotten a chance to fly the Loki 2. When I get a speedflying wing, that’s what I’ll be getting. (Step 1. Finish my P2, so I have a little more confidence in myself. Step 2. Buy speed flying wing.) I don’t have much to compare it to in the speedflying realm, but I can say that I pretty much felt comfortable with it instantly. The wing ground launched easily and smoothly. The Loki is what I’m looking for in a wing: something capable and easy-to-fly, something fun and not scary. I’d been hesitant to try any speedflying, because all I ever see is the insane, aggressive videos of people hugging the ground or doing, ya know, tricks and stuff. Barrel rolls? It all looked scary and out of my league. But a weekend of flying the Loki (I started on the 17m, but then got to fly the 15m which was a better fit. I think I might actually end up buying the 13m though.), I realized speedflying didn’t have to be terrifying. So, I’m stoked!

What’s Next?

Well, I don’t have nearly as busy as a year as sometimes, but as always, things come up. (Specifically, buying a house. eeks) So, I think the first plan is to get my P1 & P2. I know it’s not essential; I know a zillion people speedfly and paraglide without them. And I know that having those certs don’t guarantee safety or learning. But I like to stack the deck in my favor and I know that I do best with a structured learning situation. After that, I need to fly some local sites. Probably in the middle, I need to get some of my own gear? I’m still not sure what I want, but I’m working on it.

It’s probably worth carving out some time in my calendar to go back to Utah; that was a ton of fun.

So yeah! #flyfluid #fluidwings #tambassador #whowantstobuymycrossfire?

Well, we all know that the HU World Record will be going down next year and the evidence is already splashed all over the social media world. (By the way, congrats to everyone on the HU Florida record!) So, I wanted to get on that train. Because my HU is not so good. And I want it to be better.

Instead of traveling somewhere to practice, or paying an organizer to tell me that I’m not so good at this, I decided that this season, I’m going to bully my friends into regular HU practice days so that we can all get some reps. We did our first day yesterday, and this post is my recap.

Where: Skydive California

When: Yesterday, which was the most glorious skydiving day we’ve had in a long while

Who: Some local crew! Señors Butts, Rainbowsuit, Troncoso, Ozanian, Cashman, VanDevender, Madame Poliner & I. My specifications for joining the group was that you must be able to approach on your head, and leave on your head. Seemed like a good starting point?

So, What Did We Do?

Lesson 1: Don’t start your HU Exit completely inside the plane.

Well, we started with a HU 3way base exiting the Caravan, with two floaters and a diver. Our plan was to have a 3way base, with 3 stingers. The first attempt, the base only stuck our rigs out; we didn’t properly climb out. Which, put Peter, the person pushing it out, very far inside the Caravan. We tumbled. We blew up. And by the time we got back together, the all 3 members of the base decided to standfly, for stability I guess. (Me included.) Overall, 3/10.

Lesson 2: HU Bases are hard

We attempted the same jump again. It… didn’t go as planned. This time, we had a contingency plan: if the base finds itself on it’s head, we pancake. That was the only contingency plan. Alas, it was not enough. We needed a leader instead of 3 leaders. Too many cooks in the kitchen. Two of us thought that the base would settle out, so we tried to stick it on our feet. One of us thought we should just carry it two our heads. Once we were on our heads, one of us was ready to flip. The others, waited a second. Sheer chaos ensued. Honestly, after two jumps of

Lesson 3: Do a Feets Star to Feel Better

We did a feets star, a.k.a. a head-up speed star. We don’t follow the “everyone must be in the plane” rule. We don’t enforce whether people have to be on their feet the whole time. We just try to hold hands on our feet. It’s a great palate cleanser, even when it’s not super successful

Lesson 4: I Guess We Need a HD Base

So after much flailing about in the wind on our feet, we decided, to give the head up flyers something to approach that vaguely imitates a base, we should send out a head down base. So we did that, the rest of the day.

So What’s Next?

More of these days! Now that I’ve tried to get people together for a day of this, I have a better idea of what on earth we’re capable of. So I’m super psyched to do another!

1. Bully more of my friends into coming
2. Start out with a HD base. It actually gives the head-up flyers a base. And, I always worry about people not feeling challenged, or feeling bored when they have to do things like a head-down base. But I have to remember that people can find ways to challenge themselves, even when they’re in the head-down base, for example: keeping your legs still or keeping the thing on heading or working on your awareness and recall by keeping track of who showed up to the formation at what altitude.
3. Practice, practice. Man. Headup is hard. I’m glad some people were willing to come out and endure some relatively unsuccessful jumps while we worked out how to practice this.
4. Figure out how to play our videos on the tv at Tracy. Man. There was some especially epic footage from this week. Also, bring my computer to steal everyone’s footy. Hilarity really did ensue this weekend.

Vimeo and WordPress aren’t playing nicely to display an embedded video, so here’s the link: https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/816634045

Hello, all! It’s been a very, very long time. Quite frankly, the weather in NorCal all winter has been dragging me down and really quashing any of my pep and motivation to make plans to skydive or talk about skydiving. The dreariness creeps in every weekend, leaving the DZ either literally under water, covered in clouds, or so wickedly cold that I’m not interested in jumping. (For example, it was -4F at altitude today when I popped by the DZ to say hi. No thanks.)

Wingsuiting!

I’m heckin’ doing it! Also, it’s terrifying. This Friday, we had a break in the bad weather and fit in a couple of fun jumps. So to guarantee that we sit farthest from the door, we did some wingy jumps. Man, I love wingsuiting, if only for the sprawling I get to do on the bench. I have watched wingsuiters do it over the years, taking up far more than their fair share of the plane. Which was always super annoying when I had about 2/3 of a seat, squashed and frigid by the door. However, I finally have reached the point where, since I can’t beat them, I shall join them.

We did 3 rips! My goal was 4; I’m trying to work on my fear-stamina. I’m pretty nervous in the wingy so far, just because I have so little experience in it. The only thing that feels natural about it is flying. Everything else (putting it on, wearing it in the plane, exit, deployment, house-keeping under canopy) feels unfamiliar and wrong. However, I know that I am adequately prepared to deal with any issues I run into, so I need to push past this being-afraid stage to where it just feels normal. So, anyway, we did 3 whole jumps. (Clouds threatened to roll in after the 3rd so the load filled up and my next just would have been a long call, so I ended up calling it.)

I keep saying We. It’s wonderful to have Mr. Butts around! He always wants to do rips with me. I love having an always-there 2way buddy for freeflying or wingsuits. But! We also were joined by our friend Tristan, who RIPS in a wingsuit. Flying with him is literally the same as having a personal coach.

After going back through my logbook this weekend, I realized that I did my first wingsuit jump over a year ago, in February of 2022. My first flight felt. I also counted and I’m up to 13ish wingsuit jumps, I think. Anyway, I’m determined to do wingy rips more regularly so I’m less terrified. We get out of the airplane, I start leading the group, then all of a sudden, Tristan is back flying underneath me, telling me what to do. He’s so close that I can very easily read his chest-mount alti. If you want to take up wingsuit, I highly recommend having someone as awesome as Tristan as a friend to jump with. Also, also! Chuck came along! It was high fives all around (until Richô chopped. See below.)

So what am I flying?

Welp, I got a Hybrid Winx 135 in my old V319. The openings are very good so far; it’s brand new basically, since I only got it in November. I am waiting on a SkySnatch with a longer bridle. Right now, I’m jumping an 8ft Infinity bridle and PC that I begged off of Richo because my old PC was clapped out and on an itty bitty bridle. I initially was worried about the canopy extraction and opening with a non-wingsuit PC and bridle, but my first handful of jumps, I didn’t flare much before opening, so no worries there. The canopy opened so fast I practically kicked my lines. The V319 was always a bit big for me and a bit too long for it to be a good freefly rig, especially head up. I’m pretty tall (5’9″) and even for me, it hung low on my butt. However! That’s pretty perfect for wingsuiting.

Suit-wise, I’ve graduated up to Richõ’s old ATC which fits me great, probably better than it ever fit him. Bummer for him but hella lucky for me. I was borrowing a Phantom that was just too small, all around. I borrowed a Havok Carve that was hanging around the DZ a few times, but the last time I jumped it, the shoulder zipper peeled apart on jump run so I rode the plane down. I would have been pretty happy to jump the Carve more but beggars can’t be choosers. The idea of jumping an ATC so early stressed me out a bit; but it’s been fine so far. It flies great. I will eventually get bold enough to zip up the vents but for now, I’m leaving them open.

Overall, wingsuiting has been a nice change of pace. I’m really looking forward to She Flocks next year! I’ll probably mostly be a local wingsuiter, as it looks like a pain to travel with. Unless we’re road-tripping in the van. Then we can bring all the skydiving gear 😀 But it’s nice to have a new interest in skydiving that I don’t feel compelled to compete in; I can just fly to enjoy it.

Richo Chopped a BS Malfunction!

This weekend, Richø Butts had a glorious chop that I need to share with the world. Why? Because he absolutely chopped a bullshit malfunction. And if you’ve ever hung out with Richò, you know that he likes to tell people not to chop bullshit malfunctions. <<<<NOTE! He jokes. He kids. He jests. He absolutely wants people to make a smart decision when it comes to saving their own lives.>>>> After I chopped my spinny-mal last summer, first, he made sure I was okay. Then, he said “And what do I always say about bullshit malfunctions?” It’s high up there on his list of favorite catch-phrases.

So, how’d this go down?

I’m so new to wings-n-things that I’m pulling hella high on my wingy, like between 5k and 4,5k. By the time I’m done with all my housekeeping, the only other people soaring around under canopy with me are students and tandems. Which is why I didn’t really pay any attention or notice that my beloved boyfriend’s canopy wasn’t swooshing the landing area. Instead, I only realized Mr. Butts had a chop when I was walking back in. Indeed, he was trudging back from the wrong side of the runway, covered in mud, carrying a canopy that was the wrong color. He was verrrrrry covered in mud.

SOMEONE had to land in the mud, because his other choice was amongst the almond trees that surround Skydive Cal. Because SOMEONE couldn’t make it back to the landing area on his reserve. Because SOMEONE cut away at 1700 feet and . Because SOMEONE didn’t unzip his arm-wings all the way and wasn’t able to reach up to pop his toggles. Because SOMEONE’S canopy was getting unruly. Because, here’s the real beautiful part of this whole thing, SOMEONE packed himself a toggle fire. And on top of it all, SOMEONE tossed his cutaway handle. (Which we did find. We found everything because Mr. Butts is also Mr. Lucky.)

Anyway. Was it really worth writing about here?

Not really. I think we already learned the things we can learn here: Don’t pack toggle fires. Unzip your arm-wings all the way. Don’t throw your handle. Cutaway above 1700.

But the biggest thing all my readers of this blog have learned is that you have another excellent reason to tease Reverend Butts when you see him next. And when he tells you not to chop bullshit malfunctions, you should feel free to laugh at him.

It’s the Eve of Project 19! Tomorrow, it all begins! Let’s be real. It already kinda started a few days ago as ladies started rolling into Eloy. And the all-out record attempts won’t start until Tuesday. So even though this is the Eve in namesake, it’s blurry. FYI. This blog is going to be written in a confusing mix of time frames, as I wrote part of it before hand, part of it during, and part of it afterwards. Buckle up.

Where to start?

My brain is tired, so let’s run through some numbers. 100 women are slotted on the formation (2 women of the original 102 slotted couldn’t make it last minute). We have 6 days to break the record. I wish I knew the exact number of women on the bench but I’d guess from 1-2 dozen? (Pretty sure that someone told me later that the bench had 20 women.) I arrived in Eloy Saturday afternoon and did 2 warm-up jumps. Winds gusted today from 15-24 most of the day. I’ve already eaten 4 sushi rolls since being here at lunch at the newest sushi place in Eloy. (By the end of the event, I’d eaten at W&Z Sushi 5 times. The last time we took our food to go and the owner heckled me for not eating it there and drinking saki. Oh no. They already know me as that lady who drinks a lot of saki.) We had a 3ish hour briefing Sunday. My slot number started B-20 (closing a pod behind a bridge line), exiting as the second to last diver out of Right Trial (aka, in my mind, riot trail. because the ladies on it were a freaking riot). We have women from numerous countries here: the US, the UK, New Zealand, France, I think Brazil and Australia and plenty more. My breakoff wave is 7k-5k. This whole production has been 2+ years in the making (almost 2 exactly for me). I drove 12ish hours down from NorCal and I’m ready for 6 days of awesomeness.

The amount of “Hello! So good so see you! How have you been!?” conversations have been countless. So many of my friends from all across the country are all here and we’re going to try to break a world record together. I’ve already laughed so hard my face hurt a couple times. The hangar is bursting with women and it’s awesome. I’m so freaking proud to be here.

The Briefing

We had the most extensive briefing I’ve ever been to today (Sunday). However! I think it was great. We’re not doing something trivial; we want to do it right and we want to do everything we can to achieve it. This briefing was serious and it left nothing to the imagination. There will be no discrepancies about what is “on level” or the exit frame vs the stadium frame. We were given very clear expectations for how we’ll walk, brief, debrief, break-off and land. The organizers have put so much thought into every facet of this record; it builds a lot of trust in them to see it all written out plainly. It was long, but I’d say worth it. As someone who likes as much info as I can get, I found it valuable. There was a tiny part of my brain piping up, saying, “This is too much!” but that part was probably the part that needed to pee and hadn’t had enough snacks. Also, we took intermission breaks where we got swag.

Swag

Dudettes! We got the coolest swag!! I felt like a rock star or some kinda VIP going through the swag line. Water bottles. Rash guards. Jackets. Buffs. P19 stickers. It was awesome. While at the event, the organizers informed us there would be a photographer there to take our portraits (which I started calling glamour shots). Literally. I felt like a freaking VIP the whole week.

I have to say, that initially I didn’t like the Project 19 colors. Why? I’m not a huge fan of purple. Gold also is just kinda meh to me. But over the week, I found out that the purple, white and gold are the original colors of the suffragettes representing loyalty purity and light/life. Honestly, after realizing that these colors ran way deeper than just this event, I was way more stoked for them.

The Week – The Record

Monday

Monday served as warm-up day, for the outer 60. The inner 40 jumped all day, solidifying in the sky what they warmed up in the tunnel in Abu Dhabi. The outer 60 did some 20ish way jumps and a lot of tunnel time, flying with our pods. My pod, #tallpod, really got some quality time together. I’m not kidding when I call us #tallpod, either. With the exception of Leslie, I think I was the shortest tall person (coming in at 5’9″). Maggie, Sophie, Penelope, and Tilda are tall ladies! When we tried to shape out our pod in the tunnel, we had space problems because we all have such large wingspans. But I loved it! Hanging out with tall ladies is the best.

Also, just flying with my pod, before we had to start the record attempts, built so much confidence. I cannot overstate the value of getting to know the women around me, build confidence in our flying, and finding a rapport with them. Not only was flying in the tunnel together valuable, but we had such fun. We also roasted our arms. Flying static in the tunnel, specifically holding a pod shape for 1 minute at a time, for 15 minutes, sucks. But we had fun.

Tuesday

Tuesday, we began 100ways. However, we worked through it very incrementally. The first jump, only the inner 40 had permission to touch. Next, we added another layer (first stingers on the bridgelines and pods). Again, we added another layer on the 3rd jump, then including the 2nd stingers. Following that, pod closers gained permission to touch. I think by the end of the day, the entire 100way had permission to touch? (But I might be remembering that wrong. Perhaps, the outer whackers still sat patiently on the outside at the end of the first day.)

Wednesday & Thursday

100ways, bay-bee! We aimed to fly 100ways with permission for everyone to dock. We flew well, but we didn’t make it close to a 100way formation. Tuesday, we brought in total discipline, buoyed by inspirational words from Dan BC (My Hero). We flew calm. We flew chill. But Tuesday and Wednesday, we lost a little magic. So we sort of just blundered through a few days of 100ways. However! I must note, that even though we weren’t close to a 100way, we still had calm, predictable skydives. The base didn’t spin. People were relatively near where they were expected to be. The whole experience felt far away from the jumps of the 200ways. This experience just felt wholistic, composed. The whole thing felt orchestrated and well choreographed, with the cadence, predictability, and rhythm of an event organized by a few people with a clear, well-considered vision.

However, the “bad” news hit Thursday at the end of the day, after we sat on the ground waiting for the winds to calm down. We needed to slice down the record. For success. We were released on Thanksgiving afternoon, not knowing who was in the formation, who was out, and where we all would end up.

I had Thanksgiving Dinner at The Prop with a bunch of Project 19 fellow friends and I couldn’t have asked for better. The food tasted fine. The wine surely never surpassed mediocre. I only managed to chat with my parents briefly on the wifi connection outside The Prop. But every aspect made for a great Thanksgiving. I love this holiday, because, for me, it’s about appreciating what you have and the people you have in your life. I got to do just that over very average turkey dinner with some very lovely people, while I was in Eloy on a mission do accomplish a very big thing.

Friday

The 72way. That morning, we showed up, aiming to knock out a world record on jump 1. The night before, we received an email with the 72way formation. The powers that be moved me from 2nd to last diver and a pod closer in #tallpod to a floating exit for left hand first stinger on the bridge line opposite my old position. Little did I know, I had been moved into #successpod.

Ladies, we succeeded in one try. First jump of the day, despite my nerves, we got a record. We held that formation for 9 seconds. (I think that was the agreed-upon number.) It was SO SOLID. Then we ascended again with 80 ladies, to knock out another record. Again, we did it in one jump. (Despite me having a whole series of off-level wiggles and sorting it all out so Hannah could dock on me.) Then the rest of the day, we kept attempting to get an 88way record.

Saturday

The last day. The final day. We left it down to the wire. Saturday, we rolled out the 100ways again. #successpod grew from two 1st hand stingers on the 72way, to two lines of two stingers on the 80way, to eventually being a pod with two ladies docking on us. Before I moved over to this pod, I couldn’t tell you if a whole pod ever built behind this bridge line. Once #successpod became a thing, we brought our business-professional attitude and our British(ish) accents to the whole thing which just upped our game. I mean. I don’t want to brag, but we crushed it. By the end, we were the only full pod behind a bridgeline with whackers. Behind other bridgelines, were resorted to 3 lady whacker lines instead of pods. Because pods are hard! But #successpod brought our A game and flew our sexy butts off.

By now, I’m sure y’all have seen that we had an unofficial record of a 97way. I am sad to say that I celebrated in the landing area, certain that we’d made it. I was so sure. The formation flew so well. It felt so complete.

The Party

Was. Awesome.
So. The party after the 200way attempts stood in my mind as the standard. However! This party surpassed it. Not even because we went so hard, or anything. But because the party encompassed so much quality time with so many badass ladies. If you can imagine a party where all your best shredder friends that you’ve spent the last couple years getting to know and traveling across the US with to learn how to bigway were there, this was that. It was so much positive lady power. It was so much dancing and fun. It was a small amount of hanger because the tacos were a smidge late. But the party rocked. My only regret is I didn’t get more pictures. I did wear my pull-up cord denim jacket, so that was great.

Women’s Records

I’ve heard people go back and forth on women’s records. Are they worth it? Are they useful? Is it just a consolation prize for not getting on the co-ed records? But I whole-heartedly believe in the value of women’s records. Carving out space for women to grow and improve and achieve together changes the community in a good way. This process to Project 19 wasn’t just about getting a record; it had so many sub-goals, so many missions.

First, this particular record attempt stood to remind people of the hard-fought battle for women’s suffrage. We talked about that a lot at the record. I have always taken for granted that I can vote (and I always do vote) so I didn’t consider the fight for the 19th Amendment. I cannot imagine a world where my voice doesn’t matter, especially in light of recent elections. How different (and awful) a world that would be.

The media coverage around this record spans is vast. There have been so many news outlets covering it. So much press, so much media. I hope that little girls see videos of this record and decide to go out and do something daring. I was lucky to have parents that believed I could do anything, and probably do it better than the boys. I never questioned whether I was capable of playing soccer on the boys’ team in high school, as we had no girls’ team. Of course I deserved to be a starter. I was so lucky to be raised that way. But many other little girls aren’t. I hope media coverage of women doing difficult, exciting things like breaking world records wiggles its way into the brains of girls out there. I hope they’re inspired to go out and do big things.

Second, Project 19 (in my opinion, as this entire blog is just my opinions) had the goal of increasing women in the sport, increasing the number of women in freeflying. This was such a success. Well, for one thing, I probably wouldn’t have pursued freeflying with such focus if Project 19 didn’t exist. But the clear, defined goal of setting a world record was so tempting that it sucked me in. So many women took advantage of the camps and the training marketed specifically to them. So many of us have come so far in the years that led up to this. You can just see it, purely in increase of number of women on the 200way attempts this year.

Additionally, not only did Project 19 grow more lady freeflyers, but it strengthened our network. This is important. This is so important. I cannot overstate how much more appealing bigway camps are, when I know that I will have friendly faces there. Planning travel, lodging, sharing cars becomes so much easier when you have a dozen ladies you can call that are also probably going to these camps. I know that for future record cycles and events, I will be calling Maggie/Michelle/Kate/Swati/Kiara/so-many-more-ladies (just as an example! There are so many more ladies that I didn’t list). I know ladies from all over the country, all over the world, that I now consider friends. Having this network makes attending events easier and more fun. I believe these connections will keep women in the sport.

Other Thoughts

Shirley Chisholm

I picked my quote for my Project 19 poster from Shirley Chisholm. She was the first African American woman in Congress (1968) and the first woman and African American to seek the nomination for president of the United States from one of the two major political parties (1972). Dudes. This was before women could get credit cards and loans in their own name; they needed a dude to co-sign. She was a badass. [Read more about her here] I thought it was important to both choose a quote that both thumbs its nose at the patriarchy, and was from a woman in politics who was a trail blazer. I really didn’t want to quote a man and I really wanted to not just choose your average girl-boss white lady. So I hope that someone gets curious about Shirley and reads up on her, when they read the quote and think “I wonder who this Ms. Chisholm is?”

Inner 40

Am I jealous that I didn’t get to go to Abu Dhabi? Absolutely. It looked so damn cool. I super wish that I’d been invited. I wish I’d had the guts to email an organizer to ask if there was any room left. Do I think I probably had the skills to deserve to be there? I think perhaps. Did I have the connections? I think probably not. Could I have even fit it in my nuts-busy schedule this summer? Idk. I was barely finishing up my massive roadtrip to the midwest about the time it happened. Honestly, it’s probably for the best it wasn’t on the table, so I had fewer hard decisions to make. Is my ego and pride a smidge hurt that I wasn’t in the inner 40? Sure. Should it be? No. I wasn’t really a STRONG flyer at the beginning of the year. I had the best flying day of my life when I tried out for the VWR at Sebastian this spring. I had hit-or-miss flying at a lot of tryouts after that. I’ve been consistently improving all year, however, I’m not sure I would even now characterize myself as a STRONG flyer. So, did I deserve to be invited to the inner 40 and to Abu Dhabi? Probably not, or at least, not until this summer, which was much too late.

Collaboration Cooperation Ego

I try not to dip too much into gender stereotypes (because so often, they work against people instead of for people) but here we go. I believe that these record attempts went so well because of the collaboration, the cooperation of the women at this record. Also, I believe that this collaboration and cooperation stems from humility, a lack of ego, that so many women brought with them. There was so much “I’m just happy to be here” attitude. There was probably plenty of imposter syndrome. There was a lot of gratitude to have this opportunity and a lot of women knowing how hard they worked to get here.

There was just something so refreshingly humble about the way we worked together. Was break-off not great? Was the dock presentation not great? Did exit go awry? Were you close under canopy on landing? Throughout the record when anything like this happened, everyone was willing (and eager) to take ownership over their faults. The conversations that followed often sounded like “I’m so sorry. How can I help?” or “What can I do differently?” or “Okay, definitely, I’ll try to do that for you. Can you help me by doing xyz as well?” Even when things didn’t go wrong, women were constantly checking in with their pod and their exit peeps and others, asking how we could do better. It was refreshing. I don’t really have the words to say how good it felt. We felt like a team.

What Now?

I DON’T KNOW! I’m not sure what to do with my time now. No big way camps planned for next year. Will I be doing the head-up record stuff? Probably not chasing it hard. My head-up flying needs polishing. It’s pretty meh. So maybe I’ll put on some head-up camps at home, for my own practice and entertainment. This weekend, if the weather permits, I’m going to be trying out some VFS blocks I’d like to propose to the competition committee to help beef up the number of all head down points available to the Intermediate and Advanced dive pool. Next week, I’m hosting an MFS camp for peeps at Tracy who are trying to figure out how to get better at freeflying but still aren’t that strong on their head. It’ll be neat I hope.

Oh also, pilot lessons. Because I’m going to learn to fly an airplane. So I can fly hammerheads and loop-dee-loops and rolls and 1/2 cubans and all that upside-down nonsense. And maybe bullying people into a west coast VFS team next year. If you’re in the VFS market, hit me up 🙂

I keep tricking myself into thinking I’ve finally hit the seasonal lull, the respite from skydiving when it all slows down and I get a chance to play catch-up. However, I live in California now; when the rest of the country cools down and skydiving calms down, California keeps jumping. The days get shorter, but the props still spin (because the weather finally abates a googly-eyed tit [a bit] and the temperature backs off to something below blistering). So, while I’m telling myself that it’s the season for rest and other hobbies, I’m still not there yet.

I used to be pretty adamant about having a theme for my blog, every blog. I would talk about an event, or try to add a thoughtful take to some topic. However, I’m kidding myself when I say I have that much focus or introspection to apply to my blog these days. For now, you’ll have to just tolerate the medley blogs you’ve been getting full of tidbits and updates.

LB Altimeters Sponsorship

Dudettes and Dudes! I’m so stoked to say I’m part of the LB Altimeter family! Earlier this summer, my wrist mount for my Viso II slowly started unraveling so I joked that I should get sponsored by LB to get a new one. However, after joking about it, I realized I’d love to partner with LB. I’ve jumped LB altis ever since I upgraded from an analog. They’re reliable. They’re durable. They have long battery life and they’re just rad. I’ve bought two wrist mounds (I lost one many moons ago. womp womp) and a Quattro in my time as a skydiver and they’re great. So, I reached out. Now I’m part of the family! This finally lit a fire under my ass to make a gear page for my website. I’m not sure who is curious about what gear I like and dislike, but if you are- I have a page for that. (It’s currently mostly blank. But it exists, so telling y’all about it will give me an incentive to finish it.)

Gear

Watching Canopy Worlds

I spent the end of last week and the weekend in Eloy watching Canopy Worlds. I’m becoming quite the Swoop Girlfriend… (Actually, that’s not true. I’m terrible at being a Swoop Girlfriend. I almost never video Richo’s swoops. I don’t pay attention to the scores. I forget to remember to watch the judges to see if he verted any of the gates. I sometimes bring him snacks, but sometimes when I wander to the van to get the snacks, I get distracted and don’t remember to bring them back. I do have a Go Richo shirt and Richo sock puppet for cheering him on, so that’s something.)

Anyway, World Competitions are neat! Everyone from everywhere showing up. I plan to attend as a competitor, not a spectator, in the future.

Saying No

On that note, I did something incredibly hard for me this week. I chose a less hectic schedule next year. I chose more time at home and at my home DZ. I chose trying to carve out a little more time for things I’ve been putting off: Getting my pilot’s license and my paragliding license. I chose giving my wallet a break and a cease-fire on my melting credit cards after this year of VWR-chasing. But it was really, really, really hard because I said No to a Big Opportunity. I really huge opportunity (and a flattering opportunity, I might add).

I got invited to be on Prison 9

For y’all who don’t know: Prison 9 is Doug’s 8way team that’s going to the World Cup in Norway next year. I was offered a slot to just get on a team, train my butt off, then go to Norway. Even as I write this, I feel my throat kinda constrict at the disappointment I feel in myself for saying no. How do you pass up an opportunity like that? I anticipate a lot of times over the next year where I wonder if I made the right choice. But here’s where I’m at: I’ve been hitting it hard for a while now. I think I need to slow down so I don’t wash out. In the last calendar year, I’ve done 450 jumps. I don’t even work in the sport. Many, many of those weekends were away from home, traveling for events and competitions and camps. I’m pretty tired. The last thing I want to do is say Yes to a team and then spend the next year, panicked about how much I’m spending and how much time I’m away from home. I’ve done that. And when you’re in that place, you don’t give every last ounce of effort to your team. And when I commit to a team, I want to commit.

Maybe, I’ll regret this. But if I regret saying no, then I’ll have learned something. I’ll have learned where my heart lies. So that’ll be something too. I used to approach all skydiving opportunities with the mentality: “What if this is the best opportunity I get? What if I never get an opportunity like this again?” That scarcity mindset led me to say yes to XPG4, which turned out to be a trash-fire (but it did put me on the Open-level belly stage, and I learned a lot about some of the big players in the belly game, so that was worthwhile). But, recently, my eyes have been opened.

I’m good enough that I will have more opportunities. And if they don’t fall in my lap, I can go search them out. I finally realized that I have the talent to essentially take 6 months off of belly flying and then fly well enough to do my part in winning an 8way Advanced Gold. I have the reputation as a motivated flyer and teammate that, if I dug around, I could find some people willing to be my teammates and train hard. I have the confidence that even if I’m out of belly-shape, I can put in the time and effort to get physically and mentally back into shape to be competitive. So, I’m trying to give myself some grace for choosing a slower pace and a breather of a season for next year.

But my heart still breaks walking away from this kind of opportunity. It’s both good and hard and bad and probably the right decision.

Giving Back

So, with some of that time I won’t be traveling for 8way, I want to start giving back again. When I lived in Colorado, I worked very hard to give back. Lori Conner, who ran NSL in NorCal when I was still a noob without my own belly suit, inspired me. I wanted to give the opportunity for people to grow and develop their tummy skills, the way her events did for me. So I started hosting 2way tunnel comps. Which built to 3way tunnel comps, then 4way tunnel comps. I dumped so much time and energy into these events and it felt so good to watch people get better event after event. Then I moved to SoCal and started freeflying.

While living in SoCal, I did a lot of taking: I attended a lot of freeflying events organized by other people. I learned a lot. When I moved there in 2020, I wasn’t very good. I really wanted to give back, but at first, I wasn’t good enough to help anyone else; I could barely bumble my way to a formation on my head. By the time I felt good enough, I just never really saw a clear path towards helping others. I started LOing at Elsinore, which was good. But how do you run events in an area that’s just bursting at the seams with professional skydivers, all of whom are more competent and experienced than you? How do you convince people that you know enough that they should go to your events? How do you not step on any toes? The SoCal scene proved way too complicated to navigate – So, the past two years, I haven’t really been giving back at all to the sport. That kills me.

But! It’s time to start anew!

I’m going to start giving back again! I’m so excited! My plan is to host a few MFS-style camps/comps at Skydive California. I have a lot of friends who are wading into freeflying: some only have a toe dipped in, some are already up to their nips. But I remember that intermediate period where I floundered around for a long time in freeflying. It was frustrating. And unlike the belly machine that has a strong system of coaching and events and progress, the what you do when you’re in the realm of middling-freefly talent is super unclear. I think that’s a big factor that causes people to wash out; they watch some of their friends quickly become ninjas and, because they’re taking a little longer, they just decide to give up. So I’m hoping to help fill that gap (selfishly, because I don’t want any of my friends to wash out of the sport so they keep skydiving with me).

So! More deets on that to come. I’m in the planning stages. (But if you have thoughts/info/feedback/ideas/suggestions/advice/guidance, please hit me up!)

Other Gear Updates

I treated myself to some new gear this year! Currently, I’m anxiously waiting on my new Winx 135 Hybrid canopy from Atair. Once it’s here, I’ll be setting up one of my rigs for wingsuiting! Let’s rip, friends! If you know anyone who is 5’9″, 150lbs and wants to sell me a Havok Carve or maybe eventually an ATC, let me know.

Additionally, I’m still waiting for my new Vector – The original timing was such that I was going to receive it around my birthday (which is this week), yay! However, it’s pushed back to December. But I’ve got the reserve waiting around and I’m sourcing a Vigil for it. On the to-do list today: Buy another set of lines for my yellow crossfire.. They’re looking pretty sad. Ugh.

Also, I never posted my other team pics from Nationals. So here they are

My very own retro:

The dust settled. Richō and I finally made it home. I’ve got a weekend of skydiving at Skydive CA under my belt. Time and space has grown between me and the VWR attempts. It’s probably time to do my own mini-retrospective, look back at the wild-ride that was the VWR Attempts and think my thoughts on it.

What went well – in no particular order…

I touched the fucking formation! I touched it and I am so proud of myself. I fought hard for it! I only got to touch it because I waited right at the elbow of Bert, the person I was docking on, ready to dock. (Bert called me a little mosquito because I was buzzing right in his ear the whole jump.) I didn’t have the luxury of waiting 10 feet back, like people did on other days. My ditter started to scream as I went in to dock and I stayed to take it anyway. Honestly, I think that’s what kept me on the jump because the other first stinger didn’t dock and he got cut the next jump.

The Sebastian Tryout Camp: I liked that I got face time with different organizers each day. I liked that I got my report card that night. I knew that very night that I had an invite. Of all the camps, I felt most in-the-loop with the process at Sebastian

Lot of Tryouts. I went to a lot (AZ, Sebastian, AZ, Houston, AZ 100ways) which helped me feel pretty prepared.

My 1 o’clock Radial Felt Pretty Safe (and noon and 2 o’clock too): Dude, honestly very little wildly sketchy shit happened near me. I loved that. I do feel for the people that dealt with bad plane timing, where their float became a dive, or where the rotating base caused them to have to dive into floaters or float into divers. I’m glad my corner of the sky stayed calm.

I got advocated for! That was really, really cool. Thursday, one of the organizers came up to me and asked me if I wanted to move in, because I’d been flying well. What a golden feeling, to fly your ass of and see the results.

The ground staff at SDC, the pilots flying a killer formation, the mechanics who got LLLT up and going. Tracey. Incredible props to all the people behind the scenes who made this work. People at SDC. Families. Friends. Everyone. What a group effort.

Honestly, the break-offs really felt alright mostly. I really worried about this thanks to all the stories I’d heard from other records. But it wasn’t so bad.

Fresh Meat: I think it was a great sign that there’s a lot of new blood at this thing. It’s neat that there were a lot of people who owed 1st world record attempt beer. That proves there are hungry people out here who want to step up and take the place of the ninjas who are exhausted.

The Party: T’was a blast.

What didn’t go well – in no particular order, again…

Understanding Try-Outs Was Too Much For My Brain: Throughout the process, try-outs were confusing. Going in, having more clarity around how try-outs work would have been easier. How many invites are given out at each try-out? Some people seemed to know this info but how they knew is beyond me. How soon will we hear afterwards? In one AZ camp, I heard some people got an invite email, or a “you’re close, keep trying out” email. When I got neither, I called up the organizers to ask if that meant I was hopeless and should just give up. Is no email a sign you’re not even remotely qualified? Thank god for the Sebastian Camp, otherwise I might have given up out of sheer frustration. In the future, I’m likely only going to Core-run camps.

CA Sector Camps: WTF? Were the Sector camps the same thing as being invited to Echelon? If you weren’t already invited to Echelon, were you unable to get an invite from CA? How exactly did that work? That was incredibly unclear (and like, unbelievably dumb? frustrating? nepotistic?) A friend from NorCal told me that he inquired as to whether he could come to the CA Sector camp listed on the VWR website (which was the Echelon event) and was basically told “Nope.” So, would we say that CA did not have open try-outs? As someone who lives in CA, I was bummed to know I could’t get an invite near home (as I am not lucky enough to count myself among the Echelon invitees) which is why I planned on going to all the other camps to try to get an invite. There was just way too much haziness and obfuscation about how to get an invite in AZ/CA.

There Could Be More Camps: I don’t mean try-outs. I mean camps. Compared to 2021, there were not many random prep-events as other years. In 2021, Fulcrum and Polaris did some great camps in SoCal. I would have loved more of those. There were try-outs, but once you were invited, there were no “training camps”. Would we have gotten closer to success if all the sectors had training? (If the AZ 100ways were any indication, I would say no. That was not confidence-inspiring. So maybe it doesn’t matter that there weren’t as many training opportunities.)

For the Hive: Jesus, that was annoying.

the knife was not sharp enough quick enough: I wish people were sat down for a jump or two when they didn’t perform. That didn’t start happening much until Thursday. A sharper knife earlier would make people really consider what they did right, what they did wrong, and how badly they really wanted it. Selfishly, I wanted it sharper quicker so I didn’t spend so much time just sitting on the outside waiting to do stuff. Maybe I would have been moved in sooner. A rumor that I heard was that the CA/AZ leadership ran the VWR Mon-Weds and that Chicago ran it Thurs-Fri. Man, Idk what was happening Mon-Weds but we were just doing the same thing, on repeat, hoping that things would change. But there was no incentive for people to fly better, because they weren’t really being cut. I wish I’d known that was how it was going to be run; I would have at least felt a little better being a pawn in the how-to-run-a-vwr experiment if I was at least clued into the goings-on.

The Base 🙁 Womp womp. I don’t intend to just rip on the 10 people who were in the base, talking mad shit. They have a job that I don’t envy or want. It’s unforgiving and it’s difficult. But, maybe we should be re-thinking bases. Does it make the most sense to just have the biggest people in the base? Could we put some incredibly strong, if smaller, people there? Are we sure we want the 10 way base? Can we launch an 8way base? Should the base be required to do one or two training camps together in its entirety to really prepare? If someone, regardless of their skydiving resume, manages to blow up the base a time or two, can we remove them from the base? If you blow up the base, is it in good taste to do a celebratory layout over the camera flyer? Please excuse my bitterness; waiting for things to build in the very outermost ring of boondocks, my wallet hurt watching the base sort itself out. (Also, did the base do their own debriefs to help them talk about where the spins/tension/instability was coming from? Were certain pods always harassing the base?)

Sectors/Tribalism: Sectors breed tribalism. I do not like the sectors thing. I did hear a lot of people say “Well I feel more comfortable breaking off with a pod of people I already know.” which is valid. But maybe we need to teach flyers how to make each other comfortable (how to have open conversations about safety/feedback, how to discuss break-offs, how to talk about previous experience). So that then we can be comfortable flying with anyone. Overall, sectors did not help us fly like one team.

Our Bad Attitude about Cutting: At the record and afterwards, I heard rumors of leadership with the mentality that their goal was to not cut people in their sector. No. No, no no. Our goal was to get a record. Our goal should NOT have been to keep your specific players in the game. I heard people voicing their opinion that it was a good thing there were no or few cuts from their sector/state crew. That is simply a poor incentive structure. We should incentivize people to fly their best, to fly so well they won’t need to be cut. We should not be incentivizing people to just not to not get cut. There seems to be a mentality that if you bring “The Right Team” then that directly leads to “No Cuts Necessary”. I disagree so much I want to scream. Even if you bring “the right team,” one of those teammates, one out of 200, is liable to have a bad day. Our leadership should be willing to have the strength to sit down a teammate to keep them accountable to the group, to be flying their best. We as individuals should be ready to sit down if we’re not flying up to snuff. I hear a lot of murmurs suggesting if we brought the right team, we could have gotten a record. (Obviously, the assumption is we brought the wrong team.) I actually think we did bring the right team. We could have definitely built a 170 way. The knife wasn’t sharp enough soon enough.

(Personally, I’m offended that people are saying we didn’t bring the right team. As someone slotted to the very, very outside for the first 3 days, I heard everyone ragging on about the unwashed masses out there in the outer ring, those last-to-dock people. I know that a lot of people on the record assumed that everyone on the outside was just barely qualified to be there, that we were just bodies filling the last slots to get us to the requisite 200. The condescension from some experienced flyers towards people who were on the outside, or people who were doing their first record was pretty disheartening and rather irritating. I practiced hard. I earned my invite before plenty of people on the inside. I flew my ovaries off when I got moved in. As one of the heathens on the outside, I think I deserved just a little more respect. It sucks to hear everyone shit all over you based on the slot you were given.)

Debriefs: I wish we got more info in them. I wish we got inside video and debriefed by sector more. I wish people got called out for the things they were doing wrong

What questions do I still have?

Can we clarify how sharp the knife will be and when will it happen for next time?

Personally, should I advocate for myself more? At the camps? At the record? Would that have changed my experience?

How on earth is P19 going to go? I’m so exhausted from the VWR; what’s going to happen with the 102way? Will those organizers take any learnings from this? Will we have the same problems? What did I learn for myself from this record attempt and how do I apply that to P19?

Will the organizers do a debrief? Will we be privy to that info? That’ll affect how I feel about going round on this merry-go-round again. Let’s be real: I’ll probably do it. But I’d really, really like to know that we have done some thinking and aim to tweak our game plan for the future.

Next year, will the base do more training? Will the inside 50 do more training? Will there be a system of skills camps that are not tryout camps to help bring up our skills? Should I put on some training camps? (I always think about it: about running some single plane shots, or putting on a record attempt somewhere. However, I just never feel like I have the credentials or name recognition for people to actually want to show up and listen to me. Maybe some day.)

How do we improve communication up the chain at the record? My sector captains were also the overall LOs and they seemed crazy busy. My plane captain changed a lot and sometimes, I wasn’t even sure who our plane captain was. (One person was in charge of getting us to the mock-ups before jumping, but someone else was checking us in.)

Are we done with sectors? Please say yes.

How do we address it on record day when very experienced ninjas are just not having a great day? Do we sit them down? Do we talk to them? How do we handle that?

Listen. Sometimes I ask myself: Who am I to be demanding answers? Who am I to be asking for clarity and transparency in the process? I’m new to this record thing. Who am I to be so cocky about how I flew? But honestly, I need to stop that. Sometimes I don’t feel like I get some of the respect I want (and that’s probably just a perception problem on my part). But it doesn’t feel misguided to say that I am a strong flyer, with a great capacity to learn and to perform. I didn’t accidentally stumble my way up the competitive belly food chain, then to just start at the bottom of the freefly ladder and whoopsie my way onto a world record attempt. I sure hope that maybe people listen, because I have a lot to give back to freeflying if I get the chance.

Wrapping up my Thoughts

It makes me pretty sad to hear how put-out so many joyous, enthusiastic skydivers were about it. I was certainly bummed we didn’t get it. It hurts. I’m not ashamed to admit that I’m a nerd who uses my passwords to motivate me: for a year leading up to the record, my computer password was some kind of motivational phase about getting an invite to the VWR and achieving it. Not getting it sucks. (However, it’s easier than the let-down of doing poorly on a competitive team. On a team, I’m usually 1/5th or 1/9th of the reason we succeed or fail; in this, I was only 1/204th.) I hope this experience helped us all learn a lot more. I hope this lights a fire under our asses to do better in 2025.

All in all, I’m pretty tuckered out; I’m excited for a break and when I say break, I mean not worrying about jumping every day of every weekend on my head trying to remain ultra-current so I would be prepared/wouldn’t get cut from the VWR. I’ll still be jumping plenty; I’ll just let myself do other things. Might try to work on my baby swoops. Might organize a mini-MFS comp locally. Might take a day to go paragliding. My wingsuit canopy should be here soon, so I’ll be playing with that. Might put on the old belly suit and rip around on my tum. Might just hang out at the house doing much-neglected sewing projects. The break will be nice.

But wait! Tamara, don’t you have Project 19? Well, yes, I do. But I’m not worried about that. I’m not part of the inner 40 (and I didn’t get to go to Abu Dhabi, 🙁 womp womp) so there won’t be much pressure. Since I’m not particularly well-acquainted with the organizers, I don’t really anticipate being put very far in. Honestly, my biggest worry with Project 19 is that I can be a bit of a bull-dozer compared to other ladies. I probably ought practice flying a little more delicately before the record so as to not fling anyone out into the stratosphere. Richø’s must be rubbing off on me.

TLS

I have TLS! (Suck it, Nico) For a long time, I never bothered to get certs for this website so the interwebz would not recognize that it is not suspicious. However, after some cyberbullying my “so-called friends”, colorbarf-dot-com now has TLS. Please note that it does not say “Not Secure” in ominous font at the top of your browser anymore.

FLCPA and CP Nationals

Oh my goodness, the time it flies. I intended to write this as we were leaving Skydive Midwest after CP Nationals and FLCPA, but I blinked and now 4way is over. And then I didn’t finish this blog because 8way was starting and now 8way and VFS are over! (But I will talk about those later.)

About a two weeks ago, SDMW hosted what appeared to be a marathon of canopy events: FLCPA and CP Nationals, which is a rad feat for a not-a-huge dropzone. Despite some weather across both events, many swoops were done; the pond was thoroughly swooped. I remain pretty confident that there were no new entrants to the Midwest Corn Club, an offshoot of the Midwest Swim Club. (If you’re not a follower of @mwswimclub, treat yourself.) However, a few people (Richo included!) took a dip.

I’m pretty new to observing swooping. Up until last Nationals, I didn’t know how the event even worked. Now, I have a handle on most of the events and some of the rules. One of the biggest hurdles remaining is remembering to pay attention to the little things – Did someone vert the entry gates? Did they stand up their landing on accuracy? Did they drag water before gate one? I don’t know. I get really wrapped in the whole zoominess of it all and I forget to watch for the details. Coincidentally, I congratulate people who I believe did well, only to have them inform me that the zero’d that round for some reason or another.

Here are some of my take-aways, as an ignorant spectator:

• Favorite Event (of regular CP, not freestyle): Distance. I like watching people zoom off into the sunset. Speed stresses me out and I can’t, for the life of me, remember which zones are good and which are undesirable in accuracy.
• I probably should learn how to judge, to be helpful. There is a lot of staff, mostly for watching the individual gates, or marking distance, or setting up pond stuff, or things. It would be nice of me to help. *Puts it on my to-do list*
• Everyone seems to have the same color canopies for freestyle. It’s very hard to tell who is who. No points awarded for personal style in canopy choice. Where is the neon?
• The mutant/reclined harnesses frighten me. I just don’t really know a lot about how it should be flown, but it just seems like they are so-so-so low when they’re rolling out. But virtue of the reclined harnesses being, well, reclined, to a spectator, it seems like their tailbones are just way more exposed and in danger. I don’t really like watching people swoop in those harnesses; it stresses me out.
• Even for a fair-weather sport, CP takes the cake as being even more fair weather than most. This shouldn’t surprise me but it did. Canopy piloting has more strict wind limits than most things which really can screw up a meet. A lot of time was spent waiting for clouds to clear or waiting for wind to settle down.
• Maybe I’d like to get into le swoops. I started doing 90s recently and it’s neat. I’m definitely driven by structure and competition is great for that. I also am drawn to parts of the sport with great women mentors. I got to talking to Jeannie and her passion for getting women into swooping is inspiring. Maybe I’ll try to work with her in the upcoming year. We’ll see how full my plate ends up being.

The whole atmosphere of CP Nationals strikes me as rather different than freefall Nationals. First, everyone seems way more familiar with one another. All the competitors know everyone else (mostly). Even though the number of participants is lower than freefall Nationals, I think that FLCPA probably can take credit for this. All the non-big name swoopers who might be in the lower two classes (Beginner and Intermediate, in FLCPA, I think?) (like the PD Factory Team or Alter Ego, the people that everyone has known for years) compete throughout the year at a handful of FLCPA events, so they know each other. Whereas, even though there’s always repeat faces in the freefall events, I have nowhere near the familiarity with most of the competitors at the FS and VFS events as the CP peeps do.

Second, the whole thing has way more camaraderie. Maybe this is because each person is a team of 1, because you don’t really have that primary team bond like you do in 4way that means you spend time bonding with all the other competitors? Maybe it’s because everyone competes right out in front of everyone else, so your successes and your failures are on display? I’m not sure. But it does feel different; it’s pretty neat.

Going into Freefall Nationals (Are we done yet?)

This year, the only 4way belly I participated in was as an unregistered alternate for Tummy Team. Whew, is it liberating to not be all caught up in the shuffle of 4way. It is far-and-away the biggest event at Nationals (even though, this year, only 48 teams showed up, compared to the 60+ teams of regular years). I’ll add some future thoughts to the “How Did It Look Like 4way Went” to my retrospective blog of freefall Nationals but I am not in the mood to write that right now.

8way

For now, we’re keeping it forward looking. Technically, today marks the first day of 8way competition. (and now, I’m finishing writing this after VFS wrapped.. I’m so delayed on writing. Believe it or not, the van isn’t an inspiring place to write and I can’t seem to focus if I try to work/write in the hangar or Eat Up.) Today, the clouds and storms chose to roll in and loiter over the DZ all day. We spent today on temporary releases, “hoping” a hold might clear. (There was little hope.) I’m super stoked for 8way! Elsinore Jambalaya (Aka “For the Glory!”) warms my heart; I can’t wait to skydive with a bunch of my friends from Elsinore. Yesterday, Patrick and I whipped a fun 2way as my tummy warm-up and I just love remembering why I do this. It’s fun to put on my power booties and twirl around. The engineering of 8way, the smooth dance when it goes well, the clunky traffic jams when the dive presents problems.. I love it. Twice the people, twice the fun. Where 4way rewards power and speed, 8way rewards engineering and calm. It’s more of a dance.

Well, I’ll break the news to you: My 8way team won Advanced Gold! I am pretty pleased! Honestly, I went into the whole thing really nervous. I am not joking with you when I say it’s been months since I’ve put on my booty suit. Maybe 5?? I haven’t done a proper belly jump in my booty suit for closer to 9 or 10 months probably? More? Uncurrent is my middle name (in belly). But, I benefitted from hyper-currency in freefly stuff with all my prep for the VWR Attempts. It didn’t quell my nerves though.

I flew outside-front which was a new position for me. The exits challenged me a bit; we put the Fun in Funnel a couple times. However, we really flew strong together. I am really proud to know that I’ve still got it; I am relieved to know that freeflying hasn’t made me worse at belly.

VFS

2022 marks the inaugural year of SDC Core-n (corn) Trails! It may also mark the last year of SDC Core-n Trails but it was fun while it lasted. Tracey Holman, Steve Huffman, Richo and I all threw together a pick-up team for VFS and floundered through the draw together. We had a few really good rounds! We had a few really challenging rounds. We had a lot of fun. Nick Nash flew our video and just crushed it. He actually films VFS on his feet from below which doesn’t seem like it should work, but he takes amazing video somehow.

This year might be the last one I do pick-up VFS. I really love it, but I just have come to realize how much I crave that feeling of improvement you get from a season of flying with the same people, the consistency and connection you get with them. That’s such a huge element of what I love about competition; I owe it to myself to work to find a team for next year. If not, I think I might save the registration money and skip pickup VFS.

MFS

MFS starts tomorrow! Tune into the scoring on InTime to watch Let’s Make Colin Watch in Advanced MFS. Richo and I are flying inside; Colin Conway is our camera pal. So far we’ve had one training camp: a dinner out to sushi (no training, per Richo’s rules). We’ll have our second training camp tonight: going out for pizza (again, no jumping).

Even though I love training, I’m actually all about pick-up MFS. I’ll probably dive into that later. Anyway, this post has been delayed long enough.

SO…

Happy Nationals y’all! Congrats to all my friends that medaled. I’m so proud of you! Good luck to everyone about to compete still! Big thanks to the hosting DZs: Skydive Midwest and SDC. More blogs to come…

Wow. It’s over. Satan’s underpants. How did that happen so fast? I’m going to try to get all my thoughts down into one blog but, realistically, there might be a lot of recurring themes from this in future blog posts. This is kinda my “experience at the VWR” post. Next up is a retrospective post about what I felt went well, went poorly, and what questions I still have. (Already started working on it.)

VWR Experience

Honestly? This, for me, was a huge success. I didn’t know if I could make it here. Once I had an invite, I didn’t know if I could perform. I came, and I performed. I am so incredibly proud of myself. I had a number of people come up to me after the jumps and tell me I flew well. I worked my ass off to get here. I remember at Nationals in 2021, J Russ said “If you can fly VFS, you fly in a 200way.” So I went out and did it.

At the end of 2020, I was barely able to safely to fly VFS in the tunnel with other people. I worked my ASS off to be here. I pushed so hard. I attended a lot of camps: January in AZ, Sebastian (where I got an invite), AZ in March, Houston, and the CA/AZ 100ways. Before that, I did the WI women’s headdown record in 2021 and the CA women’s record. The spring summer of 2021, I attended least 2 Fulcrum bigway events, a P19 bigway event by Amberly at Elsinore, 1 or 2 Polaris bigway events in Perris, and a P19 camp at Skydive Orange. I also flew a lot of VFS in the tunnel. I worked my butt off and I’m so freaking pleased with myself for earning this spot on the record.

I spent a lot of time after receiving my invite, worrying what other people thought. I worried there would be a lot of people who would look at my name on the invite list and say “Why did she get an invite? She’s not that good.” I am confident after last week that I absolutely deserved to be there.

Am I disappointed? Yes. My heart is sad. I wanted a record so bad. I wanted to walk away, able to say that I’m a World Record holder. I’m really sad I can’t say that.

I think everyone involved with the VWR is going to spend a lot of time pondering the whole experience over the next few weeks or months. My mind drifts to the questions like “Could I have done more?” Oh definitely. Yeah. For sure. I had a huge list of things I was going to do to prepare: Visualize every day, Research all the people in front of me in the formation and find out what their gear looked like to help me visualize, Find videos of my slot and watch them, Fly even more VFS, Work on my physical fitness to help with endurance (chin-ups, running, etc. etc.), Meditate daily to help with my mental endurance. I didn’t do all that. I did a small amount of that. I could have done more.

A Big Big Thank You

Thank you to all the friends that messaged me with encouragement, support, and good luck. A big big thank you to my parents who came to watch on Monday and Tuesday, and their friends that came along too. A big thanks to the belly flyers in Chicago at the same time chasing their own record. They always cheered us on. Obviously, thank you to my sponsors. A big thanks to all my friends at the record. Y’all are awesome and I’m so glad I got to know many of you better through this process. A big, big, big shout out to my boyfriend who patiently rode the emotional roller coaster with me as I went through the VWR process and has always encouraged and supported me.

Nerves

Thursday before the record, had a zillion nerves. I was doing some single plane shots to get ready and felt… well, not ready. I felt unprepared. I was a bundle of nerves. But something switched Friday. My friends all started pouring in to town and my mood just changed. Honestly, I was just happy to be there. Happy to be invited. Happy to be included. Surprisingly, the rest of the week, my nerves mostly disappeared. I didn’t expect that.

My Plane Ride

Usually, my plane ride process is rigid and highly structured. But this week, I just went with the flow. I’ve always worked with the following structure: Breath until 1k. Visualize myself doing move that’s the crux of the skydive from outside for a few thousand feet. Get ready with gloves, buff, zips, helmet. Breath until 8k. Visualize the whole skydive from the inside twice. Visualize the whole skydive from the outside twice. Breath until jump run. But this time, my only process was to get ready at 8.5k. Otherwise, I let myself visualize, or day dream, or sing to myself, or nod off. I watched the person in front of me play a lot of Wordle and I kept wondering if I was better at Wordle then him. (Who starts with ABOUT every time?)

I thought about one of my favorite songs over and over again: San Francisco by the Mowgli’s. I love it. I love the lyrics.

“I’ve been in love with love and the idea of
Something binding us together,
You know that love is strong enough,
And I’ve seen time tell tales of that
Systematic drug, yeah that
Heart that beats as one,
It’s collectively, unconciously composed”

That song kept me going throughout the record. I kept thinking about how that’s our goal on these record jumps. A heart that beats as one. Skydiving is our systematic drug. Skydiving, our love for skydiving and chasing records and doing the hard thing binds us all together.

I’m not one for that warrior mentality. I’m not inspired by the language of going to war, going into battle. Being a warrior, a ninja. Machismo language doesn’t do it for me. These skydives aren’t a fight, a struggle. No, I like the language of positivity. We’re a team. We’re a supporting force. We’re bringing each other along and pulling each other up. We’re striving. So, if you wondered what was going on in my head in the plane, it was probably this song on repeat.

I thought about my friend Kellie a lot too. I thought about how proud she would be of me. She was the most supportive friend, the most amazing person. I think about her a lot when I skydive. It sucks to lose a skydiving friend.

Tribalism/Sectors

I’ll dive into this a little more in my retrospective blog, but expect a bit in there about the tribalism I saw in this record. I don’t like it. I think it’ll be something to overcome if we want to ever want to achieve a 200way.

So, What Happened?

I’ll tell you my VWR story. Keep in mind, there exist 200+ individual different stories of how the record went. Every single person rode their own emotional roller coaster; every skydiver at the VWR attempts lived their own saga. Each one of us was 0.5% of the record. We all played a very small part in a huge production. So here’s my tale.

Originally, I was slotted to be in the 1pm radial, in the Chicago sector. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and half of Thursday, I sat at the back of LLT. The dive felt long. I dove towards my radial as hard as I could. (I repeated a mantra on the ride up to altitude to help me remember how to dive fast: Feet, Ass, Arms. I have a tendency to banana. So I would try to snap my feet together, tighten my butt, so as to not arch like a banan, and put my arms to my sides.) My dives got better when I remembered to hook my arm around the edge of the door on exit, pulling myself out of the plane faster. I enjoyed my peeps on the plane! I hung out with Frayer, Alex Hart, Maggie, Leslie, and a rotating cast of Europeans. The people in front of me (in the 3rd layer) rotated a lot, but Alex Hart, Frayer and I remained constant for most of the week.

And so, we waited. We waited and waited and waited. I waited for so many jumps. Monday I worked hard to get better at my slot. Tuesday, I flew really well, getting there quickly, and hovering as close to Alex as I could (because I was 2nd stinger on him). I tried to be precise about my radial and disciplined with my levels. It was challenging. Often, I’d dive to what seemed to be my radial, only to realize it had moved during my dive, leaving me to carve a little.

I struggled through a lot of feelings of frustration, watching people in the 3rd layer give space to the 2nd layer, while the 4th layer kept getting lectured in the debrief about being closer. I tried so, so hard to be right on top of the person I was going to dock on. I tried to be patient, but watching someone consistently be off level, idling about 12 feet from his dock in the 3rd layer, while I worked hard to be close to my dock in the 4th layer smothered my optimism for touching the formation or for having a chance to be on this record. It was even more frustrating when I heard that several people in my radial talked to him about where he was waiting, and his response was to double down that he didn’t need to be closer. I don’t mean to be petty, because we’re all a team, but it stings to watch someone not do their job which could in turn hurt my ability to do my job. (Eventually, when I moved in, I took that slot, so maybe there is justice?)

As Wednesday progressed, I became a Pissy Patty, a Sour Sally, a Negative Nancy. Honestly, I stopped doing my job. On the outside, my job was to wait patiently. My job was to trust the organizers. My job was to stay positive and supportive, encouraging the other skydivers. I started getting pessimistic and that was not doing my job. I should have been more supportive, tried to fake a little more optimism. My interest in perfection in my slot waned as I continued watching, waiting.

Wednesday, on our 5th ride to altitude, things seemed normal, until the two minute call. On jump run, I see some people pointing out of the left windows. When I look, I see LLLT several hundred feet below us and off to the right, instead of hanging out at our wingtip. My first thought? Well, this doesn’t bode well. We rode the plane down and found out that LLLT left engine went bust. So much hubbub ensued. Rook wanted to send another load and, with one plane grounded, J Russ told us outmost folks that we were sat down. I can’t be too twisted up about that; I told myself going in to this that if I got pie crusted, I would not be mad. Getting pie crusted is something that I just cannot help if the layer in front of me is not building. I do not need to have a melt down over something I couldn’t control. So, I kept my chin up and watched with interest as the organizers thought about re-engineering a 180 way in 20 minutes. However, I think calmer heads prevailed and we called it for the say instead of sending a 180 way.

I do have to say, I let out a pretty big whoop that night when I heard the LLLT plane was up and running because I was back on the record.

Thursday morning continued as the last few days, with one exception. While waiting on the ground for weather to clear, I got asked by an organizer if I wanted to move farther in. Hell yeah, I did! I was told to wait for some directives in about 10 minutes. But in 10 minutes, I was informed that the spaces farther in had been filled; I would be first on the list to move closer. I had to work really hard to keep my face cheerful during that short conversation. It hurt more to have a hope, and then have that hope crushed, than to have no hope. Out of the whole record, that might be the closest I came to crying.

During that same weather hold, only twenty or so minutes later, Rook made an announcement. We were cutting it down to a 170 way. The knife got sharper, and quickly. The following 45 minutes tortured me worse than any other part of the week. Based on my last conversation, I assumed I was still on the outer ring, and therefore, cut. However, I looked at the google document with names and slots and I was #104. I was Schrodinger’s Cut. I was both in the skydive, and not in the skydive. I had to employ some of the mindfulness techniques I’ve learned from meditation. It’s the only reason I didn’t freak out during the wait. I had to ask myself: “Does worrying about being on it or not being on it change this current moment?” Until I actually know, there is no reason for me to be sad, or excited, or to celebrate, or to worry. My current moment didn’t change; I was still on a weather hold and no one was jumping. So I waited, patiently.

After an agonizing amount of time, the official slots came out. I moved to middle of LLT to the first stinger in the 3rd layer. I would be docking on Bert, who was pod closing the first pod off of the bridge. Honestly, we were a problem radial. We hadn’t seen much improvement the whole week. I knew that I had to do well or I would be chopped and quick.

They don’t tell you how hard it is to be gearing up right in front of your friends who got pie crusted. It’s not really possible to explain that mix of emotions when you’re on a jump and you know the people not suiting up with you are also perfectly capable of being on this skydive. It’s hard to be excited about the jump, and to be proud of your performance, when you know your friends are trying hard to mask their disappointment, and everything else. That sucks.

Jump 1 in that slot, things looked alright. But we just waited and waited. I am truly baffled that I can both look and completely not see while on a skydive like that. My head was pointed at the base, which didn’t build. It’s in my video. But in that skydive, I didn’t even see it. I stuck to Bert like glue and looked across at Kyle, my cross partner. I had no idea the base didn’t build until I got down.

I flew away from that skydive so psyched though. Once my canopy opened and my slider was stowed, I channeled my inner Megan Rapinoe: I started screaming “I deserve this!” I am not ashamed at how corny I am. I deserved it. I deserved this invitation. I deserved to be on this 170 way. I deserved to be moved in. I flew so strong and ready in position. When we got down, Bert called me a little mosquito because I was hovering so close to his ear. I deserved this chance to prove myself and I delivered.

The next jump, I touched it. My ditter was screaming in my ear and but I saw Bert taking Nalini’s grip and I had to touch it. I had been waiting for days. I reached in and touched it. I landed screaming “I fucking touched it!”. I was over the moon, elated. It’s such a strange sensation to be celebrating something like touching the formation when everyone else seems so frustrated, but dude. I couldn’t help myself. I touched it.

Once I got moved up, people toward the nose vocalized that the dive felt really, really long. It got me wondering, was it longer than when I had to do that dive? Or was it the same? It doesn’t really matter. It just crossed my mind.

The last day, on the last couple jumps, we went up quite high several times quite quickly. As we did that, the jumps got a little looser. All that has me curious about hypoxia. How good are smart watch O2 readers? Should we all be wearing them? Despite being recommended to use a canula, I just sucked on the tube. Was that dumb? I put the tube into my mouth and did the same type of ujjayi breathing I do in yoga, trying to pull the air through back of my throat. I felt pretty good the whole time, but I also don’t think we’re good assessors of being hypoxic. I did try out the method of running my O2 tube through my sleeve up my neck to my helmet. I liked that a lot.

Related to trying new things: I strapped on some weight! I wore about 10lbs despite never wearing any at the camps. It sure made my dive feel easier though.

During the record, my canopy decided to be awful. People say Crossfire 109s open nicely but I’m not impressed. Mine did a couple 360s and a couple 180s. Not knowing which direction you’ll end up facing on opening is butt-puckering. (I bet I do something weird and wiggly on deployment? idk)

Stamina for the VWR

I think I was mentally, emotionally, and physically prepared for this. But it wasn’t the camps or bigways that trained me. It was team training for belly and competing at Nationals.

This last week was not as physically hard as a 4 day weekend of back-to-backs doing 8way training. I never once felt as hot, tired, and beat as my 12th jump on day 4 of a camp with Perris Riot. It was not as mentally hard as Nationals. I never was so mentally and emotionally taxed during the week as I normally am during Nationals. Competition trained me for the VWR. Often in the past, I put myself into situations where I feel like the weakest player, the newest person, the most inexperienced flyer. I’ve figured out how to perform well with those feelings of doubt looming over me. So, when those obtrusive thoughts came to visit me last week, I knew I could push them away and still fly well.

My recommendation? If you want to have the energy, the stamina to make this VWR feel easier, go compete. But I don’t mean casually. Go compete like you mean it. Find a team and plan a rigorous training season. Do back-to-backs. Or pack for yourself and do double-digit jumps in a day. Visualize competition jumps until visualizing and focusing is easy. Figure out how to summon all your energy and attention when you are hot, tired, sweaty, nodding off, pissed off that your team isn’t flying well or you aren’t flying well, hungry, and have to pee. I think I agree with J Russ that if you can fly VFS, you can fly a bigway. Get a team, plan to do 150 training jumps, and push yourself way out of your comfort zone.

New friends!!!

My biggest win of this entire process is all the new people that I get to call my friends. By traveling all over the country for camps, I’ve met so many people, so many new friends! There is nothing quite as bonding as going through something so challenging together. I am so, so grateful for that part of the VWR.

P19 Success Too!

Dude! There were so many women at the event! I think we determined we had either 30 or 40 women there between the women on the bench and on the VWR. That’s huge! Especially, when in 2018, there apparently were only like 13 or 15 women. It is absolutely clear that Project 19 has made a big impact on getting more women in to bigway freeflying.

So… Will I do it again?

Yes. I am pretty sure yes. I will want to see that things change, that the approach taken next is different. But I want to be involved. I know we can do a 200way headdown formation. Absolutely. So, yes. Pretty dang likely you’ll see me in 2025.

Oh, I almost forgot. The whole “For the hive” thing? Incredibly annoying.

I survived my first experience LOing at Summerfest! Yay! I am writing this the Monday after Summerfest (and now on Thursday as well, because I can’t sit down and focus on a blog all at once) and I feel like I’ve been flattened by a herd of exuberant party-elephants. I feel like the last time I slept well was in 2016. Being back in the regular-folks (non-jumping folks) world is so jarring after a week+ of skydiving, I don’t recognize where I am. Whoa, Summerfest. I’m reeling. But what a reel it was! Thank you for the lovely time!

(Note: I have stopped caring about saying ‘first’ because I would rather be excited about never having done something before and, as a consequence, buy beer. That’s much more fun than pretending that I’ve already done everything. I’m way over pretending to be cool. Partly because it never works anyway.)

My Summerfest LOing Schedule Strategy:

So, never having done this before, I figured I could organize most of the days, only taking off a couple for my big girl job (Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday). By the end of the first Sunday, I melted into a small puddle of sleepiness and fatigue (but the good-happy kind). Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, I worked at my big girl job, writing software from the van (yay, for mobile wifi! Less yay for how stuffy the van got. I had to fling the doors open and let the muggy breeze try to cool down the van). I snuck in a few jumps on my days off of LOing and I also snuck in a little pond time in the afternoon. However, my days off went fast. (The whole thing went incredibly fast.) Then, I was back at it Thursday, Friday and Saturday. I signed up to organize Sunday, but the weather had other plans. (In fact, all FF LOs were voluntold to organize Sunday.)

As freefly LOs, we bounce between the different skill levels for groups. For those who haven’t been to Summerfest, there are 4 skill levels: ninja, advanced, intermediate and beginner. If I remember correctly, the first day, I rounded up beginners. The second day, I organized advanced. Then for Thursday, Friday, Saturday, I wrangled advanced, intermediate, beginner, respectively. It was a lovely time! Honestly, the first couple days of organizing was spent just feeling out a cadence, how Burble worked, whether I should be double manifesting, how big group size should be, etc. etc. But by the time I rolled into Thursday, I felt reasonably confident.

The Jumps

I had such a lovely time! I jumped with Aussies and with Brits. I jumped with people I knew well and a lot of people who are now new friends! One my favorite parts of load organizing is vampirically feeding off of the stoke of others. Which I absolutely do. I love how amped people are to jump with me! A lot of them are eager and excited and just absolutely tickled to do skydives with you. Especially beginners. Often, beginners spend the entire jump where their facial expression waffles between frowning in concentration and just beaming from ear to ear. They will get down from the skydive and rave when you get a single dock. I love it. I totally feed off it. As a self-proclaimed Eager Eagle (shout out the other original Eager Eagle, Christina Chan), I am all about doofus-levels of enthusiasm, to the point that it’s probably not cool.

I had some great jumps too! Unfortunately, I didn’t drag very many video flyers onto my loads, so I left Summerfest with few outside video shots. That being said, Nick Nash and Trunk did make me and some of my organizees look pretty good. I did some fun headdown sequentially type things on my Advanced days. I did a lot of zipping around high fiving peeps on my feet on my beginner and intermediate days. I nearly fell of the plane and did an epic swim on the hill. (Then my organizee showed me his video and it is epically embarrassing; I am just living proof that LOs are fallible. I looked like a total kook.) I did a couple 2way head-up rounds on my beginner day! It was neat.

The Activities!

Every night, the tiki hosted ridiculous games and activities; I did not anticipate how many I would participate in. Saturday night, Tracey introduces all the LOs. What I learned from that is 1) I definitely need a more abbreviate fun fact 2) I should bribe some people in the crowd to cheer louder for me. Of the other nights, I participated in paint and sip, the ship or sinked thing, and the ice block challenge. Obviously, I attended all the nights. (When the option is staying home in a hot stuffy van and eating PB sandwiches for dinner, the Tiki and the Eat Up truck take the cake, far and away.)

Of the games, I went into the ice block challenge with the least enthusiasm and but surprised me by being quite fun. Richo and I had to defrost some frozen clothing items and put them on. We were given block of frozen clothes that had a glove, a scarf, a t-shirt and a godforsaken dress. (The dress was our undoing… it was impossible to get thawed.) The hosts created a whole bunch of convoluted rules about one team member playing corn hole while the other one thawed the clothes. The corn hole player could win bonuses for your team and penalties for the other teams. Overall, I only sunk about 1/6 corn hole attempts, scurried around a lot, and had a pretty good time.

The ship or sinked (or something) game ended well, despite looking like a total disaster. Several teams had to construct a boat out of cardboard and tape, then we had to put one of our teammates (Polina) into a box on this raft, push/swim that raft out to the floating dock island, and plop our friend in the box onto the island. It was a mess. We chose the most genius of all designs; stacking many layers of cardboard on top of each other, frantically taping them together quickly, then twiddling our thumbs as we watched other teams construct pontoon-like structures. Someone taped a shark fin and cardboard flippers on Richo, so that was useful.

The real MVP of the evening was our Aussie recruit, Roy. Not only was he a swimming powerhouse, he employed cunning and strategy to help us win: He acted as a human chain between the boat of the team in front of us and ours, essentially forcing them to drag not just their boat and their person, but to also drag Roy, our boat and Polina along with it. Honestly, the whole thing was a sinky-cardboardy mess. Our team won, but I think we won on a technicality. (The technicality being that the announcers knew more of the names of people on our team so I think they chose us out of sheer convenience. The race really was neck and neck though.) I think we won some certificates, but I have no idea where they went or who used them. I hope they ended up at going to a good home.

Personally, paint and sip was… meh. I probably could have worked harder to make it fun. However, I was just tired that night. LOing just drains me of my social energy. Most nights at the tiki, I would have been happy to sip a drink, idly listening to other people chat, and staring into space. By the end of the jumping day, I was hungry, tired, and desperately in need of an eggy shower that would (somewhat) wash away the layer of sticky that I’d accumulated throughout the day. (Was it sweat? Dirt? Humidity & condensation? Pond water? All of the above?) So by the time I had to get up in front of an audience and paint, I didn’t have much in me.

But short story: The evening games were so fun! If you’re waffling on whether to participate, do it!

More Activities!!

Dude. The magic show, the Saturday night demo, and the party were all so much fun. Last year was my first Summerfest and I only attended the 1st weekend. I had no idea what I was in for. The magic show blew my mind. Having never attended a close up magic show before, it dazzled me. I am pretty gullible, so I fall for a lot of stuff, but I just kept getting surprised. Also, major props to all the magicians working in like 114% humidity that night, or whatever it was. It was so sticky.

I heartily enjoyed the Saturday night demo + fireworks + the party. I’m pleased that the powered paragliders stayed alive; watching them fly, they seemed to have a death wish. There was a big motorcycle + explosion situation before the fireworks. I didn’t totally understand the stunt but big explosions are fun (when intentional). And my favorite swooper did a night swoop! He and some of his wingy friends did night XRW with pyro and he did big swoop. What a cutie. The Saturday night party was poppin’ and the costumes were great. I think my favorite costumes were 1) Beth was the claw from Toy Story (with all the aliens? Super clever) 2) A very authentic looking looney toons martian 3) a girl who looked like she was dressed up as some kind of black hole or black dwarf star in black body paint and a big golden crown thing. Otherwise, everyone else just wore lots of shiny silvery costumes, glow sticks, glitter, etc. You can’t go wrong with a lot of glitter. The stage setup where Rook DJ’d blew my mind. I can’t imagine how much time went into designing and building this massive rocket/DJ booth. And every so often, big spurts of flames shot up into the air behind him. A live violinist rocked out for a bit and everyone danced.

Weather

The weather gods smiled upon us on Sunday; low clouds rolled in before I even woke up and they just sat on the dropzone all day. Rain continued the whole day and jumping wasn’t an option. All the tired LOs celebrated. I lolled around on the mat and at Eat Up, chatting with whoever was around. I can almost always be talked into skydiving, but my social muscles were tired from LOing all weekend, so I welcomed the break from herding cats.

Otherwise, we had decent weather. Monday was reasonably windy. A few other days either started with clouds that eventually thinned out, or some clouds rolled in throughout the day, but we didn’t experience anything too serious. The jumps went forward, we prevailed. Jumps occurred. Fun was had.

Overall, I just had an awesome time. I learned so much and I just hope I’m invited back next year 🙂