Category: Uncategorized

And I’m in charge

Guess what! The Northern California Skydiving League is back and I’m going to be running it!

What is NCSL (Northern California Skydiving League)?

NCSL is the local chapter of the National Skydiving League, run by Kurt Gaebel. It’s the Cloud Games, before Cloud Games. It’s a remote skydiving competition for 4way belly, both indoor and outdoor, that runs all year long. Local events happen pretty regularly throughout the year and the scores are posted to the NSL website, so the participants can see how they rank against other teams across the country. Additionally, you’ll find all sorts of other interesting info there; Kurt keeps everyone up-to-date on the latest in 4way scores, team lineup changes, and gossip. (If you’re curious about NSL, check out their website: https://www.skyleague.com)

Specifically, NCSL was, for the longest time, a really, really well run chapter headed up by Lori Conner. She hosted a couple indoor events at iFly SF Bay and iFly in Sacramento every month, as well as several outdoor meets during the summer, rotating between dropzones. She herded cats and juggled schedules and coordinate the heck out of the NorCal league for years and years, but now, she’s passing that baton to me.

NCSL and Lori have played a massive role in the belly scene in NorCal. In fact, I credit Lori as being one of the big reasons I started flying 4way belly at all; I’d venture to say I’m not the only one, either. The NCSL did a great job at welcoming really rookie flyers into the fold through 3way and 4way events, creating a really low barrier to entry. She always did an excellent job setting people up for success, pairing newer people with coaches and easing them into the world of FS. She put a lot of effort into making the NCSL something super valuable for skydivers in the area and I hope to do the same.

If you’re interested, fill out my form here! I’m going to use this info to help me figure out who my target audience is and what they want, to make the events as successful as possible.

Google Form for NCSL: https://forms.gle/kGp9YLGhULu2gaSq7

So, What’s the Plan?

Well, I am kind of starting slow with this. I started writing this before I left for an MFS camp in Guatemala, where Michelle Hart and I coached los paracaidistas on some MFS (Expect a blog soon), thus I’ve been a little busy trying to get all the kinks worked out there, as well as trying to get a freefly team cemented for this season. So, the progress towards getting things lined up is pretty slow thus far. But!

Outdoor Meets

I would ideally like to hold 2-4: one at Skydance, one at Skydive Silicon Valley and two at Skydive California (my home DZ). Honestly, if I get two teams at each event, I’ll consider it a win, because I believe that giving 9 people (two 4way teams + camera, minus me because I’ll also be flying) a structured comp event would be a great start for a year! Honestly, more than 4 teams and I’ll feel a little overwhelmed.

This year, I anticipate single day events where we will probably aim for 5 or 6 jumps. If I get mostly experienced people, we’ll just have proper competitive teams. If we get a lot of newer people, perhaps I’ll aim for some player/coach style teams.

Either way, my struggle is always trying to figure out the pay structure. If it’s a player-coach event, are people willing to pay to cover the coach’s slot? The coach’s slot + camera? I think I may be starting out with the camera flyer covering their slot (unless the person has previous experience flying camera for a team or flies camera at the DZ for work, because I hate the idea of people paying for a camera slot for a new camera flyer but running the risk of the newer camera flyer missing a lot of points). The cost of the events is going to be just enough to cover the fees to NCSL + maybe covering coach/camera slots.

Either way, I’m most stoked about the outdoor events because I love a good, busy day at the DZ. I love the hustle and bustle of a comp day and the pressure that comes with focusing on a dive and doing your best. I can’t wait to give people an excuse to come out and spin around on our tums.

Indoor Meets

Oh boy. These are going to be a lot more of an ordeal. With all the requirements of the tunnels these days, this is going to be a headache. But I do really love tunnel events so I intend to try.

I have no idea what an expected schedule might look like or these eventually. I think I’m probably targeting June for the first event, and would LOVE to host them 1x a month, alternating between the tunnel near Sacramento and the tunnel near SF. But that all really remains to be seen after I gather interest and run the first event.

The first meet, I am for sure only going to allow people who have flow 4way in the tunnel before to attend. I’ll have to collect IBA #s, and make sure everyone is signed off, and that iFly isn’t going to do something incredibly annoying that will ruin the event. I fully expect them to set up some new, insane hoop that we/I will have to jump through last minute to run the event. But I’m willing to do it. For y’all. For 4way. For the love of the game.

Eventually, I will open these events up to people will less experience. I’ll probably have a “sign off” night, where anyone who wants to get signed off for 4way events can sign up, and we’ll have an instructor sign them off on all the skills they need. After that, the person will get put on my “Good to Go” list and will be welcomed with open arms into the NCSL tunnel events. Hopefully, organizing an event like this will remove some of the guesswork around determining if so-and-so is allowed to fly 4way at the tunnel, based on iFly’s standards.

Finally, there’s the really tricky question of how do we adhere to the NO OUTSIDE COACHING rules of iFly while also helping newer flyers to improve? I need to chat with some iFly folk to see if they have ideas, but this is my thinking. 1. I can’t refer to teams as player/coach. They shall be experienced/inexperienced teams. 2. Nothing we do at iFly will be coaching, it shall only be “team discussions about flying techniques” even if one teammate is doing most of the discussing, and another teammates is doing most of the listening. Perhaps we will be in the clear because there will be no money changing hands for advice being given? Idk. iFly’s rules are awful and I really wish it wasn’t such a headache to just fly in the tunnel. But is is. And here we are.

(If you are a person that works at iFly or with iFly very closely and have any advice or could perhaps grease the skids on scheduling/coordinating/etc etc, please hit me up.)

Dear Abby,

Abby, I’m in a pickle. I’m about to tear out my hair in sheer frustration with one of the jumpers at our dropzone and I can’t figure out what to do. Because I don’t see the value of calling this person out specifically, and because we all have met at least one skydiver like this in our career, I will call this person Average Joey. Average Joey is a local jumper that has 260 jumps. I know this, because I asked Average Joey today, after hearing that Average Joey was downsizing to a Sabre 3 120.

I admit that I did not immediately hear the warning bells. Because my brain is slow. Because 260 jumps was probably back in early 2017 for me. Because, honestly, I wasn’t listening that closely because I don’t like to stick my nose in the canopy affairs of others. But my noggin ground through the numbers and I thought, “Hey.. that doesn’t seem right. That seems pretty small for that number of jumps…”

Let me preface this with 1. I was and still am incredibly conservative canopy downsizer 2. Some people can progress fairly rapidly through canopy IF they are focused on training canopy. If I saw this person mostly doing hop-n-pops, getting a lot of coaching from trusted mentors in canopy progression, maybe I would be less concerned. (Even still, that seems fairly speedy to be on a 120. Yes, yes, the Sabre 3 isn’t particularly aggressive. But Idk. 260 jumps on a 120 at all just sounds ill-advised, rash.)

And so I spoke up. Because, idk. I feel like I have enough experience that I should say something. Why? Idk. Because I’d like to not see people hurt themselves. Because I’d like to not see our DZ develop a safety record and a bad reputation. (Our DZ has a very good representation for Safety and Skill, I believe.) Because I’d like for the sport of skydiving to avoid any undue attention from stupid people doing stupid things to hurt themselves, end up in the news, and cause the FAA to look at us askew. I just don’t want the FAA to have any reason to make skydiving more expensive or more of a hassle. I just don’t want a knucklehead with an ego and 260 jumps to ruin my day at the DZ by pounding into the ground on a wing they shouldn’t be flying. Then we have to call the ambulance, and the jumping stops, and the mood is really soured. Don’t fucking harsh my buzz on a good jump day by getting hurt, you idiot.

Quick note: A lot of people get hurt. It happens. Some of it is unavoidable; some of it is avoidable. I’m not really talking about the getting hurt part today, more the part before that when people are trying to help you not get hurt.

Ugh. I was so put off and annoyed by Average Joey’s opinion-shopping. Because he walked up to Richo saying, “Oh I’ll definitely be needing canopy coaching, now that I’m on this Sabre 3 120”, but then went on to completely ignore both of us when we expressed concern.

Dear Abby, this is what I want to do about this situation.

I want to go back and say nothing. I want let him discuss this with Richo. I want to not speak a word, while quietly making note of whatever stupid color his canopy is So I can stay the fuck away from him in the sky, then mutter, “Saw that one coming” when he does something dumb. I want to let this issue soar by like a puffy cloud on the breeze in a blue sky. Floating on by, not my problem.

I want to save myself from the mental needling I will put my own brain through afterwards: “Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything. Do I even have any authority here to say something? Do I have any responsibility to? Do I even have the experience to say something? What do I even know.” And then I have to remind myself, that no. I do know what the fuck I’m talking about. I have so much experience, and a pretty respectable amount of skill in two disciplines, plus a lot of events and skydives under my belt that have given me a breath of experience. Also, all my travel and time in skydiving has given me the opportunity to interact with a lot of really smart, talented skydivers and I have tried my best to absorb what they teach me. So, yeah, I don’t want to engage with Average Joey and his moronic decision because I don’t want to let my own brain run that hamster wheel. I have better things to do with my time.

And, I want to avoid having to steel myself for being ignored, not listened to, and frustrated. I can’t help but having this sinking feeling that sometimes, in the sport, I don’t get the respect and recognition I would if I were a dude. And every instance where I put myself out there to say, “Hey, I, with my experience, don’t think you’re making a good/safe/smart/effective decision” and I get ignored, my brain hops on the merry-go-round of Am-I-Imagining-Things-Or-Is-It-Good-Old-Sexism. Whether I want to or not, I let situations like this, where my advice is ignored by dum-dums like Average Go, go to my head and I find myself asking, “Do I actually just really suck at this?”. So, yeah, I really don’t like expending extra energy doling out advice these days unless I know I’ve got a willing audience.

So, yeah. What I really wanted to do was zip my lip.

However, Abby, Unfortunately, I did something different.

I stupidly engaged in this conversation. Why? Average Joey wasn’t talking to me. He was talking to Richo. The canopy coach at the DZ. Why did I get involved? Idk. Because sometimes I feel bad that Richo has to fight so many safety battles. I feel like I can step in and bat for him sometimes, especially when someone is lobbing right over the plate for me.

Also, I got involved because I feel compelled to try to keep people from doing something dumb. I can’t help it. I coach people on exits a lot at the mock-up, without them asking it. If I see someone walking 4way in a way that’s going to screw up their skydive, I tell them. I just can’t help myself. I am weird cross between a know-it-all and Midwest-helpful. It’s annoying.

Anyway, Average Joey went on to tell Richo and I why he believes this is a reasonable decision. He also informed us that it would be unreasonable if he were to jump the Sabre 3 120 with weights, so he’s not doing that! (Look, he’s soooooo reasonable. Clearly thought this through.) I gathered from his demeanor that he just doesn’t think it’s possible that he could mess this up. I tried to give him examples of when me, Pita, and Richo had all gotten to a 120. (I think 700+ jumps for all of us.) It’s not even like he’s a tiny guy where he’s so light that he needs a small canopy. I tried asking behind the reasoning. (He was bored with his Sabre-whatever-150.) But I had a load to pack for so I didn’t get much farther with the questioning. Plus, I was pretty much ready to give up.

Later in the day, he got down from his first hop-n-pop on it and said to me, “See? I didn’t die.” First, I am so proud of myself for not completely losing my shit at what a smug thing to say. Second, I definitely lost some of my shit. More than likely, when you are the only person doing a hop-n-pop on a day with a steady breeze, you will probably have a nice landing. You are totally and completely ready to face any challenges that come along with that new canopy because SO MANY REASONS. You are probably pulling high – you probably got out right over top of the DZ and there’s no chance you’re landing off – you don’t have any canopy traffic – you don’t have the adrenaline and stoke fogging your brain after a really sweet freefall – you will probably have a pretty buttery opening because you’re not at terminal velocity – you are focusing on the canopy portion of the skydive without other distractions – you have a headwind. Yeah dude, for sure you could have messed this up on your first one but the deck was as stacked in your favor as it is ever going to be.

That is not the situation to worry about. The times you’ll really know if you’ve bitten off more than you can chew is when you’re under less ideal circumstances: Is there no wind? Or is it downwind even? Is it cross wind? Did you have to pull a little low because there was a gross break-off thing? Was there more canopy traffic in the pattern than normal, or someone did something weird? Are you hungry, or thirsty, or have to pee, or stressed, or tired, or distracted? I’ve mentioned it before, but this is a good example of where Richo’s $10 of focus example works again. You have $10 to spend of focus and you can spend it however you want. But in a hop-n-pop, you can spend most all of it on safely landing a canopy. You really are in danger when you have to start spending some of that $10, on freefall, on the fact that you forgot to pee between loads, on the fact that you’re kinda worried about how your meeting with you boss will go Monday. Idk. So yeah, you landed your stupid downsize once on a hop-n-pop. That’s the wrong thing to be worried about.

So Abby, I’ve gone on long enough.

You don’t even actually have to worry about writing back. I think I just needed to blow off some steam. This situation with Average Joey will play out however it plays out. I really hope it goes okay. I don’t want people to get hurt. Also, I really don’t want other people to see him do this and decide to do it too. I just want everyone to be okay going slow in their skydiving progression. Because if you really love skydiving, like if you really love it, you’ll realize you’re a lifer. And there’s no reason to rush. But that’s easy enough for me to say now; I think this month is the decade anniversary of me starting AFF. So, yeah. It’s easy to tell people to slow down now, since I’m apparently a crusty old skydiver now. Yes, that’s a good sign off.

Sincerely yours,

Crusty Old Skydiver

Man, I don’t really know how to start so I’m just going to start dumping thoughts and edit later. (Note: I did not really edit this. It’s a meandering jumble so read at your own risk.)

Last week, my group chats and my social media all have been bubbling with conversation about lines. And Fluid wings. And gear maintenance. And the sad, shitty feeling of something horrible and preventable happening to someone in the sport; because at this point, most of the skydiving world has heard about the heartbreaking incident in Dubai. And in the online world we live in, people post things and they echo. There’s always stupid hot takes, and shitty takes, and earnest takes, and probably some annoying dude “just asking questions” or “playing devil’s advocate”. There’s reaction on reaction on reaction. I don’t mean for this to be one of those. This is just a thoughts and feelings dump for me.

I think about people dying quite a bit. I think about the relative danger of skydiving, vs driving on the highway, vs BASE jumping, vs riding a motorcycle, vs a zillion other things that range from mundane (“is it likely I’ll get hit by a car on my run today?”) to catastrophic (“will me or one of my friends do something stupid under canopy and smash in?”, “will someone I love have a stroke?”). I try not to dwell on it but it pops into my head a lot.

A couple years ago, I forced myself to really have a reckoning with the possibility of death in the sport, not for myself but for Mr. Richo Butts. I’ve always known skydiving has inherent risk, but up until a few years ago, I didn’t think about it that much. But this is the 2nd go-round of Señor Butts and I dating, and before I jumped back in the 2nd time, I sat down and had a very serious think. When we first dated, he had just started BASE jumping. At the time, my poor little 75-jump brain couldn’t handle it; I couldn’t handle the emotions. I couldn’t handle the fear that stemmed mostly from a total lack of understanding about relative risk in the sport. It rattled me too much that someone I cared about had started throwing them selves off of objects. I was so new to skydiving, so new to all of it, that in my mind BASE jumping = death, and I preferred having an alive boyfriend. So we broke up. And before we got together again, I had to really sit and think about how I felt about that, about the fact that my boyfriend has a penchant for dangerous activities.

But this time around, I’m older. This April marks a decade in skydiving for me and I know so much more than I did then. I have grown up, and grown away from my black and white thinking about danger and risk. I now know a lot of people who BASE jump fairly safely. I also now stomach the fact that my boyfriend has added a slew of other highly dangerous activities to his repertoire: he (still) rides motorcycles, he (still) BASE jumps, he swoops, he competes in rally car racing and flying acrobatic airplanes. So I think about the possibility of him dying a lot. It’s fairly common for someone to die or get injured at events he goes to, or participating in activities that he does. People smash in hard while swooping. People hit trees and roll their rally cars. (He tells me it’s not that dangerous but nearly every rally race, I get at least one text along the lines of “Someone did a whoopsie, but we’re okay.”). People crash small, fast, experimental airplanes. People push through heat, and hypoxia, and all sorts of shit doing these dangerous activities and some of them die. I spend a lot of time hoping it’s not him.

Frequently when we’re just hanging out, Richo and I have pretty engaging conversations about risk. And gear. And safety. He’s a software security person by trade, and he thinks in terms of threat models, and acceptable risk. He used to race motorcycles and brings risk-theory from that to our chats. He’s also a rigger, so he stays up-to-date with gear information and bulletins and incident reports. Thus, we talk about skydiving incidents and gear malfunctions and all that fairly often. We both have a vested interest in the sports we participate in getting safer, getting better. We both really want our friends and fellow skydivers to stay safe, so we talk about safety at the dropzone a lot while at home too.

I guess my point with all of that is that I don’t take the possibility of death in the sport lightly for myself, my favorite person, or any of my other friends. I’ve sat with those thoughts and worries a lot.

So, when I started writing this on a Friday, I was thinking about the lines on my Gangster. They’re ready to be replaced. I’m not doing big turns, just 90s, so I’m riding out one more weekend on them, then they go to Pete for a reline.

Saturday, when I showed up at the DZ, someone asked me about whether I’m stressed out about quality issues from Fluid. In fact, no. I am not stressed about my Fluid lines. I am not stressed out about my Fluid wing. Nor am I worried about my new Gangster coming in the mail either (in fact, I am super stoked).

I am an ambassador for Fluid, and they are one of my very favorite sponsorships. Before I moved to Fluid, I dragged my feet buying a Gangster. I demo’d a couple Gangsters almost an entire year before buying one. Mostly because I build up the effort of changing wings to feel daunting, because I really hate selling my old wings. But that gave me plenty of time to get to know Scott and Kevin and Kolla and a bunch of other peeps that work at Fluid and are sponsored by Fluid. I got to see firsthand how passionate everyone at Fluid is about their canopies and how knowledgeable they are. I’ve been lucky enough to build a lot of trust in the people at Fluid before I even started flying their canopies. I believe in the company and the people and I trust them to do the right thing. I really appreciate the videos they’ve put out so far with situation updates and the reminders about gear maintenance. I have no problem continuing to put my life in their hands because I trust them.

Gear maintenance has been haunting my brain too. Gear maintenance and complacency and safety. We had Safety Day a few weekends ago at Skydive California and, while it was targeted at our newest jumpers, the people who mostly showed up for the talks and discussions were experienced. First, I’m happy to see experienced skydivers being engaged because I think they’re at the biggest risk for being complacent. Second, I was sad to see the baby birds didn’t show, because they’re at the biggest risk for being new, know-nothings that will make dangerous mistakes out of ignorance and lack of experience. It frustrates me that one prominent avenue for education, Safety Day, was blown off by newer jumpers, because it’s a great time and place for discussions about gear maintenance.

I started out super cavalier about my gear. I bought a whole ancient setup for like $1700 dollars in 2016, and pretty much every gear upgrade after that has been an upgrade in safety for me. I started with an old reserve (Raven) and now I have PDRs. I definitely jumped some ragged out gear for a while, but I really like my current setup, for fit and newness and safety features. I definitely used to be in the “ballin’ on a budget” stage but I am happy to say I’ve been able to grow out of that; these days I’m happy to shell out for safety and quality.

For the longest time, I’ve been so conservative about canopy progression that I didn’t worry much about lines; I assumed that if I blew a line, it would happen on opening. I’ve done a lot of training in Perris, and Eloy, and dry Colorado where the dirt takes a toll on your gear so I should have been more vigilant. I’ve been very lucky. I also am probably a prime candidate for complacency because I’ve been progressing so slowly. I still have to shake the mindset that I’m on “a big canopy”. I fly a 96. That’s big compared to most of my friends, but it’s not big. I used to count on my big canopy having big durable lines that won’t snap easily. My brain still operates under the assumption that I’m doing fairly safe landing patterns and it’s unlikely for me to get hurt. But I need to shake that mental complacency. Even though I’m now only doing 90s with a little bit of induced speed (and I want to start doing 270s), now I’m questioning what I don’t know, or what I should be (but aren’t) doing, because I’ve eased my toes into this so slowly that someone assumes I already know some important info.

I also find myself not wanting to fall down a worry-hole about gear either because I’ve seen that happen. I had an ex that spent an entire day laying on the floor, catatonic with worry about a “gear incident”. His pilot chute momentarily touched an old oil stain on the concrete of the packing hangar. To be clear, it didn’t touch oil, or other chemicals. The stain was old and the oil had been removed and the concrete scrubbed. I tried reason, pointing out that he could (and should) visibly inspect his pilot chute every pack job, so he could see if it was starting to show any signs of chemical wear. I pointed out that he could just simply buy a whole new one, if he was panicked. I tried the logic of saying that the possibility of a complete and catastrophic failure of a pilot chute, like it just deploying into pieces of confetti, was entirely unlikely and the worst that would probably happen is slower extractions. None of my reasoning really worked, and gear fear won, so he laid on the floor for many more hours in a panicked stupor. I don’t ever want to fall down that kind of a rabbit hole.

All this is say that I don’t have a real conclusion for this blog. I’m just stewing about gear and safety and risk and dangerous sports. I’m thinking about the information Fluid is putting out to keep us apprised of the situation, their investigation, and their reminders about gear maintenance. I’m glad that I’m a Fluid tambassador and I’m glad I have another Gangster coming my way. I’m glad to have a relationship with a company that does put as much thought into their product as Richo does into risk. I’m sad that this is the wake-up call to so many of us to update our lines, to be realistic about how long a lineset lasts when you jump it hard in dry, dirty places. This is just one more time for me to get on the carousel that spins be in between “Am I worried enough?”, “Am I worried too much?”, “Am I even worrying about the right things?”

In the Baz Luhrmann song, “Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sunscreen)”, he says:

“Don’t worry about the future
Or worry, but know that worrying 
Is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing Bubble gum
The real troubles in your life 
Are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind
The kind that blindsides you at 4 p.m. on some idle Tuesday”

I think about that a lot. I hope that I’m worrying and considering the right risks in a dangerous sport, doing the maintenance that matters. I hope I’m not wasting time catatonic on the floor worrying about a gear-fear that isn’t worth the time. I also hope that all my friends do their gear maintenance and take the risks of the sport we love seriously. Stay safe out there.

So, one of my New Years Resolutions is to make sure we have a Safety Day at Skydive California. I’m sure there would be one, even if I wasn’t involved. But I have the energy and the drive, so why not kick it off? There was definitely a point in my skydiving where I was striving hard to be a leader, to be a mentor and to be a guiding force in the lives of newer jumpers. I do admit that that mentality sounds… pompous. Rather self-important and also naive. Now, I find myself in a place where I have enough experience that I feel obligated to, if not be a leader, at least not leave the baby birds to the wolves (which in this case, I guess the wolves are their own bad, ignorant decisions?), or whatever wild creature hunts baby birds (idk this analogy has gotten away from me). Additionally, I sort of inherited some.. idk, proximal leadership?.. by dating Richo when I showed up at the DZ. He already had been doing canopy coaching at Skydive California for a while and, thus, he is somewhat of an authority figure in terms of canopy safety, etc. So, I received a bit of ricochet effect from that respect.

Okay, but here we are. I’m sticking my nose all up in the business of Safety Day. Why am I talking about this here? I don’t know. I guess I hope maybe hearing what we’re doing will be helpful to someone else out there. And if anyone gets good ideas from this or has good ideas to give me after they read this, I think that’s a good step for safety in the sport. So that’s why. In hopes we can all be a little more safe.

So what’s our plan?

We’re essentially planning to have 3 sort of “sections” that day: Before load 1, we’re going to have an introduction, then we’ll have sessions throughout the day, followed by a larger presentation and discussions at the end of jumping, followed by some fun!

Intro

This will be brief, probably starting right at 9, when the DZ opens. We’ll do a little welcome, introduce the basics (S&TA, pilot, lead instructor, DZO, etc), and say “Hey! It’s Safety Day! Plan on sticking around until end of day for more Safety activities!” Also, we’ll be announcing the structure of the day: We’re going to try having 15-20 minute sessions throughout the day, during predetermined loads.

Sessions

So, with this session structure (where we announce that we’re covering Malfunctions on Load 3 and Angles on Load 6, or whatever), we’re hoping people can plan which loads to get on, based on what sessions they’d like to attend. Right now, the list includes: Skydiving 101, Gear Safety & Gear Checks, Malfunctions, Basic First Aid (what to do if someone gets hurt), Canopy, Angles, Freeflying, and Plane Safety. We’re definitely going to start the day, Load 1, with Skydiving 101. This will be aimed at students, and fresh A Licensees, anywhere from 26 to 150 jumps is the target. In this session, we’re want to cover the basics again. We hope skydivers get this spiel when they graduate with their A license, but repetition never hurts. How to load the plane. What order to load the plane. Exit separation. Canopy traffic. The very basics. The other sessions are fairly self-explanatory, but will again be targeted at people with 26-500 jumps. These are people who may have not traveled to a lot of events to learn, or have not had much outside coaching. Overall, we want to emphasize safety, conscientiousness, and a heads-up, aware mindset in our baby birds. And it seems like Skydive California has a lot of new babies right now. But maybe that’s just my perception as I get a little older and more experienced each year.

End of Day

So right now, we have a presentation/discussion planned that will, at this point, probably be 1) reviewing the fatality stats, and discussing those 2) discussing safety considerations specific to Skydive California 3) malfunction bingo.

When I was a much newer skydiver, I went to Safety Day at Lake Elsinore once where they reviewed the Fatality Report. I remember the impact it had on me. This is serious. Skydiving is seriously fun, but people seriously die. And often, I learned from that discussion, in preventable ways. It impressed upon me how important knowing your EPs, knowing your mals, and having a clear plan for the common issues in skydiving can save your life. I have always been a fairly conservative skydiver, but really reading the fatality reports and discussing them does serve as a wake up call for us. So, I suggested that as an activity we do during our Safety Day.

Next, I want to talk about Skydive California specific things. Every dropzone is a little different. Every dropzone has varying norms and safety tolerances. I think it’s smart to talk to our baby birds to first, remind them of what safety standards we want to see at SDCA, and second, talk about how things may differ if they go elsewhere. And how to keep themselves safe at places with different safety cultures.

Finally, what I’m most excited about: Malfunction Bingo. We’ll have bingo cards with different malfunctions in every square. To check off a square, you need to find a skydiver who has had that malfunction to sign that square. While they’re doing that, they hopefully have a chat about what happened and how it could have been prevented. I’m hoping that the mingling and socializing involved will lighten the mood for the last activity. As an incentive to stay through the presentation and the bingo, I’m going to offer a day of coaching with me and Richo is offering a free slot in his canopy coaching course as prizes to the first and second complete bingo winner. Oh! If you have a fun malfunction that you (or an actor cosplaying as you for the evening) would like to tell me about for Malfunction Bingo, fill out my form! https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdhOC-YtJ3kHqaOR5O2jkBH34pu6e9DWn_ukN10K32z-eeTAg/viewform?usp=sf_link

So that’s the plan.

Skydive California is a small and exceptionally lovely dropzone. I am so happy and proud to call it my home DZ, and that’s not always been the case for me at different drop zones. I don’t always give back the way I want to. So putting in this effort to organize Safety Day is important to me. I would feel at least a little guilty if I didn’t try to help out. I do want it to be a safe, happy place, where people generally try to at least be nice, even if we’re not all besties. I really appreciated more experienced flyers helping me along in my skydiving progression, so I just feel like I should pass that on, and I certainly have the energy for it.

So if you’re planning Safety Day and want to chat, or you think I’m missing something, or you have other suggestions, please reach out! Or if you’ve been considering planning Safety Day for your DZ, do it! Happy Safety Day, y’all and safe, blue skies.

Well, it’s been about 2 weeks since the 3rd round of Matt Fry’s experimental headdown bigways. The photos have been flying across the social media. Nate Roth took beautiful pictures that show the pretty side of progress, but they don’t tell the tale of what we’re learning and how we are learning it.

So I went back through my blogs a little to see what I’d written last year when I went to the first in the series of these events, but I apparently wrote very little or none. What are these about? Well, the traditional flower petal shape/pods doesn’t seem to be working. Two rounds of 200way attempts led to frustration and infighting and bitterness and pouting and plenty of temper tantrums thrown by grown men. So, I’m glad to see we’re learning a lesson about doing the same thing on repeat and trying new stuff.

I’m sure plenty of people get plenty bored with me jawing on and on about how belly does things. But I do have to say belly does some neat stuff. I think right now one of the things that could draw me back to belly are their bigways. The Mustache at the All-American Bigways at Skydive Chicago last year looked fun and kooky. The Challenge always has neat looking formations. I just don’t want to break off in the basement and pull slightly above AAD fire. So, I’m scared of the big belly ways these day. But the point is that they do neat stuff. Bipoles and whacker lines and gems and grids and diamonds and all sorts of stuff. Yes, I do acknowledge that the option to grip legs goes really far in offering variety for formations, and that flying bigways without a real threat of corking and killing someone makes belly a tamer beast, but I still give the discipline credit for the creativity in it.

So that leaves us here: Freeflyers trying to come up with a different standard formation that just might fly easier. Largely, we’re experimenting with whacker lines, arching off of whacker lines. The “spines” and “ribs” terminology. Where the one or two people branching way from the base are the vertebrae in the spine and the rest of the whacker line off of them are the rib (each person is a riblet). The first person in that whacker line (whether that’s the 2nd or 3rd person away from the base) then is the “closer” I guess we landed on? Anyway, the terminology is funny and fun, which I like.

And so we did a whole weekend of doing formations like this, both 20 and 40ways. We experimented with balanced formations, unbalanced formations, whacker lines that stretch in the same direction or opposite directions. Two people in the spine before the closer. One person in the spine before the closer.

And we asked a lot of questions to Matt, and to each other, and to ourselves. What should the levels be like for this slot? What is a radius of curve for the whacker lines? Who should be flying strongly in their slot and who should allow a lot of flexibility and give, letting the whacker line move as it may. Am I looking over the bicep of the person in front of me? Or their elbow? Does that change based on the length of my arms, from person to person? What makes the first stinger’s job easier? What makes the second stinger’s job easier? And on. And on. And on. Because there’s no built-in assumptions about what “doing it right” looks like. Because there’s no set guidance, no real rules on what we should be doing. Which is amazingly freeing.

And also headache inducing. Every single thing we take for granted about our current formations almost seems like it could be argued and debated. In a lot of arenas, I find myself falling down a rabbit hole of the subjective. For example: we do a skydive and someone has an opinion about how a slot flew. Well, obviously their opinion is valid because that’s what they experienced on the skydive. But how firmly can we apply that to other people? What if that person has freakishly long arms so that slot felt easy? What if everyone around that person did something particular so their job felt easy? What if what if what if? When we ended the days, I found it hard to discern clear take-aways from what we flew. Yes, these are more or less a bit easier than pods with bridges, I believe, but we’re flying 20 and 40ways. So, nearly everything is manageable at that scale. We’ve got an end-of-event survey poll that I’m filling out after this and I’ll find it interesting to see what the results end up being. But all in all. Progress was made, or so I hope, because I think we’re all pretty willing to tell ourselves it’ll be better this next time around, this next attempt.

Saturday after jumping, we spent 2 hours in the debrief in a structured discussion about everything. The day. The jumps. Why it’s working. Why it’s not. Is this just hard because it’s hard and un-do-able? Is it hard because we’ve never done this before? Because we don’t all have the collective muscle memory for these skydives? Who knows. (I like them because most of the skydiving faces inwards and I think that is a HUGE help.)

But then we also covered the contentious question that surrounds the bigway circuit. Do the right 200 people exist out there that can to a 200way head down record? Can we get them all to come out? Are they too jaded and old? Do we spend enough time training to be ready for this? Is it possible to do it?

We talked about moving people around in the formation during the record. How do we move in people doing well? How do we move out people doing less well? How do you, as an organizer, have a conversation with your homie (that you gave an invite to) about how they’re not doing what they need to and that they oughta sit down or be moved to a place in the formation with less prestige. How do we handle the bench? Dan BC popped into to tell us about the bench on belly bigways; it’s not people who can probably do it. It’s people who can definitely do it.

We talked about cuts. How do we cut people. Who do we cut. When? How does that work? The ladies, once again, all talked about how well P19 went. Which I’m sure everyone who wasn’t part of it is tired of. But it went so good. It really did. It helps that it was fully funded. But I do think the other organization around it set the whole thing up for a lot of success. How we trained. How the week went. How cuts were handled. In that, we got to talking about pie crusting. Does it make sense to just lop off everyone on the outside, even if some are doing well? Could we cut 5 here, 3 there, when they’re sucking it up? (That would affect the cost, if you don’t sit down an entire planeload at a time.)

In relation to cost and cuts, another interesting thought that was brought up: Can we get sponsors? ReWu tossed this one out there, and after she said it, I was gobsmacked because it both seems obvious and like a great idea. I mean, why not look for some corporate partners? I’d be all about it. If, as a sport, we’re getting into this mentality of tying a message to a record, an achievement (for example Stand Together), why not get some sponsors on board who might be excited about the message and marketing? But I’m not a marketing person. I know nothing.

Back to cuts, Dan BC brought up an example where he had to cut someone who was doing *fine*. The person wasn’t screwing up. Dan just had a person on the bench who could not only do *fine* but could bring strength to that sector that wasn’t succeeding. So he had to swap them. And that sucks to tells someone who is doing something passably well that it’s still not good enough. I believe that some of the organizers at the 200way lacked that. I believe that the “Bring the right team” mentality that’s oozing its way into the big way scene won’t allow for that. The organizers are so closely bound to the people they invite that they are blind to when “their people” are fucking it up. It’s a bad mentality.

Honestly, if the “bring the right team” approach was used on the last 200way, I would have never gotten an invite. (Maybe I’m not part of the “right team”.) But the who-you-know and the choosing favorites would have kept me out of it. I’ve ranted about it before, but for the last attempts, you had to be invited to be invited to the CA sector “try outs”. (Very much a misnomer.) Maybe, if that’s the approach going forward, I’ll have enough social capital to keep me around but I’m not counting on it. I’m really happy to be participating in these events because they’re neat. I love discussing minutiae of skydiving: Season training strategies, block technique, levels, choosing teams, etc etc. The nitty gritty is fun to chat about. So these are super cool. And I think the new formations might really help lead us to success, but I think “bring the right team” will be our downfall.

First and foremost. Thank you to my lovely boyfriend. Whose first comment was “NOT EVEN A SINGLE MENTION OF ME?!?” when he read this. And then pouted. Even though I definitely posted something cute on our anniversary. And he did not. And I post other cute things of him on my insta all the time. “But I post about you on my story all the tiiiiime.” he replies. But all of his followers can vouch that he mostly just makes fun of me on his story. So. Thank you to my lovely Richo. My lovely boyfriend. Who constantly wanders around whining at me “Be nice to meeeeee! You’re mean!”. My very cute boyfriend. He brings me along to all sorts of fun activities I probably wouldn’t find myself in otherwise, like the Fluid Wings speed fly event. He comes with me on my adventures, like trying a slow speed tunnel camp. He helps with any event I want to host. He happily will fly an any comp I want. He is my adventure buddy and so very thank you to Señor Butts for an excellent 2023. He’s such a hunk.

Even though 2023 felt like a nothing burger in terms of skydiving, it took going through my calendar from last year to realize I actually did quite a lot. But without it all being under one, unifying goal (like the 200way in 2022), all my disparate activities seemed scattered into the breeze. But here’s what I got up to.

Jumps: 303. Phew. I am glad to see I topped 300 (anything less feels like a VERY slow year) but the year still felt slow anyway. Most of these are freefly jumps, with about 30-50 wingsuit jumps in there, and a dozen or so belly jumps.

Events:

• A week of slow speed dynamic torture with Martin Dedek
• First Fly 4 Life camp!
• Speedflying Camp with Fluid Wings in Utah!
• Cloud Games
• Matt Fry’s experimental bigway event in Perris
• WI Head-up Record!
• Summerfest
• FJC with Chuma
• Women’s CA Head-up Record!
• Took my first canopy course with the intention of learning about swoopz

I also hosted a fair amount of events this year also. Okay, the corny way to say this is that I’m “trying to be the change I want to see in the world”. It’s not that I necessarily want to see change, but I do selfishly want for certain types to exist, so I’ve started trying to put those on. I wanted to see more HU focused jumps so I made the effort to get friends out to the DZ and kinda took charge to get us doing static stuff, with a fair smattering of head up opportunity. I organized an MFS scrambles day. I’ve got a few other future events simmering, percolating. And I organize those because that’s the kinda flying I want to do. I don’t really love angles. I know myself, and I know that I will fall out of skydiving without some structure to my fun.

I also hosted the kind of events that I am glad I had access to. I was lucky enough to come up under the wing of Christy Frikken, who just runs the best events. In addition to regular old events, she will host some with a twist. Like she was cooking up this 4way tunnel comp called like Spy vs Spy, where during a 4way scrambles, everyone would have secret roles. If you were the spy, you had to subtly sabotage your team, but if everyone guessed you were the spy, you lost points. If you get a chance, you should try them out. You can see her love of board games coming through. They’re super neat. Additionally, I benefitted from a lot free or cheap events and organizing for noobs, and it made me better. So I want to provide some structure and coaching for newer people who want to get better. So I hosted a couple events for newer belly flyers at Skydive California, with more to come!

I did some wingsuit jumps in there too. The number of jumps I’ve done this Oct-now probably doubles what I had. Up until this late fall/winter, I probably had 20 wingsuit jumps? And I’d guess I’m up to 40 maybe now! I’m at least not totally petrified when I wingsuit. Ted Chen has been organizing wingsuiting at SDCA which I’ve been doing a bit of. I’m getting to the point where I’m mostly staying with basic skydives. But I still get stressed at pull time. I forget to wad myself into a small ball, and I forget to slow down. And I pitch and I forget to collapse my tail and arm wings. Then my legs are flying wildly toward my riser and I shake all about in my harness. But my Winx opens super on heading so that’s good. My G4 looks AWFUL from the riser slaps. I am baffled that I’m not more sore or beat up after a day of wingsuiting.

I did a smidge of tunnel but less than I would like. I miss Oceanside and when I lived 7 minutes from the tunnel. I miss their scene and the ease of scheduling and the events and the members program. That tunnel is so good. That staff is so good. The people who fly there for fun are so good. The coaches around are so good. It’s just so great. In the last few months, iFly SF Bay has been surprisingly pleasant though. The last couple months have been fairly busy every time I’ve been to the tunnel, especially compared to the handful of times we flew there earlier in the year.

Honestly though, there was just a lot of jumping with my local friends. We had a super wet, cloudy winter last year that I didn’t get jumping until pretty late in the season. And I did spend a lot of time on some other things this year too. It’s weird to have such a slow season for me.

Events Unrelated to Skydiving

For a while, I tried to keep this blog solely about skydiving. But, even though I skydive a lot, that’s a really thin slice of my life. And since I’m less and less inclined to write big posts & do photo dumps on Facebook these days (and Instagram isn’t quite the right medium), I’ve decided to start posting more of my whole life on this website. So here’s some other stuff I got up to this year:

• Worked remotely in South Carolina for a couple weeks @ Myrtle Beach
• Bought a house & tried to figure out pool maintenance
• Acquired another cat (Sid, aka Baby Cat, aka Baby Tiny, aka Six Dinner Sid, aka Chungus-Among-Us, aka Chonkasaurus , aka Baby Chonk)
• Visited & Hiked Glacier National Park for a week
• Solo vacation to Mexico City
• Colorado for family Christmas

Highlights

As probably is expected, Summerfest is high on my list. I have so much fun there. I love love love organizing, and that’s such a high energy event. It’s so chock-full of stoke and talent and fun. Skydive Chicago just puts on an excellent event and I’m so proud and grateful to be part of it. Plus, I really do like the extended period of time to hang out with some of my other friends I never see because they live on the other side of the country. It’s like adult summer camp. I never want to stop going. I will go back and organize until they tell me I’m too old and uncool.

Considering I love me some records, the WI State HU general ranks high up in the list too. That was my first HU record attempts of any kind, and it was my first record! I was so proud of how I flew, plus I love a reason to visit the folks at Skydive Midwest. They are such a fun and welcoming and lovely crew. Highly recommend that you pop in to do some rips there if you can; you’ll have a nice time. Plus, there’s all you can eat sushi fairly close and that’s always a good cloudy day activity. Plus, once I saw a car on fire on the highway near there and that was very exciting.

Secondly, I’d list the Women’s CA HU record up towards the top as well. There’s just something so rad about women’s event. It’s just really cool to see a bunch of other women who have worked hard to get good at this sport work together to accomplish some cool goals. The ones I’ve been to seem to have a lot of positivity and support and all that cheesy cheerleading I both like and am good at. Plus, I really do just like getting my name down in the history books of skydiving, even though it’s a silly, tiny sport, so so so niche. Not even to be remembered, but just to know that at one point, I was part of a superlative group of women who did achieve something that no one else had, up to that point.

Again, Cloud Games shows back up in the top things. It’s just a good time. It’s fun to get some friends together to try our best, even if we have no real hope of doing super well. It’s fun to bring a tiny bit of discipline to my fun jumping, but also a whole bunch of ridiculousness. Every time we’ve done it, mostly I remember how hard we laugh our faces off all day. Because we constantly do dumb stuff, like cork. Or walk the dive wrong and get a bunch of busts. Or throw the SD card out the plane door because you’re a dum-dum. Or brain lock. Or lose the shapes a lot. Or spend a couple skydives absolutely panicking because you don’t have any idea how to fly camera and if you bust the whole round, all your friends might be a little disappointed. It’s a great time! Plus this year, a couple newer teams participated too! It was so fun to see some people dip their toes into the competition madness. The older kids tried to help the newer kids by coaching them on exits, or helping with engineering. I think a lot of people really enjoyed it as well.

Lowlights

Man, I was so disappointed by my slow speed dynamic camp. I tried to keep a positive attitude but I was so let down. I got so little out of it. I was reduced to curling up in a ball on the net and screaming because it felt like such a waste. The style of coaching just did not jive with me. I really, really would like to learn how to fly dynamic but I can never, ever, ever do anything like that again.

New Years Resolutions for Skydiving

• Host 4 events for experienced jumpers at Skydive California
• Host 4 events for newer jumpers at Skydive California
• Attend 4 events for experienced jumpers elsewhere (HU camps, HD camps, sequential events)
• Fly on a trained VFS or MFS team at Nationals
• Go through a rigger course
• Be on the Vertical Sequential world record attempt
• Organize Safety Day at Skydive California
• Do at least 1 day of wingsuiting a month
• At least one HU record try-out

This might be ambitious. Or maybe it’ll all be fine? I just like to have goals. Keeps me from growing moss. But then people come and throw a wrench in things. Literally, Day 3 of the year, someone was like “Wanna do an AFFI course?” and I was like, “Well, obviously yes.” So maybe these will all change. Because I also kinda want to run my first ultra this year. And I’d like to get into pattern drafting in sewing. And I really wouldn’t mind redoing the landscaping in the yard. And picking up roller skating. And trying out some vegan cooking. It’s a lot.

So yeah. Happy New Year. Hello 2024. Let’s go do some neat skydives.

Hi everyone! You’re getting a twofer today in blog land. First, a little bit of time dedicated to how grateful I am that I found skydiving. Second, it’s head-up season, baby!

Thanksgiving Gratitude Moment

Well in honor of Thanksgiving, at the risk of sounding a little corny, I want to take the first part of this blog to express my gratitude to the sport and all the things it brings with it. (To be fair, I am usually one of those annoying gratitude people so this isn’t really out of the norm for me.) I am so incredibly thankful for skydiving and the role it plays in my life. It’s such a massive part of who I am: it’s where I spend a lot of my time, it’s where I’ve made so many of my friends, it’s enabled me to travel and meet people and have amazing experiences. It’s one of the biggest incentives I have to stay fit and healthy and to take an interest in my nutrition & vegetarianism, meditation, and yoga. So I’m thankful for that.

Especially though, I’m thankful for the people I’ve met through it. I have friends from so many drop zones. Every time I’ve moved to a new city, new state, I’ve met more skydivers, made more friends, and experienced the character of a new DZs. I have met people who have become close friends and teammates with them. I met and re-met Richo Butts, my adorable talented swooperific boyfriend, through skydiving. (He will hate that description.) I’m thankful that I’ve settled down in Tracy, CA because Skydive California is here. My travel is almost exclusively for skydiving events: try-outs, or camps, or events, or tunnel trips. I realize that as I type all this, I sound incredibly 1 dimensional and skydiving-obsessed. It’s my passion. And I realize that means I pour my heart and soul and free time and money into it. So I’m thankful to have something I’m so passionate about.

I don’t say this nearly enough but I am so thankful my sponsors who make the gear that I love and count on. I’m thankful for…

For Option Studios, my first sponsor. From our very first interaction, I have felt so believed-in and supported. The folks working there all do their best to lift up women in the sport and I love that. They make the best jerseys out there and their designs constantly impress me. On top of making durable, stylish, radical jerseys, I love all the people who work at Option. Such a lovely bunch. They will always be my first sponsor and I love them so so much. So thankful for their support and that I’m part of the team.

For Fluid, who have made me a “canopy-person”. I have never been a “canopy-person”. When I flew Sabre2, I found myself saying, “Oh, the canopy part of the skydive is just to get me to the ground safely.” I didn’t find much joy in it. But that is very, very different with my Gangster. I love it. I also just recently started flying my removable slider and it’s such a game changer. Vocabulary to talk about canopy flight has never come easy to me. I’m not sure how to describe what I feel or experience when I fly my canopy. I always am left with a gap of understanding when someone talks about what canopy flight is like for them. But what I can definitely say is that the Gangster LOVES flying without a slider: the way it responds to harness input, how it turns. The canopy feels unrestrained. And finally, finally, I feel a connection to my canopy. (Not sentimental, but also that.) When I’m in the harness, it is responsive. It listens. I really, really love flying my canopy. Fluid knows how to make great wings. Also, again, I love the people! They are always helpful, prompt, pleasant, lovely, fun. I am so happy to have found a canopy that I actually like to fly and so happy that Fluid wants me to be a (T)ambassador for them.

For UPT, who made me the best rig I’ve ever flown. I am so thankful for UPT and their sponsorship. I love my V306. I love its design. I love how it fits. I love its durability and reliability. I feel so lucky to be at a point in the sport where I can have my very own custom rig that fits me and looks amazing. When I started skydiving, I definitely was ballin’ on a budget. Thus, I jumped very crappy gear for a long while. Today, I’m thankful to be sponsored by UPT and to be flying a rig that’s safe and comfortable and beautiful.

For L&B. Recently, I picked up a sponsorship by L&B and while I’m thankful for that, I’m mostly thankful for their products. I am thankful for the durability and reliability of my altis. I’ve only ever gotten a new one after losing mine 🙁 My audible and my wrist alti just keep going. They don’t break. They don’t glitch. They just work predictably, jump after jump. I’m thankful for that.

For Skydive CA, my home DZ. I love jumping at Skydive California (Skydive Cal, SDCA). Just so, so much. I love the staff. I love the culture. I love the fun jumpers. I feel so invested in Skydive Cal and the people there. I am thankful they let me run events. I am thankful so many of my friends jump there. I’m thankful for their incredibly inclusive community they’ve built. I am so thankful to call Skydive Cal my home DZ.

For my teammates, past and future. I am so thankful for the teams I’ve been on. The friendships I’ve made, the fun we’ve had. I’m not active in 4way and 8way belly anymore, but my belly teams filled my heart with joy and all my memories from Funky Nuggets, Perris Riot, Stockholm Syndrome (and others I’ve forgotten?) warm my soul. I love teams and I love friends I’ve made on those teams

For anyone who has come to any event I’ve put on. Thank you! I love putting on events. I love watching people learn and grow and improve. I couldn’t run events if no one showed up (which I do worry about every single time I have an event) and so I am thankful for everyone who comes out and participates.

For my friends across the US. Skydiving has introduced me to so many people from so many places. I have friends across the US and the world, thanks to all the events and travel I do. I love this sport for introducing me to all these excellent, quirky, fun-loving skydivers.

I’m just so gosh-darn thankful for this sport. Happy Belated Thanksgiving, y’all.

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Head-up Season!

Tis the season, for head-up flying! It’s been creeping slowly up on us. Next year is a record year and the question keeps flying around: “Are you getting back on the world record merry-go-round?” And with all that, comes more events!

Women’s California Head-Up Record!

The first weekend of November, I’m proud to say that we set the first-ever California Women’s Head-up single point record! I’m very pleased we set it with a 12way as well. While every record is still a record, no matter how small, it’s fun to break a record in a big way, instead of just putting a 4way in the books. So a 12way is awesome! Friday, we had a warm-up day, which I love. Having a day to shake off some rust, practice, and get a look at your slot without much pressure is such a relief. Saturday, we made several attempts (including one out of an otter, after the skyvan popped a tire) and got the record on our last attempt of the day!

Sunday we made attempts at a 2-point sequential record (which would have been both an FAI and a USPA record) and we flew pretty well! We thought we had the record on the last jump of the day but, alas. No dice, due to some technicalities. To the best of my understanding, we didn’t get the record for two reasons: 1. The inter picture wasn’t correct. 2. We had an orientation bust in-between the points. So, between point 1 and point 2, as far as I understand, more grips broke than the judges were expecting? So, for those of you familiar with competition, I believe this is like letting go of one of your grips while spinning a block and busting the bottom of the block. However, I don’t totally understand how this works, because I don’t believe we submitted a diagram of what the inter would look like. I need to get clarity on how “inters” work on multi-point records. But during the inter, a few extra people let go and someone found themselves on their back for a few seconds (which was our orientation bust). I also didn’t realize that was a possibility in a record; I’m still a little unclear on exactly how the rules work but now I am curious. I definitely have made a mental note to really, clearly understand all the rules if I ever put on a record.

Successful weekend overall! I’m not particularly bummed we didn’t get the sequential record. I’m super proud of myself without slapping a piece of paper on it. I flew my tits off all weekend (with the exception of my last jump on Friday where I got the wiggles. And my first jump Saturday where I chased the base and ended up lapping the whole formation to get into my slot. Whoops). Indeed, everyone flew their tits off! All the ladies did some really excellent flying, bringing in patience and discipline. We had a couple ladies who haven’t done many, or any, records which is so fun! So, there’s this phenomenon I’m starting to experience at records/events where I’m not the least experienced anymore. And in women’s jumps, I’m getting to the point where I’d say I’m a fairly experienced, decently strong flyer. And now, I get to celebrate the excitement of other people who are doing this stuff for the first time with them! And without also bringing along my own massive baggage of nerves and doubt. (I still have that. It just isn’t the loudest thing screaming inside my head anymore.) I had a couple separate people tell me after the camp that they really appreciated my positivity and encouragement throughout the weekend. I really loved hearing that. Because I do wonder often if my natural positivity and peppiness irks people. And I also got to be a source of strength in the formation. In our otter jump, I got moved to a different slot on exit but we didn’t want to change much else in the formation, so I got to carve 180 degrees around the base to my slot. It was super fun! And it was also very cool to be able to say “Yeah no problem. I def can do that.” and then go do it! I also got to do some really strong flying as first stinger to give some newer ladies something to dock on. I tried to be a quick and sturdy first stinger, trying to present quietly. And I am pretty proud of how I actually flew!

So, I don’t care that we missed the sequential. Honestly, I’ve finally realized something about events, both in attending and putting them on: it’s fine to have a just one reasonably modest goal for an event. It’s fine to only get 1 record at an event, not 3. It’s fine for me, when putting on a baby belly event, to pick easy points without cats or outfacing or close accordions or burble hops; it’s okay to have straightforward, achievable dive flows. It’s okay to NOT squeeze every last drop of challenge out of something. Sometimes, it’s much better to be mildly challenged and enjoy yourself, instead of everyone having to perform to their very best standard every single jump. It’s much better to have everyone in their mid-range. Not pushed too hard, not bored. It’s sometimes just enough to be doing a really rad sport with our friends and only break one record.

Anyway, it was such a rad weekend. I really appreciate the work Jazmyne and Courtney have been putting into women’s records in CA in the last few years. I do think it’s important to keep the fire burning, that was originally lit during Project 19. Trying to get more than a dozen women who can probably all do the thing to come out on the same weekend. To get the DZ coordination for the right plane and a debrief room and to get us the loads we want that day. Solving the puzzle of slotting people in the right places to give us a good chance at success. Finding the right balance of encouragement and coaching that makes a good leader. All those complexities have to go into running an event and it’s hard work and it can be a lot of pressure. I’m glad Courtney and Jazmyne are willing to do the heavy lifting.

Also, In Other Head-Up News

Congrats to the General CA Head-Up record that just sent a few weeks ago! I feel the momentum starting to build headed towards next year. I don’t want to be “that person” who always talks about records. Because, barf. But I am curious about who is getting back on the world record merry-go-round. I am so curious if anything is going to be different about how this head-up organizing is different than the head-down organizing. I spent months after the record naively waiting and hoping that there might be some communication from the organizers with a debrief, or a recap, or about what the fuck we were going to change for the next time around. Nothing ever really came out though. (But now I am questioning myself. Nothing official ever came out, right?) The closest thing we have to a whiff of potential change to the head-down stuff is Matt Fry’s experimental events. But I digress. Will the head-up carousel be just the same? Am I willing to go around in the same circles? I mean, I didn’t hate the 200way experience. I’ll probably at least do one try-out. I’ll probably go to Chicago because I have the best luck at the Chicago camps. In the meantime, I better get decent at flying something other than left hand first stinger.

Okay! Happy Thanksgiving and Heads-Up Season!

I’m so glad autumn is here. I’ve been needing autumn to swing on through, even though I hardly realized it until now.

Most people think of spring as the time for restarts, the time for spring cleaning, and a refresh and a blank slate. But for me, because I now sadly have to admit that skydiving has the largest guiding hand in my life, spring is firmly into “the season”. If I can have my way, I’ll be tidying up a team roster somewhere in January, maybe February. By March, we’ve put in some tunnel hours and we’ve got a game plan. By real spring, we are not just starting. Hopefully, we’re already picking up steam to be able to hit the summer running at full stride, looking towards Nationals. Spring is much too late to be starting, if I had my way.

However, Autumn. Autumn is where it all starts.

Some years, it starts a few weeks after Nationals. After you’ve returned home, caught up on laundry, washed your jumpsuit, decided when you’re going to get your rig washed and repacked. You’ve dumped all the detritus from the bottom of your gear back into the middle of your floor and sorted it. You had mercy on those couple buffs that were slowly shredding another centimeter in freefall each jump. You even considered replacing your altimeter batteries but didn’t. (They’re still sitting in your Amazon cart.) Then it’s time to start plotting. Time to start putting out feelers. Calling friends. Messaging coaches or mentors. Pondering which slot you want to fly next. Or other years, as soon as they hang the medal around someone’s neck and people have cracked beers, it starts. Gossip flys around about who is leaving what team, who else is building a team. Who’s got a slot available? Who is never going to fly with those teammates again and wants a different team? Sometimes, the dance of trying to recruit a team happens before you’ve even caught a flight home.

Autumn is when I start planning. If not for a team, at least for what priorities I will have next year. I love skydiving so much & I love it all. I want to do it all. I simply don’t have time, so I have to choose. In the fall, the days get shorter and I have less outdoor stuff to do. I start mulling over next season.

But like I said before, I’ve been needing autumn to swing through and I didn’t even realize it. I’ve been needing a fresh start. A plotting session. Something to scheme about to keep myself incredibly busy with skydiving.

Because last year, I didn’t even really have one. Last summer, after the Project 19, I was so tired that I didn’t do anything. I did nothing. This skydiving season has been the quietest skydiving season I have had in a very long time. It was all things- good, and restful, and boring, and foreign, and anxiety-inducing because I wasn’t doing enough, because I didn’t have a plan. On my run tonight, I thought hard about it and I believe I came up with 4 events: Matt Fry experimental bigway, Fly 4 Life, Wisconsin HU record, Summerfest. I will be attending the Women’s CA HU record this weekend too. That’s it. I was doing some tunnel, but that faded out after they didn’t have the staff at SF to really stay open for fun jumpers. No Nationals. No team training. No real skills camps. Very little travel. I think I was just so tired after the zillion head down camps I attended all across the country. So I didn’t really plan anything. When people ask me what I’ve been up to, I kinda start blankly and mumble “Uhh..”. Nothing. I’ve been doing zero this year.

But now I’m ready for planning again. And I’m doing some scheming. And I have some ideas.

More importantly, I can feel a lot of energy building up in me. I can feel the excitement of chasing a new thing growing in me. I have this huge big list of things I want to do to start preparing, but instead of feeling overwhelmed, I feel excited about starting. I haven’t felt like this since 2019. It’s really fun to feel super, super excited about skydiving again. I’m getting back to running. Going to get back into the abs habit I started this spring for a bit. I’m going to start studying. (Yes, I study skydiving. It makes me really good. I actually have to try hard to get good at skydiving; I am not really a natural.) I am even thinking of putting off drinking for a while. I’m just happy to have an idea of where I might be headed.

And if it falls through? Well, that would be a bummer. But I have backup plans 🙂 There’s always other fun to chase in skydiving.

I’m a little late, but I’ve been busy! I’ve been on the road in the midwest, only camping up in a given city for 2 nights at a stretch, fitting in work and a horticulture trade show, so forgive my tardiness on this post.

What a weekend! We’ll cut to the chase: 27 of us + our talented camera flyer set a WI head-up record this weekend! Unfortunately, we wanted a bigger record and I hate that we couldn’t set it with the original 33 or 34 people that we started the weekend with.

First HU Record/Record Attempt: Beer!

This is my very first head-up record and head-up record attempt! What a pleasing turn of events! I did buy beer; and because I was at Skydive Midwest, I bought Hamms. (I also bought something else less gross too.) So how did I end up there? Well, obviously for the party. I was gossiping with Kate Armstrong several months before the record, before the invites were out, and she asked if I was going. Well, no. Because 1. I had no idea it was going to happen 2. I certainly didn’t feel like I had the skills to pull this shenanigan off. But why let that get in the way of a good time? So, I obviously said, “Get me invited! I’m on board.”

Talking to Colin Conway a couple weeks before reassured my nerves and stresses quite a bit. Not that I felt like I definitely could do a head-up record, but I knew I would be safe, and I knew if I got cut, those lovely Chemtrails boys would let me down soft. I set my mind to “just happy to be here” mode and sent it.

We’ve been trying some head-up days at Tracy lately, so I’ve been feeling every-so-slightly more confident with my feets down. But not great. Those jumps just kept ending up sizzling towards the earth faster than I could fly stable. My standflying is a clown show. One leg down in stag? Fine. A-okay. Two legs straight down? I am about as stable as a flying pencil. So, I wouldn’t say my confidence levels were soaring, but I at least knew I wouldn’t be disoriented with my noggin up instead of down.

Slotting

Colin asked Richo and I how we felt about being in the base. Hard yes for Richo; he’s part of Team Never Let Go. However, I’m part of team Always Let Go. I am not to be trusted in a base. Too much pressure to perform every jump. No, no thank you. Gotta have really strong grip and hands. No, that’s not me. So I said, “Please slot me where you see fit, anywhere but the base.”

I was totally expecting to be an outside whacker-person, with no one else docking on me. I find it a bit of a relief to be there because if you have to get cut, if you’re doing something silly like flying a bit zany on the outside, you can do it without too much drama. However, if your flying turns uncontrollably zazzy farther in the formation, it’s a bit embarrassing. I still keep getting myself into goofy positions on challenging skydives and I wiggle myself into a cork, or some really ugly flying at the very least. So, I was hoping to be on the outside, so when I inevitably struggled to touch it, my friends could politely cut me, and I could politely agree, a bit to my own relief.

One of my favorite parts of events is the night that slotting comes out. You rarely know exactly who is showing up until that moment, and you probably don’t exactly know what the formation will look like. It’s really fun to see who’s going to be there, which unexpected friends from across the country will also be attending, people that I haven’t seen since the last boogie/nationals/record/try-out/whatever. That’s also the moment of truth, which is also the moment that the tea starts to spill. Gossiping about who is showing up, who is where, and how this is going to shake out seems to be a time-honored tradition of events. So, I swear both me and probably lots of other people going to WI felt their ears start burning all at once when the formation came out.

I was slotted as a left hand first stinger. Oh boy. Oh man. Oh boy. I began to have to actively try to not panic. Oh boy. That feels like a lot of responsibility. But I just kept thinking, “You know, it would be silly to like, cut yourself by asking to move farther out even if you’re not very confident. I might as well give it the old college try. Then it’s in their hands to decide whether I should be there.” So I did. And it went pretty dang well.

The First Jump

I spent time thinking over the weekend about the specialness of a first jump at one of these events. For me, the first jump induces some serious stress for me; I am a pretty nervous jumper, even when I’m current and jumping a lot. I put a lot of pressure on myself to be excellent. The first jump usually riddles with me with nerves. I usually do a lot of visualizing and breathing techniques to stay calm. (I know. Nerd.) But, if I don’t, it’s not always pretty, so I stick to my routine. I breathe. I visualize. But here’s the key point: The visualizing at this point is completely based on ideas in my brain, videos I’ve watched, other skydives where I’ve done something similar. But it’s all something that I’ve imagined, an scene that my brain is actually playing out like a movie on the back of my closed eyelids.

Every other jump after that, your visualizing will be based on the skydives that came before. If not exactly the same, often they verge on identical, in the way they look. (Obviously, ignore situations where huge changes in plane timing or slot occur on jump 2.) So that very first jump feels different. For the couples hours before that jump, anything else like it only exists in my imagination.

Anyway, that first jump, I was nervous. But I got out and I just zoomed on over there. I watched Frayer break in, calmly transition, and just flew over and touched it without hesitation or too much drama. Just like that. Then I stayed on. I continued just flying my slot, with a pretty quiet presented arm as well. Then my 2nd stinger docked right at the end. It just happened. I was in shock. I tracked away in the 2nd wave just baffled at how it had all gone down. Wow, I guess I have to try to do that the rest of the weekend.

And it wasn’t perfect; my levels could use some work. I’m sure I could have been faster/quieter/stronger. But it was damn good considering what I expected of myself. Then we kept chugging. My pod kept building most of the day Friday. I was super proud to be part of it! I thought we might have it a time or two Friday, but when we didn’t, I was sure we would get it first thing Saturday. Then as Saturday progressed, with a little bit of rain in the morning and clouds/overcast in the afternoon, we kept trying but sort of got a little loose. Everyone all seemed to kinda lose focus, or like we took turns which 1/5 of the skydive was getting goofy. But we did pull it off Sunday! The first couple were really close but finally, I think we got it on the 4th one. Then we attempted one more before we had to call it with the whole group but didn’t make it.

I was just so pleased.

Honestly, I just had such a great time. I initially decided to go because of the people I figured would be there, without any real expectation of being on the record. I just wanted to go see my friends and do feets-down jumps together. We did some really neat rips together! We did some very silly things! Head-up flying is just so much sillier than head-down. It’s so hard. The sky is full of banana peels and air gremlins. My dignity just takes a vacation when I’m sit-flying. The jumps were fun; they people were lovely. The DZ was the most excellent host and the Total Break Sequential folks also sharing the planes did great, getting at least their 2pt TBS, maybe the 3pt? Overall, the weekend left my heart so warm and happy and proud. It was a great start to my midwest-month. (I’m in SDC until the end of Summerfest!)

For better or worse, the whole experience has me pondering the feets-down world record coming about in 2024. Do I want to go on that merry-go-round again? Can anyone tell me if the CA try-outs will also just be Echelon events? Do I have to get invited to Echelon to even be allowed to try-out for the CA sector at the head-up stuff? (If you know, please divulge. I have asked a couple organizers so far with no real answer.) How is my bank account looking? Will it really make me a better flyer? Should I really let my appetite for checking off accomplishments drive me into another harebrained year full of try-outs and events across the nation? I don’t know. I did largely enjoy the “Year of the 200way, 2022” despite it’s financial cost and the pervasive drama at every turn. What a rush.

Anyway, to wrap this up.

• Had a great time
• Will obviously go back to SDMW because I love it there
• I’m in SDC now!
• Oh I did a podcast too because of this!
• We got a record
• Most importantly, I got to hang out with my friends. And I met some good dogs.

Not this weekend, but the one before, Skydive Chicago once again hosted the illustrious Cloud Games, one of my favorite events of the year. If you’re not in the know, it’s a dispersed competition run by Skydive Chicago, where skydivers can compete from the comfort of their home DZ. You upload videos as you do the jumps and, Tada! A competition.

You should check out their website! They have more details, fun pics, and results here.

First, the thank yous

First, to Skydive California, for working with us to manifest the teams and get our jumps in. Cloud Games doesn’t benefit Skydive CA at all, so I am eternally grateful that everyone makes it possible for us to jump our faces off for Cloud Games.

Second, to Skydive Chicago, for hosting the event! It is such a fun event, and it gives jumpers the opportunity to try out competition on a budget, without committing to the travel or cost of going to Nationals. We appreciate you working around the 2 hour time difference and all the hoops you have to jump through to let Skydive CA compete.

Next, to Richo Butts, for being the meet director at Skydive CA! He makes a big hoopla every year, encouraging teams to get into cloud games, then he prints out the draws, the slates, attends the meet directors meetings, etc.

Finally, to all the teams. To the teams that I was on, thank you for taking time out of your weekend to fly with me! And to be flexible as we were juggling teams and events. Thanks especially for the people who were always on time. You make my life easier. And thanks to the teams that I wasn’t a part of. I’m so proud of you for coming out!

Props to the Competitors

Props to all the competitors that came out. While I find structured skydiving, like competition and training camps and try-outs, incredibly rewarding, that is not the norm. It takes so much extra effort to do a competition than just showing up for a day of fun jumping. You need to finish the jumps, so you have to keep skydiving even if you’re tired or hungry. You have to follow the dive flows, even if they’re incredibly hard and you hate them. You have to remember whose hand to hold and who to shit-whip (which blocks and randoms are in that dive flow). You probably have to show up early to walk the skydives which takes time and engineering and a fair amount of confusion. For any camera flyers, you have the added pressure of making sure you have plenty of Go Pro battery, that you get the teams in frame, and that you don’t accidentally drop a SD card out of the door of the airplane. Even a chill competition like Cloud Games still demands more than a day of just hanging out at the DZ. So I’m glad the competitors were all willing to get out there and do it anyway.

Also, big props especially to the pick-up teams. I find pick-up teams to be much harder than trained teams. If you’re training, obviously, you’ve flown the points before, so they’re easier. But you also probably have the blocks and randoms memorized by letter and number. Having the formations memorized takes a bite out of the mental load for me; it’s less brain strain to remember what comes next when I have a visual reference for what the formation should look like in my brain. Also, having a shared language relieves some brain strain. Being able to say, “Let’s exit a G” and having everyone approximately understand which grips that entails (even if you haven’t determined who is flying which spot yet), is a short cut. Needing to individually describe all the grips for each formation takes time and is more difficult to remember. Finally, a pick-up team often has little or no convention for who flies where on each point. Once again, having that convention just reduces the mental load on everyone. So, yeah, pick-up teams are hard.

So, Who Competed? How’d it Go?

Skydive CA had teams in Rookie FS, MFS Intermediate, Advanced and Open (3), Open VFS, and 10way.

The Rookie FS team, Peanut Butter and Jelly, did 5 jumps that Saturday. Before the meet, they hadn’t ever all jumped together before, but they took home a silver anyway! I love that SDC opened up the Rookie FS class; it provides accessible skydives for people who really are interested but really intimidated by competition. Plus, with only 5 skydives in the draw, it doesn’t eliminate anyone because they can’t finish the jumps.

The most popular event at Skydive CA, MFS, brought out 3 teams, one in each class. The intermediate team, Fly Faster Steve, had been training a little bit over the last month or so to prepare. Neither had competed before or flown any official MFS, yet they took home a Silver medal anyway! The advanced team, Exit Disorder, flew really well and took home a bronze. Finally, my team, FMS: French Marc Situation, flew in open (partially because we won Advanced last year, partially because open is more fun). Great news: we took a bronze by proxy!

Thoughts

Throughout the weekend, a lot of people asked what was going on. This was after both Richo and I felt like we’d harped on the subject heavily to people. We both posted several times on the fun jumpers page. We both mentioned it a lot to people at the DZ. I offered to do some match-making for belly teams even. I am just surprised that people still were caught unawares. I really want to get more people into competition and Cloud Games is a great venue for that. However, I clearly can’t even get the message out effectively to people at our DZ. We’ve decided to make some posters next year, which should hopefully help. I’m just left without many more ideas of how to spoon feed this better to people.

Also, all through the weekend I heard a lot of the same phrase repeated: “I’m not good enough to compete”. To which I basically scream-replied, “Yes! YOU ARE!” I’m not sure why people think you have to be good to compete. I consider myself a decent skydiver and my teams didn’t even do that well when you look at the scores. We averaged a 3 in VFS and a 4.5 in MFS. The average score for the Rookie FS event was between 1 and 6. The FS Beginner class had average scores between 1.3 and 4.8. These are NOT excessively high scores. If you think you can do 1-2 points on a skydive, you should probably try it! It’s fun! This idea that you have to be “good enough” to compete is silly. Competition makes you better, and in my opinion, when you don’t fly perfect, it encourages you to keep training and getting better.

I wish more people competed. I was really pleased to see how many DZs participated, totaling 19, I think? It’s awesome to have that kind of participation. I wish more teams competed in freefly though. It would have been cool to have more people to compete against, more all-in-good-fun trash talking to do. For a competition that’s so low effort to join, I wish more people had rounded up their friends for a weekend team.

One of my biggest pet peeves in skydiving (obviously not including all the safety issues that irk me), is timeliness. Skydivers aren’t known for being on time, from my experience. On a day full of fun jumps, that doesn’t bother me. I will show up for Load 1 and have a fun time jumping whether or not you’ve made it to the DZ yet that morning. But when you’re doing a team event, you have to be on time. The team needs enough time to prepare the skydives. Since this Cloud Games does offer some respite from the early start times of Nationals and the demanding schedule, it isn’t as crucial. But in this case, we were threading the needle pretty tightly to try to fit all our jumps in. I did learn for future Cloud Games, that if I want to do this many events, I basically need to clearly allocate which days belong to which events: Friday, MFS, Saturday, VFS, Sunday, other. I’m not mad, or frustrated with anyone who was late; I’m just stating what I’ve learned so I don’t have to do so much juggling in future years.

I really want to reduce mental taxation on comp days, even for Cloud Games. I have maybe 50% of the freefly dive pools memorizes. 4way FS is still mostly cemented in my gray matter, with the occasional 8way formation still bouncing around inside my noggin though. So next year, I’m going to have the letters and numbers memorized to save myself some mental load.

How do I get more people into this? What’s the best way to encourage more people to try this out? I have so many people in skydiving lamenting to me that they don’t really know where to go next, or how to progress. My answer, across the board, is to get on a skydiving team. You don’t even need to ever compete to reap the benefits. But getting on a team, doing training jumps, maybe seeking coaching, is an indisputable way to get better. You build comfort and familiarity with the flying of your teammates. You have consistency. You have ways to actually measure whether you’re improving (points, busts, inter time, time to first point). You never have to say “What are we doing on this jump?”; you can just generate a random dive from the dive pool. Teams have contributed so much to my success in skydiving, both to my actual acquisition of skills, and to my drive to improve. So, how can I convince more people that teams and competition are a really fun, rewarding way to get better at skydiving?