ccowden

Nice pics! It was great to meet you Andrea! Thanks for the hug!

some more.........

More.......

I had a blast! Thanks for the great times and great jumps everyone! It was great to meet so many new people and to see so many wonderful friends! Meeting new friends and hanging with old ones is what it's all about! I know I have finally made it too, cuz I made Ian's avatar!

Leavin from NY in about 10 hours! I will see you all in the morning!!

I hear that! Hope to have tons of memorable jumps this weekend!

Happy Birthday!!!!!!

mmmmmmmmmmm, yummy... Do you make a blackened chicken wrap?

Sweet! Food near by = Make more loads

Party pooper!

Yeah, I figured as much. But it was alot more fun when we were pretending you meant it the other way!

Thanks, Chris, at least someone appreciates me. It's nice to know you're always there to feel the women up offer the women so much love and support! Damn! They are onto me.

Geez...I feel like a consolation prize. I feel like I need to give you a hug. It is like DaGimp is saying, "Well, I guess I can't be on the cool, fun jump, so I will just have to jump with Andrea." I assume he didn't mean it like that, but you come see me for that hug anyway!

Oh, my lovely Shannon, I doubt you will have to twist my arm too hard! I am sure you can be quite persuasive!

I will be up for some bigger stuff, but I have lots o' friends I want to jump with, so I probably won't want to dedicate a ton of time to one thing. If that works for ya, count me in!

Work some "Rock DJ" by Robbie Williams in there and I just night have to get out on da floor too! I can look stupid with the best of them! Shhhhhhhhhh...... don't tell anyone I like Robbie Williams! How 'bout some Jamiroquai too!

ha! lets see if ccowden lets that one go..... Never even crossed my mind! But......if you really need something to hold onto, I am sure I can come up with something for ya!

Now that's not a good attitude at all! You should be atleast be willing to share a little bit. The northeast needs some Mafia love too ya know!

Yes, yes! You girls DO need to come up next summer! Cuz the Ranch is close to me and I can come down! Now if THAT ain't a reason to come, I don't know what is!

We will miss you too! I was hoping that you might be there, but I guess we will just have to meet up somewhere else. Shucks!

I assume you are talking about tracking away from a sit? Go slow and keep it simple. Tell the others on your jump that you are breaking off a little early because you are working on your track. At first, just go into the "recliner" position and take a good look around to see where everyone is. Then try to flatten out your back so that you are tracking away from the group, always keeping your eyes on others. Really try to push your hips forward to get your back flat, as if you are trying to put a reverse arch in your back. Only stay on your back for a couple seconds each time and then go back to your belly to finish the track. You can gradually increase the time spent on your back as you get more comfortable. But the initial few seconds are what are critical, keeping the speed up by staying in the recliner as you convert that to your back track and keeping your eyes on everyone. Don't go to your belly track until you have started to gain seperation and have gradually slowed the freefall speed as you slowly flatten out. Just as you learned on your belly, we want to get distance between us and the group. Your track won't be spectacular when you are first learning, but it will get better as you get more comfortable with it. If that means taking 1,000 extra feet to get that good smooth distance accomplished, so be it. Have fun and be safe!

Heck yeah! Let's get da partay started! No better way to start a party than to get some early jumps in! So, who's with us for Friday??

I would say something, but I can't stop drooling!

Yeah, it will be nice to see you in the air, minus the hail next time!

I agree totally here. I hope you look at these questions and can see the problems. I also don't understand how you can say you were trying to be as safe as possible when simply missing a dive loop resulted in what you describe as a very dramatic and dangerous outcome. Missing a dive loop at the start of a 270 degree approach on a crossbraced loaded at 2.3 should, at worst, only result in a less than perfect entry to the swoop. But you should still be able to finish the entire turn and swoop. If you couldn't finish your turn after simply missing a dive loop, then you were definitely too low at the initiation point. You couldn't even finish a 90 degree turn? That would suggest that you were WAY in the corner before you even started. The other thing I don't get is how you said you landed slight downwind. You say you were set up for a 90, which should have already put you crosswind. You then started a flat turn, made some adjustments, and landed slightly downwind?? Maybe I am missing something, but if you turned even 45 degrees, which I hope you atleast had the altitude to do that, you should have been basically faced into your landing direction. As stated, there are a number of issues here. I hope you can see this and consider them before trying any more front riser approaches. Do more practicing up high so that you never have to take your eye off things to get a dive loop and stick to conventional appraches for awhile until you get more consistant with set up altitudes. If a "safe" appraoch for a 90 degree front riser turn results in a post entitled, "Disaster avoided" there is a major problem. I have said this time and again, don't be in a hurry. Please take your time and move into performance landings cautiously and slowly. I didn't even pick up a front riser for landing until around jump 600. Sure you can do it sooner, but my point is, don't rush it. Glad you are ok and atleast willing to hear feedback. That is a good start.