Fast

My thought is, knowing how DZs work, if you are asking on the internet, you don't have the moves to get her. She has already been wooed by someone who knows what they are doing. My suggestion, just hang out, be friendly and maybe the right situation will present itself. Then again, I have been single for awhile! ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

I have had my neptune reset a few times in freefall when the battery wasn't fitting quite right. When that happens I just fall back to my backup altimeter. (My eyes) If for some reason I couldn't see the ground I would probably wave off and pull. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

A jumper at my DZ custom made her own chincup cutaway system that has a 2-ring on it. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

Agreed. No shot is worth a life. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

The only honest answer I can give is "I don't know." There are a lot of things that can go wrong on a tandem and I am an AFFI but I am no tandem master. I have seen some bad stuff happen while shooting video and that was when everyone was doing things as right as they could. In my case, the tandem master has always managed to make things right before pull time. I would have to be in the exact right position at the exact right time and even then I don't know that I would want to get involved. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

I was older, but my parents were pretty cool about me living with them while I was in college. I was planning on moving out anyways, but I got "quit skydiving or move out" mostly because my mom thought I couldn't afford to skydive if I moved out. What she didn't realize is that I was already shooting video which meant not paying anything to skydive anymore. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

Not nearly enough information has been presented to answer the question. Given that this is the internet it may be that no amount of you telling us things would satisfy if that is ok or not. I suggest asking your local instructors what they think. If they say "no way" no amount of asking on the internet would change what the real answer is. They know you better and are much more able to tailor a response that is appropriate. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

This is my reminder to have a good understanding of the "buying gear process." We have a newer jumper at my DZ who kinda just went out on his own and bought some stuff. It is all the right stuff, but he never got a rigger to take a look at the stuff. Subsequently, he had to have some repairs done before it was jumpable. The general process is that you pick something you like. Talk about price. Have the person send it to your DZ or rigger. Your rigger inspects it and tells if you if it is worth the price you both agreed on. If the rigger says it is, you send money. If the rigger says it isn't then in many cases you send the gear back. or work something out. That protects both parties. I always suggest used gear to newer jumpers. You are going to change things around a bit in your first year or two and it will cost a lot of money if you are buying new every time. That money is much better spent on jumps. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

I was out a couple weeks when I first started jumping. I made a jump in some questionable winds and landed in a questionable place (hard). Had a sprained ankle, nothing new for me, have had them before. I strapped on a brace, let it heal some and then was back at it. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

Agreed. This whole thing is nonsense. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

My dz pretty much has a person on the ground doing radio for all AFF jumps. This solves most of the problems. The student can see where all the canopies are landing (other jumpers, tandems, Is) and that clues them into where the landing area is if they choose to not hear the radio. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

I like the part about having your legs together. I don't like the suggestion of having your legs out in front of you. What does that mean exactly? What is a little bit. You shouldn't have your legs straight, but they should be together and below you with a slight bend at the knee. (as I am sure the OP was taught in his FJC) Is that what you meant by lifting your legs up a little bit? Anyways, really, there is no reason you can't PLF all your landings till you get a better handle on things. I really just want to say that you should talk about landings and what you can do to improve them with your instructor. I really hate when students take advice off the internet and put it into practice w/o running it by a local instructor. The concept used to mildly annoy me, but I just finished up getting my AFFI rating and now more than ever the concept scares me. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

hahah good shit. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

141.414 in that.. 145.007 145.724 got up to 145.767 on a subsequent try. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

I dunno if that statement is fair. I think from your viewpoint that is probably true. The more experience you have the more things you will be able to pay attention to and notice. I watch other people under canopy all the time. I have a pretty good idea of who is doing what and who is doing well and who is not. I have come down from more than a few jumps and gave someone advice about how they could be doing things differently under canopy. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

My replies in bold italics above. All the other commenting in this thread, well I dunno what to say. I think that the sport is what you make of it. I know a guy that has more than 1000 solo jumps and has a great time with it. He mostly does hop and pops though. I think that whatever it is you are doing, be it freefall skills or canopy flight, you can learn more and learn it faster if you have someone there to jump with or watch what you are doing. Even if it is another person that is newer to the sport. I don't think you can develop a good concept of what is going on up there without a good reference point. One thing that cropped up in this thread is comparing a person with x jumps to a person with y jumps with z solos. If you are going to compare skydivers, you should really compare people of similar jumps. I think it is a big stretch to claim that a person with 30 jumps that are all coached has the awareness of someone with 100. They might have certain skills that are better, but 70 jumps goes a long way when starting out to develop awareness and help a person get comfortable. Without question a person who has 100 solos is going to be lacking many of the skills that a person with 100 non-solos has. But maybe they just don't care about those skills? Chris- If you are trying to claim that you do solos so that you can practice canopy flight w/o worrying about much else is the best way for a new skydiver to get started and telling other people that, you are short changing yourself and others. If you go on a non-solo and don't work on good canopy flying and proper awareness you are being irresponsible. There are many things you just can't even start to get a handle on unless you are jumping with another person. A new skydiver would do well to remember that working on all aspects of the skydive, from picking the right gear, learning how to check gear, learning good preboarding and inplane behavior, good freefall practices, good canopy control, and good landing area behavior makes you much more able to handle new and unique situations and also to have fun safely. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

What dave said is the important part. As long as you are having fun and staying safe... thats all that matters! Having to repeat a level is somewhat costly but it isn't failure. At some point it will just click and you will relax a bit in the air. That time should come pretty soon.

Do your best to practice and learn new things in a safe environment. Learning to swoop and doing it in traffic can cause some serious problems. Don't drop your toggles. Make sure you practice letting go of the fronts w/o droping the toggles. Practice different techniques for doing the turns, there are quite a few ways to make a 90degree turn. See which one works the best for you and your canopy. Make sure you have outs, know what they are and when to take them. I have made my share of mistakes when swooping as I am sure most have. The only ones that I stood up and felt lucky after were the ones I didn't leave outs and somehow didn't get hurt. I should have not put myself in that kind of situation to begin with, but it happens. I like using my alti to set up my pattern but I learned to turn by sight. I think there is too much to be watching on final to be looking at your alti. For that reason, I use it to set up my pattern and that is about it. I think when you are starting out with double fronts and 45s or 90s that it wont help as much. You need to learn what it looks like when you are coming in high/low/right on. If you can't just see it, when your alti fails you will have problems. Also, with the lower rotation turns on a lightly loaded canopy you are still close enough to the ground to have a bit more depth perception. I think it helps to jump consistantly at one dz when you are learning too. I know most people do that, but there are some people who like to travel around a lot. Being at one dz where you can be familiar with the landing area and people around will help a lot when you are first learning. Brian Germain and some of the others out there doing canopy courses and swoop coaching have a wealth of information to offer so hit up a course if you can. Most people don't get that opertunity right away though so I suggest finding a local mentor. Someone who can watch your progress from week to week. I say week to week to point out that I think currency is major requirement of learning to swoop. I don't just mean what USPA wants either. If you are going to take on swooping I think you should be someone who is making multiple skydives every week/weekend. In my opinion it is one of the most dangrous things you can do while skydiving. One of the other posters made a point that he learned that he didn't even know what/how much he didn't know yet. That is a fairly important concept to wrap your head around. It means more than what the words say. If you get overly confident in what you are doing the bear might just bite you in the ass before you can get away. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

I don't think I want to know how much that camera is going to cost! ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

Imagine how much more insane the protesting of the past would have appeared if there was widespread use of digital video cameras. I have no idea about this specific instance, but the appearance of police use of "force" has gotten pretty out of hand. These types of videos keep showing up. I wonder if that has more to do with more cameras or if things are just more violent now. It doesn't seem like there is much toleration of protesting. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

I'm certainly interested in seeing some footage from this camera. Thanks, Scott Yah. Is it OIS or EIS? edit: NM re-read the thread. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

I am currently downsizing because I want something that is more aggressive and swoops farther. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

If this doesn't stop please see a doctor. Seeking medical advice on the internet from people who are not doctors (and from my best recollection of who I know on here to be a doctor, none of the posters are) isn't the best way to go about things. You shouldn't be getting headaches after every jump and if you are there is probably something going on. Again, please seek qualified advice, I might have stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night, but that doesn't mean I should make suggestions of how you deal with what could be a serious health problem.

Found mine at a Ace Hardware. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka

I have one hung up in my apartment of the NYC skyline. Watched a guy paint it on a sidewalk on a family trip to nyc. ~D Where troubles melt like lemon drops Away above the chimney tops That's where you'll find me. Swooping is taking one last poke at the bear before escaping it's cave - davelepka