peregrinerose

I'm a very new AFF instructor, but would never expect/want a tip from a student. The best thing you could possibly do for me if you enjoyed your jump and learned a lot is to come back and jump again. Hang out after the jumping is done. Bring a case of beer sometime. Give a great big grin when you land and have a blast!

My husband never gets me flowers for any holiday, anniversary, birthday, any special event EVER. But he does sporadically bring home flowers, every few months, just because he loves me Never anything fancy, just whatever's on sale at the store or is growing in our yard, and I love it. Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

I thought that athiests believe there is no god. Agnostics believe that the possibility exists of god, but have no proof of it, so don't really believe in one. Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

I jump in PA year round. Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

At our DZ, we agree that one instructor will 'fly' (usually reserve side), the other instructor will 'ride' when we anticipate a particularly sporting exit, for the same reasons. It works, and we can talk about it in front of the student, and they have no idea what we're talking about. Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

Maybe that's the nice thing about our DZ, it's pretty small, everyone knows everyone else, even low time jumpers, and we do all watch each other. I won't be able to tell you how your rear riser practice went under canopy, but I'd know where you landed and be able to sign off on your card for accuracy. If you are doing 2 ways with a coach/more experienced jumper, it is a lot easier to get even more specific canopy feedback. If you ever jumped at Chambersburg, you'd be amazed how many people will notice you doing a solo and walk up and ask to jump with you. Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

When you are jumping with other people, whether 2 way or 4, or more, you are all opening at about the same time and all watching each other... that means you have other people actively watching out for you under canopy and can give you valuable feedback regarding your canopy skills. Just like RW, it's tough to truly learn canopy flight just by screwing around in the air without any feedback or pointers. At least the RW I've done, we've just as often talked about landing patterns and canopy issues as debriefed the freefall portion of the skydive. I'm not sure why you're so hung up about 4 way... you can jump with other people without doing 4 way. Only a tiny fraction of my skydives are 4 ways... start with 2 way, preferrably with a coach. If you think you can't backslide enough to go over/under another formation, you've never jumped with a student who backslides a lot Learn how to track and track well. Learn how to fall straight. Get some canopy coaching. These are the skills that will save your ass... not canopy alone (unless you are going to spend the rest of your skydiving career doing hop/pops! ) If you want to keep working on canopy... great! What altitude do you normally open at? Plan on breaking off from your 2 way 1500 ft before that, and you can get a lot more out of every skydive. I'm a 500 jump wonder and still have a shitload to learn, both in canopy and in freefall... that's what I love about this sport, is the the fact that I'll never learn all that I want to or be as good as I want to... there's always some higher goal to set. All of us are here helping you find new ways to learn and keep us all safe. I'd jump with you in a heartbeat, do some fun 2 ways and watch your canopy work as well, maybe do a little proximity flying. I'm not the only coach/experienced jumper with that mindset... find someone at your DZ to learn from (or come up to PA and play in the sky with me ) Jen Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

Same here, for the same reasons. Mine encouraged a solo right after AFF just to have one skydive all by myself to relax and not have to do anything but pull, but that was the only time I was encouraged to do a solo. Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

Did the instructors have anything to say about why things went to shit like that, and how they could have handled it differently? Did the first instructor let go intentionally, to allow the other instructor to get the student stable? My AFFI is all of 2 months old, so I'm still learning Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

I disagree.... if someone has 50 jumps, 30 of them solos (NOT hop/pop solos, but doing freefall), then chances are they have picked up a lot of weird habits, not necessarily good ones. If someone has 20 jumps, none of them solos, they have been receiving active pointers on their flying skills from jump number 1, have been actively working on improving flying skills with feedback from coaches/instructors and receiving feedback just by having another body in freefall with them. I have jumped a lot with people who have 100 jumps or close to it and most of them solos... they do far scarier things in freefall than someone with a brand new A license.... they tend to be more erratic, less fall rate control, and have unfounded confidence in their flying skills because of the 100 jump wonder status. When I work with them, I have to spend a lot of time unteaching the bad habits that have been ingrained during all those solos. Jen Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

I have to disagree on this post... your advice here is scary. When you are in freefall alone, how do you know if you are falling in a straight line or not? How do you know how far you are tracking? Without a frame of reference, it's impossible to learn these things... and these are skills you need to save your life. The jumpers I have worked with that make tons of solos end up having to un-learn all the bad habits they managed to teach themselves, and this is a LOT more difficult than learning how to fly well to begin with. Who says you have to do 4 way or freeflying or anything else? You learn little to nothing from a solo skydive, go jump with people, learn something every time you jump! Do some fun 2 ways and build up from there as your comfort level increases and your skills improve. Jen Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

I like doing some proximity flying, but I have only done it with 2 other jumpers... one is my husband and we know each other extremely well in the sky and had a game plan well in advance. The other was as part of a canopy control course. I've always learned a LOT about canopy flight by doing proximity flying like that... gives great information about exactly what different control inputs are doing when you have a frame of reference right there to use. Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

There, I fixed it for you Kyle Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

I honestly don't know the answer to that. My Christian friends would say 'yes' because my perspective of God is very different from theirs. I don't feel that I have any form of personal relationship with any deity. I'm just me... just a part of this world doing the best I can to be the best person I know how to be. The only time I feel even remotely spiritual is when I get away from other people, go hiking and exploring and get to be a part of nature. Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

Welcome! I jump at Chambersburg, but know Marc and Theresa... they were instructors at the rigging course I took... great people!!!

When it comes to the God of Christianity... yes. My perception is far more vague... I don't even know if the 'nature force' or whatever it is that I do believe is even sentient. Paganism, Buddhism, Native American beliefs all probably are closer to mine than Christianity. Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

I got my coach rating because I love to teach, love to work with newer jumpers, and know first hand the frustration of being a student sitting around all day stuck doing either solos or waiting for a coach. AFF: Just got that rating 2 months ago. It's something I knew from the start that I wanted, because I had so much respect for the instructors that worked with me... they always made me feel like I'd accomplished something. I wanted to learn how to give that to a first/early jump student too. After Dublin, I considered not continuing with my aspirations to be an instructor, but then decided that whether I pursued the rating or not, people would get hurt. Maybe I could do a tiny little part to make it safer. Rigger: It's just my nature to love to pull things apart, see how they work, and put them back together. The mechanical end of the sport fascinates me. I'm lucky to have been around people like Dave DeWolf, Greg Beecher, and Bob Mehl who share their interests in rigging, it sort of rubbed off on me On all three counts, I love to be challenged.... to be forced to improve my skills, whether flying or rigging, every day. I love to learn from other riggers and instructors, and I've learned a lot from students too. Advice for AFFI candidate... make LOTS of practice jumps before the course. I was the world's most retarded AFFI candidate when it came to air skills. But I had 2 evaluators that busted their butts making jumps with me and giving me feedback every weekend. The proudest moment of my life was when Griff told me that I was ready for the course... I knew he would also have been honest if I wasn't ready for it yet. Don't let the psych end get to you... when you screw up (and you probably will), let it go, move on to the next thing, always be looking for the next moment, not concentrating on the last, or you'll just hose yourself. And have fun! Jen Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

Have you asked your instructors to tell you exactly what they mean by 'elliptical'? And exactly why they are making that recommendation? If you don't understand exactly why the recommendations are being made, you probably shouldn't just be blindly making guesses regarding what canopy to get. Why do you want to downsize at the same time as changing canopy design? Have you gone through the downsizing recommendations that have been posted on here more than once (all the things that you should be able to do on your current canopy prior to downsizing.. things like landing on rears, accuracy, etc)? Do you understand that at the canopy sizes that you are talking about, wing loading is less an issue than just the size of the canopy. Smaller canopy means shorter lines. A malfunction will get really ugly really fast. You will have less margin for error loading a 135 at 1:1 than someone who's jumping a 190 loaded at 1:1. Keep that in mind with regard to downsizing. Maybe consider staying at a 135. With regard to your Spectre, as a couple of others posted, it has a flatter glide ratio than a Sabre2 (per PD), and I've seen people swoop Spectres. Get your goals in mind more concretely for what you want in a canopy and think hard about downsizing before doing it. Jen Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

Not for everyone.... I was raised catholic, switched to Presbyterian when I went to college. Did Bible studies 2-3 days a week, vespers on Saturday, church on Sunday, led youth groups, etc... I was very active in the church until my early 20s. The problem was that the more I learned, read, and questioned, the less sense the whole thing made and the farther I felt from Christianity. Over the course of years, I eventually got tired of pretending I believed in something that neither my heart nor brain could find truth in. I still believe that there is some greater force that links all of us together, and that force could easily be called god, I guess, though I see it more from a mother nature perspective. Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

I've been pretty stable weight wise around 135. Decided to quit with Medifast, at least for now. It's been 6 months and although it works fine during the week, I just don't have the energy I need to get through the weekends at the DZ between AFFing and packing and a crabby instructor/packer isn't a good thing. Tae Bo will kick ass... definitely not easy. I started with the original Basic Tae Bo tapes, took me a LOOOOOONG time to graduate to Advanced. Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

Chambersburg teaches two hand... Look R, both hands on R, look L, pull R, clear cables, pull L, clear cable. My first chop was a week ago, and after learning 2 hands method and teaching it two handed for so long, that's what I did... though I admit, I never looked at anything, just grabbed. Even if I tried to look, my boobs get in the way anyhow though. Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

Every day I probably do something that I could have handled better I just wish I was better at not beating myself up for mistakes. Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

I do know that I wouldn't have manifested with wind conditions like that (had I known on the ground), but not sure what I would have done if the winds changed to that on the ride to altitude. Probably would have jumped, but it would really depend on what the winds were doing the rest of the day, if a storm was rolling in, etc. It takes a lot more guts to ride a plane down than it does to be a lemming and get out!! A smarter move too! Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

Dave's rigger course seal has 'ILV' on one side and 'SEX' on the other Mine is UMP but doesn't all usually fit on the seal either. Drives me nuts. Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda

So does a tandem save count as 2? Just curious. My first save was Saturday... it was myself. Idiot packer (me) packed a lineover on my main. Do or do not, there is no try -Yoda