plastic

No, you are right he does not go directly between the videoman and the formation but it does look like he is closer to the formation than the videoman. plastic

Hi, I will ask PD what he can remember about that. Sadly the freefall videoman who shot that footage died some years ago on a base jump so i heard. I think it is really safe as long as you get it right! Plastic

This post has developed in the wingsuit forum, i have also posted some footage on skydivingmovies.com of a camerman in freefall buzzing a rotation jump (former uk rotation team) in clewiston circa 1995 courtesy of my team cameraman PD Smith. enjoy plastic

Footage on skydivingmovies.com in the crw section, file is ffall past stack.avi This is two clips joined as the videoman makes a pass down the side, slightly in front of the formation and the second one he is going right down the back between the formation and the team videoman. Footage is courtesy of PD Smith my team videoman. Enjoy Plastic

I will do that, i just ran out of time last night. will try to get that posted this evening. I just took the quick and easy way of giving hans some satisfaction! plastic

Hi Hans, I will see what i can do!

He did show up on our cameramans video but it did not look as good as my view of him as pilot of the formation! looking forward to him getting some more footage later this summer. our videoman also has some great footage from when he was videoman for an ex-uk rotation team called skytribe - famous for the skyvan exit - when they trained at clewiston in 1995, this was of local cameraman bob neely freefalling between the stack and the cameraman as they were doing rotations! this was planned by the way. plastic

I have jumped at langar for 15 years. why, because i have not found a better dz in the uk. Good lift capacity, good staff. They cater for all skydivers regardless of discipline. Some dz's look at cf jumpers (like me) like a disease, langer, if you want to pay they will let you jump, all are treated with an equal amount of respect. If a dz cannot accommodate you it is because they cannot run the dz properly. Langar is the place to skydive. Plastic

The main problem is, you get a group or team all jumping lightnings with 300+ jumps on them (3000+ for some people i guess) and you buy a new one and jump with them it is like flying a hot air balloon in relative terms. Also i guess crw dogs are just tight fisted with money. plastic

In that case he lost 1 1/2 stone. looks like it might be me that needs to loose more weight.

You looking for a 143, hope you lost some weight since i last saw you! plastic

Hi, evrything wendy said is spot on, two important tricks are: 1. Try to dock from the side as much as possible, slide the canopy towards the pilot from the side and just before you arrive jab the outside riser to kill the momentum and any lift. Docking from the side gives the pilot a much better view of your end cell as you approach and makes it easier for him to adjust his trim if he needs to help you out. 2. When you call the point the bottom guy immediately puts on a little brake so there is no tension when the pilot drops his grip, in fact you should be able to spend a couple of seconds flying no contact (not in competition though) with his leg just alongside your end cell. This is important,as my old sequential coach (4 way but the principle is the same for 2 way) used to say the seperation between points should be a seperation not an explosion, when you explode apart you are starting at a disadvantage for the next point as the greater the seperation the longer it will take to get back together and increse the risk of the bottom guy going low. Hope this helps. Plastic

Out of interest, any good dropzones in poland? plastic

This is a link to the rules that the british used for the 2005 nationals which includes 2-way. We always run our nationals to the current fai rules. This may be of help or not but it is all i know of at the moment. http://www.bpa.org.uk/forms/docs/Canopy%20Formation%20National%20Rules%202005%20-%20NWPC.doc regards plastic

Sorry tom, didn't mean that last post to sound like i was being funny or anything, must be the pomm sense of humour! plastic

I could be wrong but that kind of sounds like you agree with me! plastic

good point, i have competed against dutch teams over the years, always pretty good teams as well. Here is a point for comment about microlines and if the risks match the advantages. In world meet 1998 russian rotation team set new world record 20 rotations on practice round, on the competition they score 20 rotations on 7 out of 8 jumps and on 8th jump they score 19 which is the throwaway round (is that impressive, they throw away a 19 which was the old world record) leaving them with an average of 20. This is on tri 120 with no microline. No other competition team has come close to this average in 7 years and in fact to my knowledge only american roatation team also in 1998 has even scored a 20. The russians also since moved world record up to 22 although the average has never been much over 20. So if russian can average 20 without needing microline is it possible that microline would help the other teams to catch them, i think no. If microline helped that much and other teams could average 20 and the russians used microline and would average higher. On the other side doing competition you are pushing things to the limit to try to get better and faster, you always have high risk of wraps, and bad ones, i have been in one or two myself which have left me with line burns, with microline they would have been much worse and could cause very serious injury. So is microline necessary, my opinion is no. If you cannot average 20 rotation then you need to work on your technique not buy microline to try to help you go faster. Rotation is only an example, i think the same for all crw but I do accept that world record was different, but for most of us we will not be building 85way at weekend. I would however be interested to hear opinion from other people. Also congratulations to those on world record, including three people from my 8-way team. Not me though, getting too old. regards plastic

I used to jump a comp tri and did not notice any difference in the openings as such, you can pack either to open fast or slow. We had dennis dodonov from the russian wolves team coaching us when we did 8-way training in russia this summer and he was doing video for us using his old team tri 120 and it most certainly did not have microline but they do use spider sliders and pack nose down with the brakes unstowed but roll the nose right the way in. Nobody in their right mind would have microline on a competition crw canopy and personally i would not do crw with anybody who had microlines at all, however i do appreciate that the wr was an unusual scenario. plastic

90lbs of lead is impressive, hope there is no deep water around, although the name "lake wales" makes me suspect otherwise. plastic

Personally I only do crw and have not done an intentional freefall for about 5 years (other than after a chop). I dont use an aad and apart from my home dz in england dont jump anywhere in europe anymore (my ex team used to train in france) because cypres is now becoming mandatory in most countries. In fact last year we trained in Russia because we found a dz that would let us jump without aad (also about $9 a jump from mi-8 helicopter was a strong factor). When aad becomes mandatory in England (hopefully not for a while) then i will retire from jumping. We lived for years without aad and deaths were very rare (more so than now), I don't like being dictated to about these things, I am grown up and like the opportunity to make up my own mind on such matters. plastic

Not just strength in the arms for crw but a good strong grip, i used to use one of those squeezy ball type things that climbers use to build up the grip, can't remember the proper name but it is no good having rambo type upper arms if you cannot grip the risers any more. Also good for keeping hold of your money when other crw jumpers keep trying to make you buy beer when you do "first's" plastic

AH, you caught me. ok consider it your contribution to crw. plastic

www.omniskore.com

we like conquest of paradise from 1492. Or alternatively some apocalyptica. plastic

My advice, the top guy does most of the work. The bottom guy sits pretty much still, maybe making minor adjustments to his brake level to help the top guy if he is slightly out of position. plastic