stevehamiltonxl

1-on-1, 2-on-2 or 4-way coaching with Pete Allum and Steve Hamilton of team XL and Sinapsi. This is the weekend before the XP tunnel meet, so it's the perfect opportunity for some last minute fine tuning. For details please contact stevehamiltonxl@hotmail.com

I believe the scores for the 3 completed rounds will stand, all the remaining formations will be put back in the hat and re-drawn next Friday night for rounds 4 onwards. It looks to be a great fight if the sun finally makes an appearance. It's a very unique situation here with 2 very talented, focussed teams battling it out. Unfortunately Thomas and Niklas have whussed out of the cold weather ( I don't blame them !) so we will not be able to complete, but we're very happy, averaged 23.6 over the 5 rnds. we got to jump, even though 2 of them will not stand due to re-draw/incomplete rounds. Those 2 training jumps must have paid off

Remster, I don't really know to be honest. I guess so since he has dual-Nationality but then the 3-year rule would apply again . He's sat next to me on the couch not looking too impressed with the weather so I doubt he's very motivated to do that ! It's now certain that the meet will roll-over to next weekend. Right now we're the only team to have done rnd 4 so it looks like 2 of the 5 jumps we've done will be scratched due to the re-draw(s!)....bummer Looks set to be an exciting race between Storm and Elan though...good luck to everyone next weekend....

After the draw was made, it was realised that it had already been available on-line as the same draw was being used by another country's nationals. At this point round 1 had been completed but after a team captains' vote it was decided to re-draw and start over. Unfortunately there has not been much going on since then due to weather. The "XL reunion" is Team Flightschool with Niklas Hemlin and Thomas Hughes (Fastrax) , John McIver and Steve Hamilton. We are a guest team in the "British Open Championships" not the "National Championships" so world meet eligibility will not be affected. Some teams just got the "new" rnd 1 done, I just saw Elan post an 18 ( P-13-7 ) but now we have another weather-hold....hard to believe it's August !

The standard in the UK now is just incredible, I've never seen anything like it in all the categories. As for teams having to move up....I think they are in the correct category....they just got a whole lot better! 100% are a great example of what hard work and consistency can achieve. Those guys have only been skydiving for a couple years, had a 5 average in January this year!! They've really taken advantage of the tunnel over the winter, they came on 4 of our tunnel camps and have jumped regularly since spring, a leap from 5 to 16+ average in 6 months ! I think we're gonna see some great skydiving in this country in the near future

Ron, sorry bro, the Angel just put a cheque in the mail, my lips gotta stay zipped ! Anyway, back to the original "who's it gonna be?" thread that started a couple hundred pages back..... Following on from Mr Talbert's comments, the teams that win will have trained hard, trained smart, have unwavering self-belief, natural talent, passion, determination and a fire in their eyes that blinds them to any other possibility than standing on the top step......if all else fails and there is more than one team that can get all these stars aligned on the day, well some old-fashioned good luck might just make the difference. That's the exciting thing about competitions like this , we just don't know for sure. But when the dust settles and some will have achieved their dreams and others not, they're all still winners since they've all busted their balls (or not, but I'm not gonna get into the gender thing ) to give their best. There's a great quote by Mr Roosevelt about those in the arena, so us armchair critics can speculate all we want but we'll just have to wait for a few more weeks to watch it all unravel, and maybe be inspired to get into the arena ourselves. I'll be at the meet and what I do know is that several friends and a couple ex-teammates will have some shiny metal-work jangling around their necks...I just hope they let me touch it Now, where's my popcorn and icecream...........

Hey Ron, For fiddy bucks I'll tell you who AlienAngel is........... Hey AlienAngel, For a hundred I won't tell Ron.........

It was a great meet, exciting in all the events. It was my first trip to SA so thanks to all for the warm welcome and enthusiasm. Good luck to the teams who will go to Gera, hope to see everyone again soon.....Thanks guys

Hi Liz, Sent you a PM.

I'm planning the next session for sometime this week, just mail me if you would like to come and if you have any preference for dates/times of day.............steve@bodyflight.co.uk

Nigel, I told you it was a stairstep.......didn't you believe me? I'm hurt......

Thanks to Joanna, Richard, Laura and Jason who showed up for the first session last night. It was a pleasure working with you all and, best of all, 200 pounds will shortly be on the way to the hospice. I will be training in Spain for a week but standby for future dates, it would be great to make it a regular event. Thanks again and if you would like to attend any of the future sessions please let me know. Steve

Thats great...the time is booked for 1830-1930..... 1 slot left steve@bodyflight.co.uk !!

OK, ...it seems like the time of day is a restricting factor for people, so let's do it later in the evening...only thing is the tunnel time is more expensive so we can't give as much to the hospice....I guess we'll just have to do twice as much flying !!!!

Surprisingly, nobody has yet claimed the free coaching offer....Come on guys, for every 1 hour of coaching I do I will give 200 pounds to Keech Cottage Children's Hospice !

I will be doing regular free coaching sessions at Bodyflight in aid of Keech Cottage children's Hospice. There will be 4x15 mins slots available, first session provisionally planned for 26th January. It will probably be mid-late afternoon. First 4 e-mails I receive will get the slots. 150 pounds each covers the tunnel time... steve@bodyflight.co.uk The hospice needs 5000 pounds per day to keep running so let's fly and help them out !

I will be doing regular free coaching sessions at Bodyflight in aid of Keech Cottage children's Hospice. There will be 4x15 mins slots available, first session provisionally planned for 26th January. It will probably be mid-late afternoon. First 4 e-mails I receive will get the slots. 150 pounds each covers the tunnel time... steve@bodyflight.co.uk The hospice needs 5000 pounds per day to keep running so let's fly and help them out !

I guess experiences can vary, seems to be luck of the draw. I just got back from spain and saw lots of rigs go in the overhead lockers, but a couple years ago going to a world meet the whole aircraft was almost evacuated when someone checking in their rig was asked what it was and in their answer the words " explosive-powered device " casually dropped into conversation....Doh ! We ended up in the cockpit ,with the pilot threatening to throw about 30 skydivers off the plane. Eventually he called his boss and we were allowed to take-off. The "explosives" dudes were not so lucky, they had to get a flight with another airline to a different destination followed by a long drive thru the night to get to the competition. I suggest getting e-mail confirmation that it's ok to take a rig on board....oh, and don't say any scary words when you check-in

The tunnel is an amazing tool for any level of flyers. A good example is Thomas Hughes. I did some of his AFF with him after he had flown around 80 hrs in SVO. We graduated him in 4 jumps ( after making sure his canopy control and alti awareness were good) and 2 years later he was my 4-way teammate doing a 20-average ! I've done some tunnel AFF where students fly 20 mins before their first jump and, for the most part, they cruise thru the skydives at twice the speed and confidence that students usually experience. Go fly

That's cool but check out what we saw at Bodyflight today....I guess the power increase was worth doing.

The engineers are up there right now. There should be more air available due to an increase in prop pitch, also I understand it will be quicker to change the airspeed due to faster -responding controls......I'm sure Paul will be along shortly with all the tech info for you geeks out there

Not quite...like I said there will be some level of sponsorship. Our calculations put it closer to 1/4 of your estimate per team-member

Some knowledge/experience of 4-way will certainly be beneficial but for us to take, say, a team that was top-five in the category this year and they make top-three next year would not necessarily show as significant an improvement as if we put together a team of people with little/no competitive experience, gave them some good training and they showed a steady gain through the year and beyond. We also need people who would like to be part of something bigger and longer-lasting than just a year's commitment but we obviously realise that this is hard to predict so, for now, we want super-motivated individuals with some natural talent and a desire to learn and excel.

The concept is to have an ongoing project whereby the junior teams will move up after a year or so and eventually become the open class team. For the junior team we have set a goal of 100 jumps and around 20 hours of tunnel between now and UK Nationals 2006. This will entail 1 or 2 camps in Spain over the winter and 1 weekend per month at a UK DZ from spring onwards. There will be some level of sponsorship with regards to tunnel-time, coaching and jumps.

Bodyflight Bedford will be hosting tryouts for their junior team on SUNDAY 4th DECEMBER. We're looking for skydivers who are new to 4-way and want to be a part of the Bodyflight project to train at the tunnel and UK DZ's, coached by former Sebastian XL members John McIver and Steve Hamilton. PLEASE NOTE There will be NO FREE TUNNEL TIME involved...sorry ! Still interested?? contact john@bodyflight.co.uk or steve@bodyflight.co.uk