fedykin

anyone here jumped the oakley sunglases called water jackets. they're made for surfing with a built in strap on the back, look ideal for jumping as well apart from the vents on the glasses. ive already lost a cheap set of oakleys once. anyone had any dramas with the wind getting in? cheers

anyone here jumped the oakley sunglases called water jackets. they're made for surfing with a built in strap on the back, look ideal for jumping as well apart from the vents on the glasses. ive already lost a cheap set of oakleys once. anyone had any dramas with the wind getting in? cheers

well, ive heard the CAA vs FAA argument before and it falls apart for a couple of reasons. the CAA effectively needs to be able to stamp the BPA as having an relevant ops manual and make sure we are insured. by and large all they care about is heavy metal(planes), as a regulatory body as they relate to us all they need is another regulatory body that can give some plausable duty of care. To claim that the USPA cannot do this, is ludicrious. There were DZs awile back with grandfather rights(they operated before the BPA and thus were allowed to operate as non BPA DZs). The BPA aparently devoted a great deal of resources in getting them shut down. With insurance, well waivers can be just as solid or as pourous here as the US(from a legal point of view if you can prove negligence on an operators part then the waiver falls apart). At least the USPA one is valid worldwide. I find it very hard to believe that there is only one insurer in the UK that is willing to cover the BPA, ive had personal insurance covering me for jumping worldwide that only costs me 61 pounds a year(3 million 3rd party + medical etc...). So i think something is going on there. When it comes to forein ratings. FORIENERS can use thier ratings but brits have to get brit ratings to use them in the UK. I believe this is devised to stop people doing their quals abroad and making the BPA system irrelevant. Well the argument of staying in the BPA to change matters, well, no thanks... The council members by and large all have a comerical intrest in the sport this clearly affects thier decision making process. i think it would be more productive for me to take my 120ish quid, stappel it to my forehead and run around a doggy area in Cape Town naked, im pretty sure id get the same result. Id be robbed and have a really sore behind. One of the hardest things in the world to do is convince a myopic group of dinosaurs that serving their own intrests in a semi-politcal means isnt good for the whole.

gotta say im more or less onside with Vikki on this one. Taking it one level up, heres a couple of things I feel strongly about in regards to the BPA 1- Exclusivity in membership. The fact that the BPA effectively runs a parachuting cartel and gets away with it, even in the UK, goes beyond belief. In all markets and industries competition best serves the customers. Were USPA membership become an option in the UK, im pretty sure the BPA would become defunct. Quiet simply its a organisation that much better serves its membership in a number of senses. The fact that you arent obliged to join in able to jump forces it to become relevant to the needs of jumpers otherwise people dont join. The BPA operates regardless. 2. Insurance. I find it very hard to believe that the council is unable to find a cheaper insurer. In litagation prone US, the premium is infinately cheaper. Cost of goods and services in the UK is higher, but paying three times as much for an inferior service(BPA vs USPA) just seems ridiculous. Were not so many council member to have a personal comercial intrest in skydiving I believe an extra premium for instructors(or anyone who makes money at skydiving) or students could be passed. The risk of these two groups is higher, why is everyone else paying money so instructors and DZs can make wonga. 3. Not allowing BPA members to use forein ratings. The claim by some STC types that our standards of safety and training are the envy of the world, are laughable. In terms of fatalities and injuries per 10000 jumps, we have one of the highest ratios in the world(some council members and editors would have you believe that the US in dangerous, really...). Fair enough in the USPA you can be a secondary AFF instructor with alot less jumps, but the knock on effect is that they have more instructors, and at the point they qualify, due to the environment they jump in, they're already at a higher skill level than UK instructors 500+jumps on. Again, its another protectionist measure. Not in terms of safety but in terms of influence. 4. Accounts. By investing a significant amount of money in low risk investments the BPA is effectively insulating itself against the membership. Ive heard a council member say that its unwise to only have a single source of income ie.. the membeship. I feel this is irresponsible. Not in a financial sense, but bad policy as a matter of course. It somewhat like a legistlative body that stays in power irrespective of the politcal swing. If we loose 50% of the membership, council can with little difficulty run its affairs as normal, not being responsive to the best means most of us have in affecting affairs ie... voting with or cheque book(going elsewhere). Im going totaly USPA now,only jumping abroad(hey cheap flights allow you to go to europe every second weekend quiet cheaply and get alot more done then you could in the UK), and hit the wind tunnels(very impressed with bedford). I think if you could somehow add up all the UK non BPA members that only jump abroad vs. the BPA members, the figures would be very revealing. I think the abroad types would outnumber the BPA ones. Im sure this is really going to rile some people up.

hey jimmy, whats the scene in lodi like summertime is there enough guys to make regular decent formations all day sorry if u didnt get the other message p

im afraid this one isnt me, and i dont appreciate the suggestion that i would post under another name ive openly stated and stood by my views and will continue to do so it would have been alot easier to post under another name from the begining, and i decided not to for a number of reasons p

you can add fedykin to the definately list

well, british freeflying hmmmmmmmmmmm pretty much everything on the vid was done outside the uk(most non uk residents), all of the flyers were educated outside the uk and alot of the personalities are italian just because a dog is born in a stable doesnt neccesarily make it a horse email andy if u want a copy im sure he'd be pretty cool about it

probably no more than usual- me and the unmentioned one tend to have a pretty non linear speed curve nearly every dive(track, flat, vertical, steep, vertical, track etc...) so that dive was pretty much the norm. andy is a bit of a fiend for action though

well actually no, matter has just copied the ourgan design and is marketing it is europe for a pretty simular cost the same thing they did with their current wing suit design that they are being sued by solomon for --- and Cedric Dumont(Matter owner) has been caught before putting positive reviews about his products under various alibi's --- naughty man

i believe it was Lycurgus who said- fox skin will have to be stiched wherever lion skin isnt available

i was in the tunnel not too long ago and was really impressed, i dont think you need mega baggy tunnel suits for this one, and the air feels different than perris(less need for ' tunnel flying') i was flying in a FS type suit and doing whatever i wanted vertically awesome tunnel

the dz has figured it all out have the biggest lift capacity with low prices and the most switched on manifestor working themselves unbelievably hard + a well motivated incredible collection of coaches and LO's + a wind tunnel = eloy they have contributed so much to the sport and make such an effort to keep all of us jumpers happy

i though the lift capacity was incredible for the UK the vibe was pretty good too some of the staff can be a bit terse and give mixed messages apart from that i was generally impressed

my favorite dz incredibly progressive attitude the best food i have ever tasted the altitude is incredible the staff are incredibly friendly and professional thumbs up keep it coming olav and stefania

i think this DZ has got the most practical location in the UK easist to get to and from london you can do more or less as many lift as you can expect to in the UK(5-7 is my upper limit there) the altitude isnt great wherever i go abroad the jumpers from weston are always friendly and energetic it would just take i bit more freefly LO etc.. to make it an awesome DZ and maybe some accomodation and better altitude

ill second that motion as much as some people would like to claim that the cost of goods and services is higher in the UK is due to intrest rates, VAT etc... its more to do with anti competitive behavior and not being motivated by trying to find savings in efficiency. Ill give you an example, in eloy if you arent at the plane on time, it goes, delegating responsiblity to the lowest level, I routinely see planes in the UK throtling for 10+ minutes while they change loads around and people have a long chat about the latest football scores. We've all known for some time that price fixing is a real problem in the British economy and I wouldnt be too surprised if the dropzones and in the future, tunnels subscribe to the notion that its easier to set prices in a captive market than strive for greater efficiency. On a similar note, if these prices are to believed about Skyventure UK, I dont think too many skydivers will be there, as motivated as i am to go there because the British womens formation team will be 'Training there exclusively'(re:sarcasm). Do the math, if you want to do any serious time, go to the states. I think Uk skyventure is being incredibly unrealisitic due to financial pressures about the uk market.

not to sound too much like an authority on the matter, however, the more dropzones that you go to the more you will likely realize just how appauling headcorn is. headcorn was the 3rd dropzone i had ever been to and at the time i still though it was so so i still honestly believe that paying an extortionate membership fee to watch tandems go up and down all day with mediocre instructors strut around isnt really what im after, and for that matter what most people consider worthwile. put simply, nothing ever happens there, and you pay far too much. it is interesting to note how scared some of the these british dropzones are of the reviews put about them, a number of headcorn instructors have put positive reviews about thier DZ to try and up the STAR rating, the same thing is done by netheravon instructors, very european, fudge the result if it doesnt suit you... p

a couple of years ago(2003) nethers by one means or another got its act together and started to resemble an progressive dropzone! but- the state of things now is somewhat different... the managment is either absent of disintrested most of the time and the lower level staff have been given no motivation whatsover to help things turn around. (they cut all of the Staff incentives this year for them to contribute to productivity and the general feel of the center). the location is probably the most ideal, for kite surfing in the UK (on top of a hill in the middle of a plain) ( Edward Sissor hand house, Ref) they just cant get thier act together and frankly dont seem particularly concerned, i think its partly due to the confusing nature of the organisation ie... APA, JSPC, Pilots, and anyother Tom Dick or Harry all thinking that they have exclusive controll of the center. despite recent efforts the manifest system is achaic and ineffiecent. They actively recruit and retain staff there that are totaly unsuited for the basic task of writing a manifest and communicazting with DZ control. If they cannot cope the window gets slammed in your face so they can have a little breather from the high stress environment of running a manifest!! Fair one! its not a case of bad managment or leadership, its a clear cut case of NO managment or leadership just because someone has made the right jestures, nudge nudge wink wink, doesnt neccesarily mean that they are capable of running a comercial operation(business backround, hmmmm....) its almost bizare in the fatalistic view of some of the people(IMSHALA like) in the senior staff, if things dont turn effciciently its gods will not due to any action or inaction on thier part. this all leads to apathy with the staff dissillusioned jumpers going somewhere else I.e. enduring a drive up north to jump where people are actualy interested in skydiving. if they could get thier act together then id be more than happy to comeback, but to be honest I dont think that;ll happen in my life time.

im with euphoria and i can honestly say it best not to come down to nethers, we're all taking off(in fact most of us already have ie.. mike in spain, andy gone, alec gone, me too in sept and only gaz here) the dropzone is getter worse and worse im moving up to hibalstow which by all accounts is where things are happening... westons not too bad either and id DEFINATELY aviod headcorn, probably the worst DZ on the planet the uk freefly scene isnt much though to be honest

hey tough guy just so you know andrew newell is my team mate(Euphoria) and when it comes to flying ill let the people who know me make thier judgments

thats probably hit the nail on the head added to the fact that head down had a 'badness' factor to it

from the beggining matter took 6 months for my suit when i ordered it and it took longer for you to get yours, just because your now getting 2 free suits because matter lost babylon and are desperate to get some people on the list, your position on them has changed overnight funny that Okay so lets make a list of all of the teams at world level competition have worn anything other than cotton or pollycotton pretty long list lets now make a list of all of the teams which are flying any of these suits the list is endless just because one or two manufacturers who both are strangely situated in empuriabrava, which as far as im concerned is one of the biggest hubbs of misinformation on the planet and are trying to convince the public that they should be spending more money on more expensive suits which as far as most of us have seen, doesnt help anyone... imput in the extremities, well this is what both Olav and Alchemy swear by in term of where your drag loading should be, but hey, i guess you know something that they dont and also this is the most efficient place to put drag given our biomechanics and where our center of drag is best placed if flying on our heads the argument of thicker matierials vs. more matierials is a bit muddied, however one thing is undeniable drag is drag, if the matierial has a higher drag value if it is thicker, or there is more of it, the quotent is the same as is the effect who is this guy skydee or whatever???

Matter and europe for that matter can be a funny one and a couple of issues ive noticed get raised and dont and hey who looks like a clown, i think cedric more than likely 1- its really fashionable to wear tight suits in europe for one reason or another, in some tracking it can help.... this is irrespective of how much the person weighs, alot of schools are suggesting putting really snug suits on people that are a bit heavier and doesnt really make any sense ie...Babylon 2- matter itself is very variable, ive had extreemly bad experiences with cedric dumont and so have alot of friends and i wouldnt choose to ever do any business with him every again 3- theres a real push for TECHNICAL suits and fabrics which for the most part are a load of sh~t. proconcept tries to make out that drag is soooo specifically placed that it aids in flying precisely etc... i think this is possibly the case but amount to less than 1% of the overall flying profile they're creating a market for themselves and convincing people that they need these products by some interesting marketing and lets not also forget they're bloody expensive and very rarely deliver on time and the customer service is very poor. if you wana get a euro boy gimp suit get a boogy man one, at least they look better if your into all of that if its pertinent i fly michigan after flying proconcept for too long p

do i know you?