Roll Call Again - Sept 2008 Perris P3 Big Ways

[mdrejhon 8]

Writing from PERRIS...

Shout out time!
Anyone else from either P3 Big Way Camps?
Post here if you were here or will be here!

I'm the deaf Canadian skydiver here, with Jan Meyer (MakeItHappen) being my interpretor. I was here in May 2008 (my 49-way). Another amazing experience. Did so much better on this second visit, and did two consecutive 52-way completed formations Sunday, and got my provisional 100-way camp invitation confirmed for next weekend. Yay!

I am now between weekends, killing time with a few skydives now and then, probably increasing my jump count by 50 in the shortest time period I've ever done in my life.

For those not familiar (new jumpers, etc):
The Big Way camps are a gateway to becoming invited in bigways and being invited to the future formation skydive World Record (Project 500). Any 250-jumper with reliable 20-way experience can be set at the beginning of the path to a future world record at these kinds of camps. There are two consecutive Big Way Camp weekends here -- as seen from bigways.com. Some people here for the earlier camp not originally going to the 100-ways, are so inspired by their performance at the 50-way event and extended their vacations to be part of the 100-way they just got invited to. Very few events in the world are equipped to train jumpers for bigways as well as these bigway camps, it is only here that they fling up a complete 100-ways where approximately half of the jumpers has never done their first 100-way -- and two consecutive 100-ways consisting of back-to-back loads -- back in May 2008. Dozens of future World Team members are being born here at this event, many of the organizers for the P3 camps were team leaders in the 2006 record (see www.theworldteam.com), and are actually the people organizing Project 500 -- the next World Record, happening in 2010. Very few events puts your foot into the big way door as closely as this 100-way camp, especially if you are persistent and go to every P3 camp (twice a year), then eventually they're impressed enough with your jumps to begin inviting you to invitationals. Make the 2009 event if you have any remote interest in bigways, it's actually even not too late to be on Project 500 even for a relatively low jumper like me. It's just a little matter of money and interest in it. Many 500 jump RW people with hours of tunnel time, are already much better than many 400-way World Team members. Then one gets a provisional World Record invite that asks you to jump X more times at bigways (like those listed at bigways.com) and you're automatically invited to the World Record. Yes, provisional World Record invites are given out at 500 jumps if you're good enough -- and visiting this and similiar camps several times is one way to get good enough. Even if you're not interested in World Record, the P3 big way camp is an awesome event to go to and will help you be part of a country's or state's little bigway record (and a photo in the newspaper to show your parents!), and a good way to experience Perris for the first time too -- just need 250 jumps and reliable/consistent 20 way experience -- and the training is first class. The camps happen twice a year (spring and fall).

[yjumpinoz 0]

I am not a world team member, but I would be careful about calling out "many" of them.... I do agree that these camps are very good though.

[billvon 2,404]

Hey, how you doin'. If you were the guy with the Bluetooth keyboard and the PDA, I was sitting next to you in the bar on Sat night.

[BillyVance 34]

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Hey, how you doin'. If you were the guy with the Bluetooth keyboard and the PDA, I was sitting next to you in the bar on Sat night.

That's definitely him. When he was at the Deaf World Record a few years back, that was how we communicated, reading and typing on that keyboard and PDA.

"Mediocre people don't like high achievers, and high achievers don't like mediocre people." - SIX TIME National Champion coach Nick Saban

[MakeItHappen 15]

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Writing from PERRIS...

Shout out time!
Anyone else from either P3 Big Way Camps?
Post here if you were here or will be here!

I'm the deaf Canadian skydiver here, with Jan Meyer (MakeItHappen) being my interpretor. I was here in May 2008 (my 49-way). Another amazing experience. Did so much better on this second visit, and did two consecutive 52-way completed formations Sunday, and got my provisional 100-way camp invitation confirmed for next weekend. Yay!

Mark did an amazing job this weekend. Even tho my fingers are worn out from typing, I'll share a way cool story.
I'm going to tell it in reverse order because it's much more exciting that way.

So there we were looking at the video in the debrief.
Kate freezes the video and says in a very demanding way "Who is this?" She is pointing to Mark.
I and a whole lot of other people say it's Mark.
I'm thinking to myself "Mark did everything right - why is Kate pointing him out?"
So Kate rewinds a few seconds on the video and shows Mark's approach to the formation, his excellent stop in his slot, his waiting for the anchor guy to get there, his 'pause-take a breath' before he takes a grip on the anchor guy. Mark was doing everything right. What's Kate's beef about this? Then she says "This is how to do it right. This is an example of what we want."
Then I go "Whewww" Oh, Mark, Kate is pointing you out as how to do it right. Big bonus points there. You won the lottery.
The story was not done there.
I asked Kate to rewind to the top end of the dive.
You see that low guy there - the guy about 100-200 feet low right at the top end of the dive? That's Mark.
Mark got tangled up with another floater on exit and then came back to make that stellar, un-rushed dock.
That was something Kate did not know. Add that to the awesome dock, Mark got elevated big time.
A lot of times people panic when their exit gets screwed, but not Mark. He just did his best slow fall and got back to his radial and did his job as required.
That was awesome. Mark got BIG brownie points on that dive.

Mark was amazing last weekend.
He did a fine job.

.

.
Make It Happen
Parachute History
DiveMaker

[labrys 0]

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Mark got tangled up with another floater on exit and then came back to make that stellar, un-rushed dock.
That was something Kate did not know. Add that to the awesome dock, Mark got elevated big time.

Rock on with your goal to be on that 500 way, Mark.

Owned by Remi #?

[mdrejhon 8]

yjumpinoz:
Oh, all 400 people did an amazing job -- it's just that, thanks to things like Skyventure's not yet built, people can rack up "Red Zone" skills faster than ever before with fewer jumps (I have 4.5 hours tunnel time which contributes to this low jumper now being invited to a 100-way). Meaning, it's slightly easier to reach World Team levels than it was before at slightly fewer jumps, thanks to the wind tunnels (utilizing bigway coaches in the tunnel in "red zone" drills) and modern bigway camp training methods. The formation skydives at the 20-to-50 way camp resembles cutouts of the World Team formations, specially designed to train skills that maximizes chances of being in the World Record. During a weather hold, Kate Cooper gave an inspirational speech to all of us being on the World Record. The 100-way was once the world record -- in 1986. Now it's routine. Training methods are still even improving since the World Team 400-way, albiet a little slowly.

As for MakeItHappen's story:
I'm still surprised at how well I did on my jump #324, recovering from a messed up exit and actually ended up waiting for my dock in the middle of crowded 52-way traffic. I was totally boxed in with waiting people to sides and behind me - parked for the dock signal, then docked approx 15th out of 52. This was a more critical slot to arrive early at. I actually managed to arrive ahead of the person to the side of me. I think I actually enjoy the front float position, something that people dislike, because I find it very easy to slow-fall from that exit type.
P.S. I don't think I'd have been making it into the 100-way camp without MakeItHappen's help. She deserves more credit for jump #324 methinks.

P.P.S. More stories to write but let's see how I do next weekend, shall we... [Insert obligatory skydiver prayer here.]

[wildfan75 1]

Dang! Billvon was within sight and I didn't get to meet him!

Back in MN proudly showing off a picture from one of the two completed 52 ways!

Let the count down to May's camps continue...

[VanillaSkyGirl 6]

Hello Mark...I was on those successful 52-ways with you.
MakeItHappen has been an amazing help to you, and I think that she deserves all the credit in the world for being your interpreter plus a great person to learn from and be around. (I hope to fly with her someday.) That said, YOU ultimately made it happen for yourself, Mark. Congratulations on all the hard work!

By the way, I also was accepted back for the 100-ways. I only recently became recurrent. I had been in graduate school for 19 months straight and finished a month ago (all A's). However, I also have skydiving goals, so it's now time for me to dedicate myself more to the skies. I learned so much during the last camp, and I look forward to learning much more. I'm honored to be a part of this and can't wait to fly with everyone, tomorrow. See you then!

[wildfan75 1]

Ted?????????? Is that you????? I don't recognize you without the Rosa on your back!

[VanillaSkyGirl 6]

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Ted?????????? Is that you????? I don't recognize you without the Rosa on your back!

Ted is sleeping soundly in my gear bag.

For those not in the know...
I flew in the BASE with Dan B.C. (who wore weights, too), Tony Domenico and 3 others all day last Saturday for the group's four 42-ways. My 97 lb. body wore 22 lbs. of lead. We ROCKED that base. I also named my 22 lb. weight belt baby "TED", after Tony & Dan.

Side note:
Tony - "Take good care of Ted. He's my baby, after all."
Me - "God Tony, are you sure it's Dan's? It's black!"
Tony - "I'm not sure about the ancestry origins..."

[Jayruss 0]

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Hey, how you doin'. If you were the guy with the Bluetooth keyboard and the PDA, I was sitting next to you in the bar on Sat night.

He is and you were, as you you were next to me then joe on my left then Mark.

__________________________________________________
"Beware how you take away hope from another human being."
-Oliver Wendell Holmes

[mdrejhon 8]

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He is and you were, as you you were next to me then joe on my left then Mark.

Shhhh! Joseph hates being called Joe.

New update from the Perris 100-way camp. My group just did a near complete 65-way. All docked, but one grip in a loop was not complete. This time I was in the base. I was wearing 14 lbs of lead pratically half of the day. Some of it dirt-diving out in the desert fully geared up (40lbs total), in a half-black jumpsuit. I think I drank a liter of fluids after every jump.

Tomorrow, same formation but I get to fly outside of base. Fun. I think I can do any slot except second-last-out or last-out deep diver on a crowded 23-person Twin Otter.

Now the day before the bigway camp was a whopper:
Outside of the bigway camp (yesterday), I'm glad I made all my mistakes (Wed) in the regular fun zoo formation loads. You know, those fun formation loads collected by Mark the load organizer. I also believe I made one of my biggest mistakes in my skydiving career (....gulp....landing direction....gulp....) (several apologies were made) (and I mentally bitched at myself for half an hour afterwards too). In addition, on another jump, I got knocked about by a dust devil for 5 seconds at 1800 feet - that gave me a super scare with my Sabre almost collapsing. Perris is famous for dust devils. This was the same jump I had a stuck toggle that took 10 seconds to free (second time it has happened to me in 250+ packjobs), and I successfully freed the toggle just 5 seconds before the dust devil hit me. After I landed, the dust devil was now very dusty when I finally looked back. I realized what I flew through. I did not know it was a dust devil until I landed, since the region at 1800 feet was invisible. It behaved like super-bad turbulence that nearly collapsed my canopy. Up there when it hit me, I immediately looked down and flew far, far, far away from 'heat islands', trying to get away from any turbulence sources I could see. Then on a different jump the same day, I watched someone go down in a reserve, and I landed out with him (he thanked me for being the only guy who landed with him). First time I landed with someone landing under reserve, the sight of a cutaway is unsettling until you find that pearly beautiful white reseserve nearby - then I thought, that was expensive equipment floating down -- keep an eye -- I was half a mile away from the next nearest parachute, so I decided I should land with him, not to bother to try to make it back to Perris' landing area. That was Doc. Yeah, Wednesday was a crazy (and scary) day. Now, I've never, never, never had such a crazy skydiving day like that -- yes all of that happened in one day. A year's worth of scares crammed into one day. Really.

Today, Thursday, was a great big way camp day. Nearly everything went right. I'm glad I didn't have another Wednesday today.

[mdrejhon 8]

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By the way, I also was accepted back for the 100-ways. I only recently became recurrent.

Congratulations on making it into the 100-ways, you are probably the lowest-jump-numbered person on the Perris 100-ways, with me already almost a hundred jumps ahread. Tunnel time helping you get recurrent?

I wonder if my baby Ted is related to yours. 22lbs of lead must be torture during dirt diving in the desert on the scorcher of a day it was.

[mdrejhon 8]

My group had four 65-way jumps today, all oxygen jumps from 16 to 16.5K, with the last two of them nearly complete. The very last one was actually complete, except that the whacker from the opposite end of the formation started breaking off just before the last grip in a loop completed! Made my outer slot every time so far.

I'm now moved to the 102-way group middle-to-deep diver on middle-left trail plane, slot B17. Can't wait for tomorow.

[BillyVance 34]

Great job, man! Good luck today!

"Mediocre people don't like high achievers, and high achievers don't like mediocre people." - SIX TIME National Champion coach Nick Saban

[mdrejhon 8]

Copy of post made in the DWR thread in Disabled Skydivers area, but also relevant to this thread.

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Middle-left trail plane out of 5, deep diver, third last out of the door, weed whacker slot.

Six times. Yes, six 102-way attempts in one day. Catching up for bad weather.

Docked 2 times (or was it 3?), I parked 3 times in my slot (ran out of time for my neighbours to dock), and went low once because someone from behind me flew under me. Essentially I've made my slot every single time - No noteworthy violations so far except being a couple degrees off-radial in my stadium, which I've been continuing to refine. It's more sensory overload of a 'breathy, wavy' 102-way attempt that I've got to resist and keep my eye through the center of the base, which is challenging with the sensory overload of over a hundred jumpers floating near you. It is still a new sight to behold.

Biggest buildup was about 95 people with me included, there are still people getting low or pairs of people funneling each other due to redzone traffic.

I must say these are stressful jumps. Just as 65-ways were starting to become easy, 100-way is a whole new league (of a different ballpark) and it's super stressful, being suddenly thrown as a deep diver for my first 102-way, with 101 other people depending on you to make it a complete formation. I know it's just a camp event, but -- this has been a very stressful day even if I performed well.

I'll get used to it. The dives are fun. I used to go low often as a deep diver, which contributes to a large part of the stress, but I avoided that pattern and am gaining more confidence as a deep diver. That is the final frontier for me -- I believe I can now do any slot on the 100way, deep diver being the hardest slot for me.

My new slowfall jumpsuit is very handy in this slot. Big stopping power and I'm almost middle of fallrate range when the base starts to get floaty, which is good. I have only jumped my slowfaller jumpsuit 10 times total, so I've had to get used to it new diveslope and fallrate range capabilities in such a hurry. It also make me a very floaty tracker too - by the end of the day, I was almost reaching the outers and floating far above (And to side of) my breakoff team. I was under them early in the day, but I think I've nailed the track in the new slowfaller...

[mdrejhon 8]

I'm a new member of the 100-way club!

The weekend's over, and I did ten full 100-way attempts (some were 101 and 102 way attempts). I managed to make my slot (more or less) for either parking or docking on all jumps, except for one where someone from behind me flew under me in the "Red Zone" on one of the earlier attempts.

We succeeded in "pratically" completing a couple of the formations. Including one jump where just as one docked, someone from the other side of the formation broke off. Got a photo of a 100-way that looks complete.

Sunday was a lot more fun because I was now trusting myself to make the slot. I docked every single time on Sunday. My 'spare jumpsuit' (new slowfall jumpsuit) paid off here.

The main dissapointment was that a friend of ours got a little bone broken during a reserve landing.

With over 50 jumps (36 official camp jumps over two weeknds, plus 14 fun formation loads including a 23-way tracking jump), I've been thrown into every slot on various plane -- base, inner, outer, anchor, whacker -- from various exists -- front float, middle float, rear float, door, middle diver, and deep diver -- from left trail plane, lead plane, and right trail plane. Finally, for the first time, I now feel I can do any slot and keep up in a 100-way...

Now I have to hit my desk hard at work. After 50 skydives in one vacation and 70 skydives in one month, I sure could use a little break -- never going to be able to jump as often as many 1000-jumpers (who often get paid by the dropzones, rather than jumping mostly RW like me), but I will be working to stay bigway current in the months to come, since my new skydiving goal is now...... Project 500!

I need to practice more in not letting myself get sensory overload of al these bellyflyers near me in freefall and concentrate more on the base.

Everyone did a good job, the organizers, my interpretor (who doubled as a personal bigway coach), MakeItHappen, and everyone else who helped...

Now time to apply at bigways.com ... (as dozen other new members of the 100 way club!)

[BillyVance 34]

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but I will be working to stay bigway current in the months to come, since my new skydiving goal is now...... Project 500!

Cool! Now get on facebook and become friends with Hiro Hiro (Hiro Masuda). He can share his experiences being on the Thailand world records including the 400 way, and help you with anything you ask him.

"Mediocre people don't like high achievers, and high achievers don't like mediocre people." - SIX TIME National Champion coach Nick Saban

[freakyrat 1]

Hey Mark

Congratulations on your successful big-way camp. Jan thank you for assisting Mark as his interpreter. He is one amazing individual with a lot of determination whom I met a Nouvel-Air a few years ago.

Mark keep it up and surely you will reach your big-way goals.

Truly a TEAM EFFORT.

Chris

[VanillaSkyGirl 6]

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Congratulations on your successful big-way camp. Jan thank you for assisting Mark as his interpreter.

I have to repeat this. Jan was awesome as Mark's interpreter and deserves much gratitude from everyone for her enormous help to him. Mark deserves a huge congratulations for his success and hard work. Well done to the both of you!

[tetra316 0]

Excellent sig line by the way