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billvon

Perris dueling 100-ways

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We completed an 89 way last night (group 2, Larry and Dan's group.) This morning we added 11 people from the other group, went up and built a 100 way. Then we took the 11 people back, put them in the other group, and built a 100 way with the other group.

Group 2 is going back up now to do a 2 point 87 way, then they are going to try for a 2 point 100 way.

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What a great event!

2 DIFFERENT groups completing back to back 100 ways...was really amazing thing to see.

But the coolest thing was that there were 62 (yes, SIXTY-TWO) people there who were on their very first 100 way! The beer was flowing freely :P

great job, everyone!

Never meddle in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup!

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We completed an 89 way last night (group 2, Larry and Dan's group.) This morning we added 11 people from the other group, went up and built a 100 way. Then we took the 11 people back, put them in the other group, and built a 100 way with the other group.

Group 2 is going back up now to do a 2 point 87 way, then they are going to try for a 2 point 100 way.

Congrats!

By next spring 2009 I hope I can be one of the 100-ways! I only stayed for the Perris P3 camp last weekend, where I was in a complete 49-way.

Next stop for me: 40-ways at Skydive Burnaby in June. I need WAY more big way experience this year to get to that level!...

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Back to back 100 ways was pretty sweet! Especially for so many new bigway jumpers. Thanks for letting me jump with you all! Plane hopping and meeting so many new people is always fun. I love it when people come from all over the world to Perris. There are a few photos from the event on my shutterfly site, check it out.

Karen
(Tall blonde camera-flyer chick from Perris)
http://www.exitshot.com

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If you were at the event then you know the significance of the attached picture. I can't wait to see the video ! !

B|



Holy crap! :S Did that dude get his ass chewed out for that? :P
"Mediocre people don't like high achievers, and high achievers don't like mediocre people." - SIX TIME National Champion coach Nick Saban

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If you were at the event then you know the significance of the attached picture. I can't wait to see the video ! !

B|



Holy crap! :S Did that dude get his ass chewed out for that? :P


Actually it was planned. Two 100-ways dirt diving simultaneously. Pictures were taken of it from the air and the photographer (J.C. Colclasure ?) jumped out then swooped over the two formations filming it from that angle too! Sweeet ! ! !


Group 2 rocks

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If you were at the event then you know the significance of the attached picture. I can't wait to see the video ! !

B|



Holy crap! :S Did that dude get his ass chewed out for that? :P


Actually it was planned. Two 100-ways dirt diving simultaneously. Pictures were taken of it from the air and the photographer (J.C. Colclasure ?) jumped out then swooped over the two formations filming it from that angle too! Sweeet ! ! !


Group 2 rocks


Ah yes, J.C. is a class act. Have seen him in action before and he's amazing. B|
"Mediocre people don't like high achievers, and high achievers don't like mediocre people." - SIX TIME National Champion coach Nick Saban

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I have a question from those of you at the 100-ways...

What are the lowest-number jumpers for the 100-ways --- were there several with under 300 jumps?

I am still a little over 270 jumps at about 100 per year, but helped by having 80% of my jumps being RW and now have more tunnel time than skydiving time including 4-ways in tunnel. Because of RW priority, I can't yet freefly -- though I'm beginning to working to fix that... ;)

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There have been some with as little as 300 jumps that have done 100 ways or bigger. Usually those are the ones that learned quickly and jumped constantly, or grew up on the DZ, or knew an organizer and could get a step in the door to prove themselves.

I think there was at least one jumper with less than 500 jumps on the 400 way, but I can't be sure. I know Hiro Masuda, the deaf Japanese skydiver, successfully completed the 400 way with about 1000 jumps give or take, but he also had almost a full day's worth of tunnel time. One of the 400 way captains had this to say about Hiro after he'd done a Perris big way camp before the world record "he is special, much tunnel time".

I did a 100 way at 500 jumps and I thought that was pushing it. Nowadays I would probably fuck up an 8 way. :D

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

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I have a question from those of you at the 100-ways...

What are the lowest-number jumpers for the 100-ways --- were there several with under 300 jumps?

I am still a little over 270 jumps at about 100 per year, but helped by having 80% of my jumps being RW and now have more tunnel time than skydiving time including 4-ways in tunnel. Because of RW priority, I can't yet freefly -- though I'm beginning to working to fix that... ;)



One of the people on one of the 100-ways did their 402nd jump that day.

Numbers alone can't tell the whole story. I've jumped with people with more than a thousand jumps, who couldn't do a simple four-way. (You don't learn a lot when nine hundred of your jumps were doing a solo after putting out a static line student.)

One of the people I was load organizing a number of years ago brought her brother over, and said he had just gotten off of Level 8s, and she asked if we do a three or four-way together. He had maybe fifteen jumps, and no tunnel time. But I figured, we'll keep it simple and he'll get a chance to do his first three-way. It went just fine, and over the course of the next month, he kept progressing at a nice pace, and was one of the better jumpers on eight and ten-way jumps within a month or two. He really had good perception, and quickly learned. If people kept their distance from him because of low jump numbers, they'd really have missed out, and he would have, too.

Bottom line: if you make the acquaintance of a serious load organizer, and can show that you're able to learn, and fly safely on a 20-way, then you can get onto larger things. If you can make the commitment to go to a big-way camp or two, such as the P3 ones, you will learn, and the people who can recommend you to be on a 100-way will get to see what you can do.

If it's what you want to do, then you can make it happen. If you're at a Cessna DZ, well, you're going to have to do some traveling, but it can be done.

-Jack

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Canada winters and nearest regular Twin Otters 2.5 hours away and an occasional Twin Otter 1.5 hours away, and another mouth to feed. That's why I haven't been to my home dropzone very often, only 3 times a year now -- I'm constantly hunting for opportunities to go to bigger ways because that is my specialization.... However, the opening of Skyventure New Hampshire helped a lot.

I need the wind tunnel bad. It is challenging with Canadian Winters and a limited budget. The wind tunnel makes it all possible. I went from a winter layover to successful bigway jumps to a 49-way complete jump in 28 jumps (Jump #246 was over 6 months ago, and my successful 49-way as a weed whacker anchor on jump #272.) My tunnel definitely kept me mostly "RW-current" in the winter despite few jumps in the sky due to the longer than expected Canadian winter and the lack of skydiving vacation. I think I did very well considering the circumstances, but I realize I need a lot more regular bigway experience to get to the 100-way level. Let's be honest, I'm very much a bigway newbie, even if I am nuch more pure-RW than the average 300-jump people, or even most 500-jump people...

I did not think I would enter the club of jumpers who have more tunnel time than sky time, but I did... If this accelerated rate of adding several hours per year tunnel time keeps up, I may even exceed 20 hours of tunnel time before I reach 500 jumps. What happened: Doing 4-ways in the tunnel cut my tunnel costs by 75%!!! (All guys split costs.)

Two tunnel visits totalling more than 2 hours of 3-ways and 4-ways, was all that kept me up to date in the winter. So once I was back in the air, I knew that I needed to refresh my dives/radials/stadiums/fallrates/approaches/tracking, which is something you cannot do in a tunnel but refresher jumps by doing a 3-to-5 second Cessna preplanned delay exits (exit the door and chase the agreeing buddy that jumped 3 to 5 seconds ago from the door) and dock a small-way, as if I was last diving out of a trail plane and docking on a bigway. Trying to choose my jumps "efficiently" specifically for these skills ... But at the same time still leaving room for occasional unusual jumps as the high altitude hop-and-pop, for a break... Or a fun tracking jump.

I am REALLY looking forward to Skyventure Montreal opens in early 2009. Groundbreaking is happening this month, according to my contacts. Once it opens, I can do day car trips with no overnight stays required. Since I can do 4-way in the tunnel now with people of my own tunnel skill level (or better), it costs me only 3 to 4 dollars a minute of tunnel time (approx $200-250 per hour when all jumpers split cost, then add the cost of a monitoring coach in the staging area) -- much cheaper than a single 4-way jump at a Cessna dropzone. So most of my 4-ways will probably be in the tube rather than the sky. Till then, I'm always keeping an eye out for 4-way roadtrips to Skyventure New Hampshire these days, which happen a few times a year... I will keep doing 4-ways in the sky, but it's almost 10 times cheaper to do 4-ways in the tunnel, minute for minute!

New jumpers have it lucky with all the Skyventures popping up. True, for someone who never flew tunnel, it often takes (from some people's perspective, annoyingly) a super-expensive hour with an instructor trying to teach you mantis instead of boxman flying, before you get good enough to start doing 3-ways and 4-ways in the tunnel with a good RW tunnel coach. Tunnels sometimes feel like timewasters in the first hour to an experienced sky bellyflyer who's surprised they keep hitting the walls in their first tunnel visit, but once familiar with the tunnel windstream and cleared to do 4-ways, it becomes a super-cheap way to stay RW-current! I have no idea why some bigway flyers continue to hate the tunnel, if only they take the time to invest (like the expensive step of buying a rig before skydives become cheaper) the expensive tunnel training before they are cleared to be able to share the tunnel with other people, then the tunnel suddenly becomes 10 times cheaper than a skydive... I met other 300-jump people like me doing bigways of the 3-plane league, many of them had tunnel time to compensate for their lower jump numbers... It's not a substitute for the sky but here I am, 6-months winter layover of no skydives to a very safe 49-way in only 28 skydives made possible by tunnel time in addition to very helpful dropzone buddies covering skills that weren't covered by tunnel time. For the same money, 15 carefully optimized sky jumps and 1.5 hours of tunnel 4-way RW with a very good professional RW tunnel coach, helps bigway skills, on rough average, a LOT more than doing 30 RW jumps. Bumbling about in a crowded tunnel helps you to flatfly properly in heavy traffic without taking others out, and recover from things like tension and other problems, and improved burble management, ability to recover quickly from someone accidentally flying under you or even staying stable despite that happening, doing softer docks, chasing fallrate problems, slow fallrate manouvering (avoiding altitude loss during evasive manoevers while falling slow; a useful bigway skill that may be exercised if you are forced to merge into an unstable weedwhacker or outer loop slot slot of a slow falling bigway). Tunnel time helps wonderfully with all of that, if you have the right RW-oriented tunnel instructor! But yes, balance is needed (too much tunnel time can be bad I am told - and you still gotta practice criticals such as tracking, stadium approaches etc. possible only with real jumps)

I also realized my application did read 50 recent skydives but that application was made before my winter layover started... Uh oh when I got the call that I made it on the P3 waiting list! I had to get current really damn quick after that call - and I fortunately had almost two hours of tunnel time scheduled on the weekend prior to P3. So I asked some people about this (emphasing the 1.5 hours of tunnel RW the weekend prior) as I worried if that would disqualify me from Perris P3, but what I did to get recurrent worked wonderfully, and I performed well considering my limited jump level...

I can only wonder how much better I will perform if I increase my jumping and tunnel visits by 50% annually (which is feasible this year -- four or five bigway camps) and do at least one winter time skydiving vacation.... Now I just have to go to many more bigway camps, do P3 again... And make more new friends too! :)
Canada's record is only a 59-way at this time (It was supposed to be an 80-way). I think once Skyventure Montreal opens -- we'll witness Canada's first 100-way a lot more easily...

P.S. Landing at Perris is still always scary though - especially when dust is being blown up. That's where the REAL danger was for me: I had one scary landing roll (no injury but my first rig grass/dirt stain) that convinced me to stay under my 170 for a while longer. I truly really can't afford to swoop at my current jump frequency anyway.

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>were there several with under 300 jumps?

I don't know if there were any with under 300, but there were a few with just over 300.

On the 300-way, one jumper was invited on at the 300-jump mark. (By the time the event began she had about 450.)

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About 350 was the lowest (She was on my plane), however that person had previously participated in BigWay records.

The thing I am most concerned about with people that have low numbers participating in big ways (even if they have massive tunnel time) is awareness under canopy and ability to deal with shit if it goes all bad. Then again high numbers don't guarantee those skills either :S

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i think that may have been me, i had 302 jumps on the 100-way camp. I was on the Brit Chicks Record with 150 jumps? dont know if im still that same person?!

I understand what your staying with the canopy flight and for that reason alone, i am jumping a spectre 170 with a wingloading of 0.87. This is for many reasons;

1. I only have (now) nearly 400 decents under canopy
2. I am not going to feel 100% confident in landing with all the traffic
3. I can sit high, have my head on a CONSTANT look out for other canopy's.
4. If i need to wear lead then i still have range within my canopy WL.
5. I aint interested in being the first down, i dont mind a walk and I certainly are not into downsizing to look cool.
6. I like my limbs the way god intented them to be!

That is how i deal with being on high experience freefalls with 99 other people but as soon as my canopy is open i go back very quickly to low experienced canopy pilot!! B|

But thanks to everyone for jumping with me and all the advice and support...you guys rock! and yes group 2 did rock!!!!! hahaha

:)

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i think that may have been me, i had 302 jumps on the 100-way camp. I was on the Brit Chicks Record with 150 jumps? dont know if im still that same person?!



Actually Sarah I wasn't especially worried about you B|

The week before on the BWC we had a high pull in heavy traffic from someone who had WAY too much experience to be doing that shit. As the deploying canopy went by me I thought to myself "Hey, that guy uses black rubber bands!" :o

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You definately held your own Sarah and it was great jumping with you at the BWC.

Enjoyed the camp greatly and it kick started the 2008 season for me in a styling way.

Catch you in the sky somewhere, sometime

Blue Ones,

Major Dad
CSPA D-579

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...As the deploying canopy went by me I thought to myself "Hey, that guy uses black rubber bands!" :o



Whoa! Flashback to many years ago when I had just turned to track away from a 20+ way and a green canopy came up to meet me. My foot barely grazed the nose of the canopy as I got away and knew for certain I had used up one of my 9 lives!

:o

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thank you, you guys are very kind, i have a LONG way to go but it helped me being surrounded by such amazing people and the experience !!! aaah! it was like a library of knowledge to pick at! lol,

talking of scary i have a cool quote "i thought i had a really good track so i just pulled at 3.5k!" on a 100-way [:/]

send my love to everyone by the way, it was an amazing experience, and im doing it all over again in september!! wooooooooooooooo!!!!!!! :D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D

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