OK. I really need clarification on somethings.

[Droolbaby 0]

Hey everyone. I kow these questions have been asked many times before and I have read a lot of comments in conjunction to them on this site. But, as all new things, some make sense to me and my situation and some don't. So I am looking for some clarification based on my current level.

Me: I am comletely new to the civilian skydiving world. I did jump for a few years in the military, but there wasn't much need to learn to "arch" when you only have 800 feet to fall and the parachute is attached to the aircraft.

Currently I am finishing up those things I need to do to get my "A". Though I do not have many jumps under my belt (15) I do have 2 hours of tunnel time. While I am comfortable with others and understand what is happening, I want to pursue freeflying. The freedom it introduces to open creativity is what I am looking for in this sport.

While I know and understand the need and USPA's desire to increase RW work into everyone, I am curious as to when I should start thinking about freeflying. There are many various opinions on this issue, but I am trying to get an understanding of what is going on. I am in no real rush to get there (as you can tell 15 jumps and a hell of a lot of tunnel time).

So here is my conundrum..should I be decent at RW work before pursuing Freeflying. I have even been told I should do at least a dozen or more 4 ways before Freeflying. This "4 Way" work will allow me to beter understand heading, positioning with other and help keep my head centered on the task and altitude, and also help provide me a way of checking on my awareness (once one pulls, pretty much everyone knows to pull). And second, as an alternate part to this, is it good to start in the tunnel, or should I just get a coach and sling my body from the plane while having a Freefly coach?

Thanks everyone for the understanding, I am just trying to sort the information out in my head and this site. Lots of opinions and just trying to make it specific to my situation. Thanks.

...Happiness is just a drool away....mmmmm....

[freeflydrew 0]

a lot of people will say it's good to have the rw foundation before you start freeflying, but I don't think it makes a difference. Fly the way you want to fly. Coaching will always help, and tunnel coaching will definitely help you... especially since one of the biggest habits to break, when learning freeflying after rw, is not going to your belly when you cork. Having a good sense of backflying from the tunnel will give you an option when you do cork, which in turn will make you safer.

If the tunnel is a realistic option, I would start there for the freeflying... the learning curve is crazy in the tunnel, and I think that dollar for dollar, during the early jumps of freefly, it's much more worth it to hire someone in the tunnel, than to hire someone in the air... Just try to stay current in the air for emergency procedures, canopy flying, circle of awareness, etc...

[AggieDave 6]

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a lot of people will say it's good to have the rw foundation before you start freeflying, but I don't think it makes a difference. Fly the way you want to fly.

I disagree.

I've been FFing since 2000 and I made the mistake of not establishing good RW skills early on in my skydiving career, so I'm speaking of personal experience. I'm also speaking from experience by observing many others in the skydiving world.

FF skills are great skills to have, I know that, personally I love FFing. However, the standard in skydiving is belly skills, that's from the beginning of everyone's skydiving career. From jump 1 you've learned how to arch. Why? That's you're safe place, that's where all the gear has been designed for deployment (TSOed gear) and that's where the skydiving general population resides. Not having a good set of RW skills may leave you in a serious bind on a random skydiving at somepoint in your career. I know that it did for me more then a couple of times before I went back and learned how to fly on my belly.

I'm not suggesting that someone has to spend 1000 jumps learning how to fly on their belly, just that some jumps past the license requirements would be a very wise choice to make before learning how to freefly. Not only that, but those jumps spent on your belly will only help you learn FFing much quicker due to your increased body awareness and air-awareness while skydiving.

If you don't believe me, ask the top FFers in the US. Drop Trent a line, or Rook or Max or any of the other people who have a crapload of jumps and experience. Ask them what they think.

--"When I die, may I be surrounded by scattered chrome and burning gasoline."

[freeflydrew 0]

I really don't see the big advantage of learning rw before learning freefly. There's plenty of dropzones where the majority of people freefly, and most do so right off of student status. There are some dropzones where no one does freefly, and others where no one does rw.

Here's a thought... focus on all disciplines. Do some rw jumps and some freefly jumps. Focus on canopy flight. Learn to track early on. Maintain awareness, keep eye contact...

There are no set rules with the learning curve. Some people wait 200 jumps before freefly, others wait 500 jumps before RW. Once off student status, you can go whatever direction you want. You can do everything wrong and not get hurt, or do everything right and get hurt. Just have fun, be safe, and remember the things you learned as a student.

I learned freefly right off of student status. 1500+ jumps later I still have yet to do any serious rw jumps... do I feel I'm at a disadvantage? not at all.

[dharma1976 0]

Quote

I really don't see the big advantage of learning rw before learning freefly. There's plenty of dropzones where the majority of people freefly, and most do so right off of student status. There are some dropzones where no one does freefly, and others where no one does rw.

Here's a thought... focus on all disciplines. Do some rw jumps and some freefly jumps. Focus on canopy flight. Learn to track early on. Maintain awareness, keep eye contact...

There are no set rules with the learning curve. Some people wait 200 jumps before freefly, others wait 500 jumps before RW. Once off student status, you can go whatever direction you want. You can do everything wrong and not get hurt, or do everything right and get hurt. Just have fun, be safe, and remember the things you learned as a student.

I learned freefly right off of student status. 1500+ jumps later I still have yet to do any serious rw jumps... do I feel I'm at a disadvantage? not at all.

Ditto minus the 1500 skydives...although I have flown belly slots for some hybrids

remember aggie dave that freeflying encompasses belly flying as well...I remember John Skinner getting so pissed that no one in the freefly league could fly on their belly and made us all do accordion exits :-P

truth be told...outside of the turning points part, I can get there no problem ;) they always choose me at sussex for hanger slots cause they knwo I can get there quick and get the grips and not get sucked into the top...

and you want to know what jump I started working on freeflying?

Jump 21

Cheers

Dave

http://www.skyjunky.com

CSpenceFLY - I can't believe the number of people willing to bet their life on someone else doing the right thing.

[Trent 0]

If you can't flat-track, hold a heading, or fly to a dock on your belly... it might be a bit soon to start jumping ahead to freeflying. Technically, if you can't do any of those things... you couldn't pass AFF, but we've all seen some students graduate with only VERY basic survival skills. In my opinion, you WILL spend a very important part of each skydive on your belly... tracking and at pull-time. If those aren't locked down, that should be your first priority.

If you've got those survival skills down pretty well, who's to say you can't mix it up a bit. I would recommend learning some freeflying, but not forgetting to spend a couple of jumps on your belly. The best freefly students I've coached have had pretty good belly skills already and were able to apply what they knew about flying. This is mostly because they had the air-awareness already, and could focus on learning the new stuff.

Another thing to keep in mind... it'll be easier for you to find people to jump with if you're diverse. No freefly coaches available? Don't want to do a solo? Don't want to get on a freefly zoo load? Get with a small RW group and JUMP. Who says that freeflyers don't have to be as good on their bellies? I personally think it's embarrassing when freefliers screw up a belly jump. Besides, turning points is fun and challenging no matter what your level. The most memorable jumps I've done have all had at least some belly points in them.

My opinion bottom-line: Work on everything. Get competent on your belly at the very least before you go 99% freeflying. Never miss a chance to jump with people and get better at something just because it's on your belly.

And here's a hot tip: Almost ALL freefly instruction was taken from RW. The same principles apply.

Oh, hello again!

[AggieDave 6]

Thanks Trent, you said what I was trying to get at, but in a well written manner.

--"When I die, may I be surrounded by scattered chrome and burning gasoline."

[diablopilot 2]

what the man said. ditto.

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You're not as good as you think you are. Seriously.

[Droolbaby 0]

OK. That makes total sense. Thank everyone for their input. With so much information on this site, it is hard to decipher it all at once. I know what I want to do, and coming up with a plan to get there is often hard with a sport such as this. I will roll out a keg in thanks after my first sitfly for all of you. I'll even post a notice when it happens and when and where the keg gets tapped. Thanks.

...Happiness is just a drool away....mmmmm....

[Canuck 0]

Something else to consider...one day you might decide you want to get, for example, an AFF rating. Having a solid base in flat flying skills is absolutely essential. A couple of my bros who have very, very few "arching jumps" as they call them and have had a very difficult time trying to do tandem video, flat fly coaching, etc. nevermind AFF. Both are well over a thousand jumps now, and both wishing they had taken a bit of time earlier in their skydiving to develop some basic belly skills.

Canuck