superstu

For me personally it's all about the mental state. Realizing that it's just swooping and not the end all be all of my life. Breath, relax, have fun, and enjoy the journey.

Other than that...flying a good pattern/set up is key

Huge congrats!!! Very well done

lol, nice pic. yea that is how i was oriented

Someone was nice enough to put the article on their website, for those interested: http://pyrodan.privatedata.com/skydive/stu-schoenfeld-report.pdf

If anyone knows how to resize a PDF file I will upload it to this post so who ever wants to can read it. Also, when I deploy I typically watch the canopy open so when this spinner happened my head actually got trapped back near my shoulders and not down towards my chest. That's why I think I experienced negative G's in my face and not the rest of my body.

Not over your pay grade, they just didnt ask anyone from the canopy piloting community except for possibly a select few. Then they didnt think it through and just implimented what they thought sounded good.

Personally I dont have a problem with the rules from the stand point of actually running them. What i have a problem with is how these changes were made. It seems like they asked maybe one or two canopy pilots how they would change speed and distance to make it fit in a smaller area but didnt think about the other consequences, such as safety, judging requirments (more judges needed along with cameras), course materials (ie only timing systems and no possible use of cameras now), the lack of good training facilities (dz's with ponds), and so on.

Our discipline needs a better system to make rule changes. Other disciplines have forums where people can put ideas out there. Nick Batch also mentioned to me that the people making the decisions should be qualified such as having attended a minimum of 3 world meets. That way those people making the decisions are somewhat in the know on how rule changes effect the sport over the long run.

I would have done the exact same thing. Jumper in my opinion did a great job.

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Due to the size of the competition the weather conditions were rather different between the first and last jump in each round, so again, I don't really see what valid test data was gathered if one wanted to compare designs

From what the guys at the competition told me was that groups were formed based on World rankings so all the top pilots (Jay, Tagle, Nick, Greg, Curt....) were all on the same aircraft and relatively close to each other during the whole comp, which also means there were Petra's, experimental's, comp velo's, velo's, JVX's, and so on relatively close together within the competition. So it was a decent location/event to get a direct comparison versus other canopies.

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Yes, but what I wrote was that in most other fields manufacturers want to save up that buzz to near the product launch, not spread it out so thin that people have almost forgot about the product when it is finally released.

I completely agree

i've talked with a few paraglider pilots that have watched the video and these types of collapses I guess are common with paragliders when you pull on the front risers. I guess with paragliders they're not supposed to be flown using front risers. I think since the petra (and this vera) are "paragliderish" shaped they might also have some of their tendencies.

Definitely interesting watching this testing, makes you appreciate those test pilots just a little bit more

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I believe in order to keep competition competitive (truly) the competitors should have access to the same gear

Do you honestly believe it's the gear holding most of us back from being on the podium? Cause if you do we should all go back to regular velocities cause that is what Curt was flying when he won overall in Dubai.

How do you propose PD or Icarus to measure the performance of their new canopies if not in a competitive setting?

As far as the "can't see the label...I can't talk about it" stuff, what good is it to know what the label says or how someone else thinks the canopy flies if you don't fly it anyway? Especially if the company is doing a lot of tweeking still.

Bottom line is all the companies are working on their little toys and the people they trust most get them first. However, if we look at the scores and placings of the most recent competition no one canopy has a distinct advantage and it still boils down to the pilot under it. Take a look:
Dubai Overall
1. Curt - Velocity
2. Nick - Petra/ JVX
3. Jay - Experimental
Dubai Accuracy
1. Curt - Velocity (I don't think a comp velo)
2. Nick - JVX
3. Bobo - comp velo
Dubai Distance
1. Jay - Experimental
2. Tagle - Experimental
3. Marat - Petra (I think)
Dubai Speed
1. Tommy D - Comp Velo
2. Greg W - Comp Velo
3. Jay - Experimental

As you might guess i've had plenty of spinners on all sizes of canopies and yes 99% of the time I can feel them start spinning or come off the back fucked up. However, this 1 particular incident of mine I had no chance, it was immediate, I didn't even have time to get my hands up to the risers once it stood me up. It was the most violent opening I've ever experienced, spinners on my 79 don't even come close. Hell, I've had toggle fires on my 71 and those aren't even close. Definitely weird...still don't know what caused it though.

Also, I got a message from someone about this incident and was asked about if i jump with an RSL and I don't. I also don't hook up my skyhook and I don't have an AAD if anyone was interested.

I've attached a picture of what happened to me on a violent hop and pop on my Comp Velo 71 loaded at 3.0 last year. Still don't know what the malfunction was that caused the spinner but the docs said I was doing close to 5 G's for a short time. I broke blood vessels in my face, eyes, nose, and mouth. By the time I chopped. probably less than 10 seconds after deployment, I was almost blacked out and I lost my vision till 1500' under the reserve. I was conscious the whole time but it was extremely hard to get to my handles and am lucky I got rid of it so quickly. Lesson I learned from that one is that it pays to practice your emergency procedures and when you're dealing the ultra small shit, there is no forgiveness so get rid of it.

Pic was taken 20 minutes after the incident and my home dz Mile-Hi Skydiving in CO.

I don't know about that Dan, I mean Nick only went 220meters without really popping up so he did lose quite a bit of distance there

One of my teammates I think said it best I think "They want to change the sport to suit a prince...they bid on it now support their bid"

Personally I really don't like the fact the we're getting rid of our margin for error, as small as it is already, for the power events. I think that 5' saves people's ass's, just like 10' saves people just getting into the sport.

Yes, there's a few out there without metal. Doesn't mean we haven't hit, just means we haven't hit hard enough and have gotten lucky.

All canopy pilots hit no matter if you're starting out or a top tier guy, and we all know we'll hit again if we continue to swoop it's a risk one has to be ok with unfortunately.

For the record I don't have any metal

Stu

The FLCPA already has their 2012 schedule out, check out their new website: www.swoopleague.com

FLCPA and the NorCal/SoCal leagues also paired up so check out the events section...should be fun next year.

The drop zone i started learning to swoop at prevented a right hand turn due to the runway so I had to do a left turn, so that's what I do. I can do a right 270 but it feels really uncomfortable, especially if i'm doing a formation landings with others.

Hey Ian, is your drag reduction shaving party invitation only too?

GW will be there

If you've recieved coaching from Jay and Pablo and they've seen you fly the first thing I would do is email them these questions and see what they say. Most of us haven't seen you fly and have no business telling you what is right for you on these forums.

I revised the original poll to allow multiple answers so people can vote on both speed and distance. Please revote

So PD's Big Boy Pants event is happening in about a week and half out here in CO and the question has been risen will the speed and distance records fall or stand? And If they do fall what is your prediction of what the new records will be?

Current distance record is 181.7meters (596 feet) held by Nick Batsch.

Current speed record is 2.093 seconds held by Greg Windmiller

Also, remember that in 2005 Jay Moledzki set a performance record of 206 meters but was before the current weight rules were in effect.

So what do you guys think?

This was Al's comment from the original post:
The format of the event isn't the traditional 3 rounds of each event. The courses will be set up downwind(whichever way that is). They'll be making as many runs as possible on the courses with a goal of setting records. No penalties for missing the gate like they have to deal with at a world meet. Swing for the fence, and if they miss the gate, no worries, pack up and go again.
Invitational has kept the meet to a low # of jumpers to give the big dogs the most opportunities to run the courses when the conditions are prime for record runs. The dates were picked with the best potential weather conditions.
Jay just went 172.80 Meters at Canadian Nationals last weekend and that DZ is about 1/2 the altitude as Mile Hi.

The odds are stacked in our favor for this event. The question isn't IF the records will be broken, but by how much and by whom.....

So I forgot to allow multiple choices in the poll, does any one know if I can change that?

So PD's Big Boy Pants event is happening in about a week and half out here in CO and the question has been risen will the speed and distance records fall or stand? And If they do fall what is your prediction of what the new records will be?

Current distance record is 181.7meters (596 feet) held by Nick Batsch.

Current speed record is 2.093 seconds held by Greg Windmiller

Also, remember that in 2005 Jay Moledzki set a performance record of 206 meters but was before the current weight rules were in effect.

So what do you guys think?

One of my teammates (Scott) has been doing a lot of "special projects" in regards to stuff like this. Here's a little video he just put together of his antics as of late. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KHNJJaDhD8

Justin Thornton and myself have integrated our canopy control course with Mile-Hi skydivings student program. Everyone out of AFF will now be going through this course.