BigBUG

1) loose weight. 2) anything that increases your flexibility, general stamina etc. You do not need big muscles to fly in the tunnel and you shouldn't rely much on your physical strenght to do it. 3) there shouldn't be 'long head up sessions'. As soon as you exhausted, there is no reason to continue and you are wasting your money. Good coach will switch to less energy-consuming exersices, while still developing your body awarness and better feet/lower legs/head control. For example, flying good back-belly and belly-back transitions, doing barrel rolls and flying low-speed headup carving will increase your head-up flying skills way more that just trying to sit-flying over and over again.

For student? Stupid instructor :) Seriously, let's define where student zone ends. If you are flying solo headdown with cartweels and take part in huckjams, are you still a student? If I am your coach, answer is yes. But I do not have 100% ability to spot you all the time, you should be flying, not panically holding my hand. If you are flying dynamic 4-way in a team training for world cup, are you a student? Probably not. So ok, here is my team and a 5 month of training - broken leg (foot), cracked ribs, broken fingers (mine :( ), couple of serious head hits. And we had at least 3 teams cancelling their White Night cup training because of injuries (for ex Inka mentioned above), and we are talking about World' best flyers. Could this happen to you while you are still a studet? Very unlikely. But bruises and 'net marks' at some points are guranteed.

I am so happy we are not in IFly system. From my point of view Dynamic (European) approach is much faster, better and more fun. 60 mins of back flying? I would probably die of boredom. I prefer to teach people to fly, to move, instead of teaching them to hold static position. You learning proper back/belly transitions, back carving and layouts almost from the start and it greately improves your back flying. Also I do not see a problem to allow student demonstrate his sit fly abilities. If he screw up - I will spot him, discussion closed, we are going back to basics. If not - great, let's just run through effective bailout positions on varrious speeds and move from there.

My teammate does not want to wait. https://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xpa1/t31.0-8/11200929_1602789546673227_1738577189575239552_o.jpg

Me or NWPaul are said contacts - we both are Flystation' instructors. I regulary organize camps, just finished one with skydivers from Benilux countries and some more are on the way for Brazil, Chilie and Singapore. You could PM me or find me on a Facebook, I will be happy to assist you. Let's not flood the tread :)

This is right and this is wrong. Do not orger baggy suit - right Body position matter - right Small and big ppl have the same fallrate in headup - wrong Big guy like me (90 kilos) _could_ fly on low speed. But it will be way more energy consuming and harder to learn, if we are talking about 'static' flying. Dynamic is different, there you could fly at really slow settings. So the answer is - tunnel should be able to provide _comfortable_ flying speed, which usually 10-15% more than 'lift-off' speed. And again, there is huge difference between tunnel and the sky. In the tunnel you apply force to fly, you need to fly at set speed. In the sky there is no 'set speed', you need to maintain position and then adjust fallrate to your buddies, thus you have a way broader fallrate range.

Aerotruba is pretty weak. Especially in the summer. If you are big guy, forget headdown and fast headup. If you stuck ultimately in Moscow, Letarium probably will be place to go. Otherwise, Flystation in Saint-Petrersburg offers lower rates and great 14-feet ISG tunnel with English-speaking coaches for all levels from belly to 4DW.

Not my tunnel, but this is my favorite tunnel video of the month. Australian instructors are awesome! https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=413437502159743

hey, let's do it a sticky one ;) Fellow instructors/flyers, I am sure you have lots of funny stuff we could share and make a little fun of ourselves - bloopers, funny screw-ups and some awesome moments! Let's post more of that here and share good vibes from tunnels around the world! Please state your tunnel with your submission. So, I start with recent Flystation pics :) 'when single facepalm is just not enough' https://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xpf1/t31.0-8/11010612_10206413627929450_4842538237877134914_o.jpg may be NSFW for some :) https://fbcdn-sphotos-d-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-xfa1/v/t1.0-9/524995_532886473402224_656477744_n.jpg?oh=6763765c6847b571eac580c782a29680&oe=5578A18D&__gda__=1437696307_c9649bb720e64f73298a3aa645a2b675 https://fbcdn-sphotos-f-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-xap1/v/t1.0-9/10647048_435469956607134_1077086317166526370_n.jpg?oh=9e4959e4ae55c7309eb61fd0368818dd&oe=55715CEA&__gda__=1438517814_a0768a4bfa6c2cf8ea1a83a248ba7162 I missed my training session with a team https://pp.vk.me/c624925/v624925384/177d/0XRDtfugh_k.jpg

dealing with russian bureaucracy, I'd encourange you to take care of this, acually :/ Just to be sure... just send us your passport details and we will make an invitations / vouchers for visa inquiry.

If I am correct that this is about 115 kg. No big deal for any modern tunnel. To do some advance flying, however, you'll need to think about losing some weight and definitely need to order a proper suit. Weight is not only limitation becasue of the power of the tunnel - modern tunnels could blast up to 300 kph. But this is a matter of safety. Instructor should be able to provide spots and support you. I am currently coaching a guy who is 120 kg and though I am not a small guy myself, this is a physical challenge and potential risk is way higher. Also, ity is really much harder to learn on a high speeds, so big guys usually progress slower. It's all vary, of course. We have a 140 kg guy flying good sit and learning to headdown, so nothing is impossible :) But I refuse to teach him layouts and dynamic staff :)

:) See you here! For everyone who is about to go! Please keep in mind that getting a visa now is takes longer that you are use to. We already received some information about some serious delays in visa issuing process, so please plan ahead. Sorry, but this is completely out of our control. From our side, we still offer any support we could.

And if you go this way, you also gain proper freefly leg awarness. Flying your lower parts of the leg is essential for a contermporary freefly and tunnel dynamic flying, carving, layouts etc.

/quietly sitting in the corner :) If you pm me I could give you a list of facebook contacts. Some were coached by me, some by Olga, some by Paul who answered above, some by Dmitry and Leo and other instructors - so I hope you could get a good impression. World-known coaches like Ramsy, Inka, Ty Baird, Martin and Fillip from Voss Vind and many others keeping to return here, so hopefully we are fulfilling their expectations about service level. I also would like to encourage guys ang girls who trained with me to share their opinions, are they good or negative - I know you are on this forum, people! :)

Thanks, interesting! That's why we add a bunch of additional temperature sensors and even a second cooling/conditioning system to initial design. I have potential access to infrared camera, will try to get it for a couple of days and go for a maintenance check. Might be interesting. Thanks for this useful idea!

it just hit 100 EUR :/ Yes, guys from Finland, Sweden, Norway, etc practically live here. Just finished a course with Venezuela and Brasilian students. Frenchies just left too. We couldn't book time for our D4W team because these damn Finns booked everything until X-mass! :) Actually we love visitors, seriously. And, BTW, there is no prime time now during weekdays. 20 000 RUR per hour 9-00 to 23-00, 18 000 for the rest of the night and morning.

Just to let you know, we here in Russia experience some real harsh issues with our national currency. But our loss could be your win - the tunnel time in Russian tunnels is extremely cheap right now for visitoirs! So, 1 hour of time in Flystation tunnel (14 feets, Saint-Petersburg) will cost you 18 000 RUR or ...tadam!... 340 USD for today's currency rate! Add a $100 for coaching per hour and you probably looking for cheapest big tunnel (German ISG machine) in the whole world. ANd, if you book 10 hours, you'll get one hor free, so it will be freaking 315 USD per hour. We will help you with the visa and logistics and if you want to stay at the tunnel, we have a motel right next to it. So follow VossVentus, AirWax, Inka Titto and Polte team from Finland and other great flyers and use benefits of the currency rate - as a Russian citizens we really hope that they will not stay like this for long! :)

It is very depending of what exactly you are flying. Generally as an instructor I would not reccomend to fly if your body is not working for 100%, but then no one will be flying at all, so I won't. There are two things you should consider - possible impact and static/dynamic load. If you flying something quite advanced, serious chances are that you'll hit the net or the wall. If you are trying to 'protect' your damaged limb, these chances significally increases (see Murphy's law :) ) Even without impacts, advanced flying could be very hard for legs, especially headup and dynamic. We have two instructors here who had problems with their knee - in the end one had to do a surgery and second guy won't fly for another 3-4 months. So, please be very careful. Do not rush, try to squeeze this brace under suit (or get a bigger one), plan short sessions and listen to your body. And let your coach know (actually remind him ofthen) about this problem.

And THAT makes me respect Canadians even more. http://www.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=478562&playlistId=1.2076951&binId=1.810401&playlistPageNum=1&binPageNum=1

This belongs here. http://i.imgur.com/CED4Mzd.jpg :)

yes, I've seen the device in FSB museum. :) it is neat, even had a nuclear power source. but I personally like 'Operation Jennifer' more, when US Navy recovered our DISSUB (at least part of it, hull broke during recovery). Brilliant engineering. And points for proper burial ceremony for found Soviet sailors. Sea chivalry at its best.

it works both ways :) one of our sub commandres got his golden star (top military decoration in Russia) for sneaking into San-Francisco harbour couple of years ago :) Both Russian and American submariners well respect each other. At least that's the impression I have, behing an underwater vehicle/robotics and commercial diving specialist. I deeply respect any seamen of any nation. Especially submariners.

and their progress is...? fear our mighty and invisible submarines! :)

My deepest condolenses to all Canadians. I have a lot of friends in Canada, stay strong! Here in Russia we have way to many memorials for Unknown Soldiers. It is really driving me mad that someone was f@cked enough to kill one of the guards who stands there to honor the fallen and to remind the living about the ultimate sacrifice. This should never be forgiven.

there is a train service between Moscow' Kurskyi Vokzal (Kurskiy Railway Station) and Kolomna. For 200-400 rubles (8-10 bucks) you will have a taxi ride to DZ from railway station. Also when you became more familiar with DZ, there always a bunch of ppl who will help you out and drive you back to Moscow. Also there is a bus service to Chekhov (where tunnel is) from subway station Akademica Yangela Street; and, if asked, they will stop right next to the tunnel. Getting back is a tricky (you do not want to cross crazy Russian highway where everyone drive 150 kph with a 'f@ck rules' attitude) so get some lift from locals is a best bet. Taxi is quite expensive. Get in touch with Freezone staff, they will help you out. New freefly world champions like Alex Ragulin or Valery Konnov are great coaches, btw :) If you are into RW, there are also a list of world-class ppl from Barkli, Black Cat etc.