SuperGirl

Z-Hill New Year !! 1. Greg (Crazy Russian) 2. Kallend 3. Andreea (SuperGirl) But of course I'm coming!! Xmas and New Year's, I'll be there. I have a "work from home" week in between the two, so I'll be in Z-Hills the whole time. I believe Purple is coming with some of his crew, I heard JSho might come, the Z-Flock locals are always there, and then there's the whole Finnish invasion going on... Love 'em, those twisted crazy finns :) I can't wait!

Purple Mike and his whole crew of wingsuiters is in the Houston area, you're lucky, you'll have quite a nice flock to play with. I believe they all jump at Spaceland nowadays. PM Purple Mike on here, he goes as Birdman_Mike

trying my damnest to make it there this year... so... there. very much interest from US team... but... fuck... the comp is months away! I haven't even gotten my plane tix for Jsho's vertical thing in January, nor have I confirmed Flock n Dock or Hawaii iet, let alone an event in August... trolls, fuckin trolls...

yea, good luck with that. Once upon a time (whoever has time can even dig up related threads, I know they're out there) I promised that if anyone makes me a transparent wingsuit, I will gladly test fly it naked. The only manufacturer that volunteered was Lurch, mentioning how it would potentially take a lot of very close measurements and whatnot... yet I have heard nothing of it since...

and much, much beyond... but yes, you generally have the right idea... Now that I'm single, Z-Hills for New Year is sounding like a really good idea. well then come on over!! book your tix before they get really *really* expensive, if they haven't already :) can't wait to fly with everyone!

and much, much beyond... but yes, you generally have the right idea...

Yes, head low, we experienced that issue. I have also experienced that whenever docking on Purple Mike's feet while he was on his back, only that in Mike's case backflying also meant easier communication with the base, and he would almost always yell "arch arch arch" as soon as we took the foot docks, until we could stabilize it better. this is the million dollar question we are trying to answer. since the stinger on my foot was only there for a brief period of time, I couldn't really tell you. We all suspect that once the stinger grabs both feet, the whole diamond should stabilize. But at this point what we need to do is try it some more. Like I said... Zhills xmas/new years boogie, anyone? Looks like the same team will be there, and hopefully we'll get a few good jumps in. Spot, you should join us. With Scotty flying stinger slot, you'd be great on video...

Since I received a few inquiries about it, here's the cool picture of the weekend for everyone... This is the almost completed diamond we managed to pull off at the zhills challenge. It didn't last long [that's what she said...] But it was wicked cool regardless. Sadly we got weathered out on Sunday and didn't do any more... oh well, next time. In any case, I for one am pretty stoked about how far along we've gotten on docked formations. Last year in Puerto Rico we were giggling just as much about the two simultaneous foot docks only lasting for a second, and here we are now, holding that double foot dock for long periods of time, nice and stable, flying smooth enough for someone to come in and half-complete that diamond... I say that's progress. And I can't wait to see even more progress. (winter holidays in zhills, anyone?) So... inspiration, food for thought, something else to bitch about on here other than politics, whatever you wanna call it, here it is. Photo (screengrab) by Simon Repton.

comp or not, we should have a bad ass enough group of flyers there to do some very cool docked formations. I, for one, am very excited at the possibilities. See you all there!

so... do it! come! attend!! take a day off, call in sick or something. it's way worth it.

Zhills always gets a good group of people around New Year's.

Really really excited for all these upcoming vertical events. This summer's 16-way vertical was definitely one of my favorite events of all time. Very much looking forward to the upcoming 25-, 36- and 49-ways.

01 - Scott Bland 02 - Macca 03 - Robert Pecnik 04 - Jarno Cordia 05 - DSE 06 - Tom van Dijck 07 - Butters 08 - Mike Miller (maybe) 09 - Skwrl 10 - Michal 11 - Kallend 12 - Ralph K 13 - Kyle 14 - Simon 15 - J-Sho 16- Jeremy Tyer 17 - Andreea (SuperGirl)

nice

I would also recommend either the Shadow or the Phantom2 from the Phoenix-Fly line. Likely you will enjoy the Shadow a lot, because it has aaalmost about the same performance as the Phantom2 (as Jarno also pointed out), but you don't need to even worry about grippers, which will probably add to your comfort level with it in the base environment (just my guess, I am not a base jumper, but I do have a lot of wingsuit skydives). Your profile says you're in Perris. Is that info accurate? If so, you could take a weekend to do a little trip to Elsinore and find DSE, and I'm sure he could help you out, show you a few suits, and perhaps also do a nice first flight refresher with you and feed you some more awesome knowledge. Anyway... welcome back! caw-caw...

great! sounds like you have the right idea. yaay! I just always want to make sure this stuff gets said, even if just or completion's sake... as new people come and read these forums all the time, and I'd hate to hear about some newbie hitting some tandem because they got the idea from dizzie.com have fun! hope to see you at a boogie sometime...

all good things to do, except the "buzz a tandem" part. guys, let's please not encourage new flyers to do that. it's dangerous, and it's a great liability concern... it's the kind of stuff that takes a bit of skill to accomplish properly and SAFELY for all parties involved... otherwise... yea, what he said. fly around, do flips, find another flyer, try to stay together, try to dock, then try to dock on the other side, try different exits, and have fun with it. if you can afford going to a wingsuit boogie, it is highly recommended. you'll be amazed how much you can learn from the good flyers in just a few jumps... and take a look at the PF proficiency card that DSE posted a while back... it'll give you some more ideas of things to work on.

Hell yea. been wanting to come way too many times. I believe Purple Mike is also coming with a lil flock from his dz. Scotty should be there to take pictures... who else, who else... man, looks like November is gonna be filled with FL events...

Good point. Let's assume the person learning could be anybody... once one views themselves as an instructor/coach, they really don't know what kind of first flight students they're going to get. Sometimes the very skilled and experienced skydivers can pull the craziest stuff on FFCs. There's no way to know in advance... you can guess... and most of the time you'll be right... but every once in a while you will get that student that just does something to freak you out. So it really shouldn't matter on the person learning. Most would be fine teaching the easy FFCs where the student flies so well you could dock on them... but there's no way to guarantee that.

Please don't feel so attacked... it's really not all about you... My concern is more with future wingsuiters' perception of what is an okay number... and I can think of a few examples where people with only a handful of jumps think it's no biggie to lend their suit to their buddy and show em a thing or two... Spreading awareness on what may go horribly wrong in such a scenario may be of benefit here. Notice that I didn't pick on any names of people or brands or instructional programs in my post. This goes beyond just this one recent example... yes, your thread happened to be a good reminder for this discussion, and I felt like others could benefit from keeping the discussion going rather than locking down the thread. That being said, I am more interested in the community's general opinion on the topic, than I am in dragging you through some crappy drama. Yes, people with 500+ jumps can do whatever they please. No BSR to prevent them. But general awareness of what's involved might help... Otherwise, my concern is with sub-500 jumpers who might feel like they're hot shit and want to attach an instructional label and number to themselves and start teaching other sub-500 jumpers after just a handful of wingsuit jumps, "because that other guy was doing it, hence it's okay". That's the type of reasoning that lead to people with fewer and fewer jumps doing FFCs back when there was no BSR to enforce it. The more people with sub-200 jumps were being taught to fly a wingsuit, the more people figured anyone's good to try... even at 107 jumps... and we know how well that went...

you shoulda asked... Careful, Mr. Master has a padlock just waiting to be used. Don't let this thread drift to far, or else. actually, I'm hoping one of the mods can clean up the boobie related bullshit out of this by tomorrow morning... I'm still very interested in people's thoughts on the initial topic, regardless of the first few off topic remarks that we always see here...

you shoulda asked...

not in this post, but come to a boogie i'm at and you might just happen to be on a load where I kindly ask the pilot for some extra altitude... cause I'm a good team player like that :D now back on topic. geez, people.

Sad to see the other thread about the cool new instructors getting locked. While I can see that it was drifting and was only meant to be a congratulatory thing (but then again, what thread doesn't drift in our awesome little dysfunctional family here, I surely have been guilty of throwing out the occasional unrelated boobie post more than once), I believe the topic that arose from it deserves some follow-up attention. So I'd like to ask... what does everyone feel is an okay number of wingsuit jumps for someone to start teaching others how to fly? And under what circumstances, if any, would you be willing to break that chosen jump number recommendation? Call me anal about this, but I see it as a safety concern. At 20-something wingsuit jumps, while you may be totally awesome and fly a solid slot (as I'm sure 100ish jump wonder FFCs resulting in fatalities also had mad flying skills), you simply haven't had enough experience with student/low time flyers. I'm talking about exposure to situations like a student diving hard and then popping big time right at you, in which case you could easily take out your student if you don't know what you're doing. It has a lot to do with knowing to SAFELY get close, without putting yourself or the student in danger, all the while anticipating the student's potentially erratic movements. You need to be proficient enough in your flying to not worry about what you’re doing, but to observe and report (the primary objectives of a USPA Coach), to provide relevant feedback/critique and suggest areas of improvement after the jump. Hell, it takes a whole bunch of jumps to even dial in any new suit, let alone explore the whole range of your flying to the point of being able to teach others about it. I'd appreciate hearing everyone's thoughts on this matter.