pinkfairy

These people put the 100-way in your logbook: http://www.p3skydiving.com/info_BWC.php But to get started with jumping first: get warmed up in smaller jumps before you go do bigways. Just so you know you can consistently get out of a plane stable, track properly and control your canopy. I really, really recommend going to the tunnel to learn true no momentum docks, efficient, in place slowfall, and turns that doesn't make you sink through. Tracking is really, really important too, and this can only be practiced in the air. See what your track looks like compared to others: do you outtrack everyone, or do you go straight down? If your tracking is no good I recommend having someone coach you, this could be done on the ground, there are often just small adjustments that are required to turn a lousy track into a good one. Often you just need some tips on how to do it, and you'll work it out. A lot of people can get into a 100-way, but they can't get out safely, so they won't get invited. As someone mentioned here: Bigways costs money. They also costs commitment and time. There is a thread in the RW forum about how the P3 makes bigway too expensive, that the price per jump on the TSR is too high, but what I mentioned above is not controlled by that: Tunnel, 50 jumps so you get current again and coaching is going to be expensive no matter what, and is something you'd want to do if you wanted to get serious and competitive in any discipline. It really takes a lot to get cut from P3s 100-ways, but I have seen it happen, and the only reason was lack of currency. I have 44 100+ ways this year, with one completion. It gets expensive with all the travelling and all my vacation days are used on this, but it's so worth it. I can't imagine why anyone would use their time and money on anything else. Maybe I'll see you, then, Lars, on a big jump. If you live in Europe, check out bigways.eu. Great annual event that includes 100-ways, and intermediate and beginner's camps.

No, no, they are PERFECTLY safe. No, seriously, they are a lot of fun, and the visuals of a big dive is pretty amazing. You don't really get the real picture of what they look like if you've only see them on video, they are way cooler in 3D. And they aren't that scary really: There is a plan, and if everyone follows it and keep heads up and attentive, it is pretty safe. Good bigway breakoffs and canopy traffic is as beautiful as the completion, IMHO. But Perris is a great place to do RW. Both in big and small groups. There's organizing, and both local and visiting jumpers to jump with. I go there and don't even take out my freefly suit.

C-130J Super Hercules. Preferably a factory new one. Because you don't have to stay in them for long, the ramp is fun, fun fun to run off, and it's really cool to get off a plane that goes that fast: there is no hill, you hit the hard, hard slipstream and instantly fly. And they're piece of cake to float. Balloons are fun too, I had a great balloon jump in Perris this year, very good spot and a beautiful morning, with the sound of my body punching through the air.

Belly flying is still alive and kicking! It just depends on where you are and if there's an organizer at your DZ. It's more popular some places, less other places. And one thing hasn't changed: you have to make an effort to find people to jump with, it doesn't just happen by itself. I changed my home DZ to find a place where there were more belly jumpers. I got coaching and tunnel time to build skills so I could be on formations. So belly flying is still popular, now go make some jumps. Relax, you can die if you mess up, but it will probably not be by bullet. I'm a BIG, TOUGH BIGWAY FORMATION SKYDIVER! What are you?

I've seen the base been taken out, funneled out the door (yep, on 100-ways!), people in front of me dock so hard I had no chance of getting on the resulting wave, people dock so hard on me I felt it in my entire body, gotten ripped out of the formation when I was docked, had people fly below me, and none of that stuff has ever ruined my skydive. I've had some seriously good jumps where someone else messed up. If I screwed up really badly I say sorry and get tips on how to improve my flying from more experienced jumpers. Of course it depends on how serious the group is, but I always look for learning opportunities. I won't sit myself down, and what's the point of running away, no one will respect me for it. Don't be so hard on yourself: keep jumping and learn how to not go low. The only people who has never, ever gone low are seriously underweighted or over dressed. And if you never go low, you'll never know how fast you can go, and you'll never be on anything that builds really fast. And spend your money on jumping not buying beer for other people for something that's not covered by the beer rules.

I'm not a wingsuit expert with only 18 flights, but these are my recommendations: I disagree with "staying off your butt". Freeflying made me worry less about instability and feel more confident in the air in any body position, including wingsuit. Don't rush to buy the smallest, most elliptical canopy you can buy, it only limits what kind of jumps you can do, including wingsuit. I disagree with doing tracking dives as the best preparation, I think Wingsuiting is very different because you can fly so much longer. Get instruction in how to make a flightplan and fly it from someone experienced, or from a wingsuit instructor. I found that very helpful, and I didn't have a problem flying a good pattern even without a lot of tracking experience. Jump a lot! Be experienced and current when you do your first wingsuit flight. There are some procedures in wingsuiting that are different from normal skydives, and they are easier to remember when the "normal" part of the skydive has become second nature. Such as gear checks and canopy flight. I don't have a lot of wingsuit flights, but they were all nice and stable and trouble free. I never felt restricted in the suit or had any problems with my other gear because of it. I had instruction, and flew a Phoenix fly Prodigy as my first suit, and then a Tony Suit T-Bird (I LOVE that suit!). I did my first flight at 450 jumps, and I was very current. Wingsuiting is a lot of fun, but so is other skydiving disciplines. Try different things and see what you like. And quality coaching is definitely worth it. Have fun, be safe!

Congratulations! You look great on the picture, both of you.

This is a general label that is used for ram air parachutes. They all include things about "training and or experience is required to reduce the risk" and "This is a high performance parachute. Even normal use can cause serious injury or death. I see you have 500 jumps. You should get one immediately. I should too! No really, far too many get that canopy because they have enough jumps to jump it, not because they can max it out. Relax, you can die if you mess up, but it will probably not be by bullet. I'm a BIG, TOUGH BIGWAY FORMATION SKYDIVER! What are you?

I rather LIKE packing. I like touching and smelling the fabric, and I like my own openings. The only way of getting better at packing is doing it a lot. With practice, you'll get faster, and by getting faster, it will actually get easier, because the fabric will have less time to suck in air again. Keep doing it, and enjoy the nice feeling of a good opening from your own pack job. Relax, you can die if you mess up, but it will probably not be by bullet. I'm a BIG, TOUGH BIGWAY FORMATION SKYDIVER! What are you?

Wow, thank you! But this wasn't your 10k! Relax, you can die if you mess up, but it will probably not be by bullet. I'm a BIG, TOUGH BIGWAY FORMATION SKYDIVER! What are you?

It's normal to be more nerveous on your second jump because now you know what you are going to do. On the first one, it was kinda abstract, "Hey, I'm gonna jump out of a plane, but I'll be wearing a parachute, so it's OK!", now you're more like "I'm REALLY gonna fall out of a plane, gravity is gonna grab hold of me, and if I don't do what I'm supposed to, Im DEAD!" You know what it looks like and feels like, and it's unfamiliar and scary. It's up to you to decide if you want to keep doing this, but if you do, you'll get less nerveous and have more fun. On the ride to altitude on my AFF2, I was completely sure I was experiencing my last minutes in this world. But it got better. Relax, you can die if you mess up, but it will probably not be by bullet. I'm a BIG, TOUGH BIGWAY FORMATION SKYDIVER! What are you?

Stops the suit from sticking to you on warm days. I don't really know if it makes a big difference or not, because I like it when it's in the 100s, I'm covered in sweat and wearing full gear & weights on a 20 minutes call.

Tell ME how beautiful I look in my avatar! Duh, this should be OBVIOUS! Relax, you can die if you mess up, but it will probably not be by bullet. I'm a BIG, TOUGH BIGWAY FORMATION SKYDIVER! What are you?

Mark Brown Organizes at Skydive Perris, the "100-way factory", so he knows what he's talking about. Relax, you can die if you mess up, but it will probably not be by bullet. I'm a BIG, TOUGH BIGWAY FORMATION SKYDIVER! What are you?

There ya go!

Tricky one. Have you talked to your friendly, local system administrator? They set up the computer in the first place, so they will know the ins and outs of it. There will often be a local administrator account that you can use, and the people who set up the computer will know what that is.

I always have a look out the window and then at my wrist where I think my altimeter is, so I can determine the altitude of the cloudbase. I always liked flying, even on commercial flights. And I like the feeling of the jet taking off.

Yes, you are a 100 jump wonder, but the good news is that you can do something about that. It's completely wrong to assume that: 1. regulations KILL skydivers because underqualified jumpers choose to ignore them. 2. 100-jump wonders forget to put on their legstraps under the WS. But that's not a big problem compared to the fact that experienced jumpers forget their cheststraps all the time. I can understand that you're impatient to do everything you want, and that regulations can seem boring, but trust me, the regulations and recommendations are there for a reason. I'm not exceptionally talented, but did get better with experience. Everyone does. I jump with 100-jump wonders, and know what they are generally like. But they will get better in another 100 jumps if they keep current. ALL of them. So, Jump more. Complain less. Have fun. Pack for yourself and buy your beer.

http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=3442236 Man coming out of rig at because his legstraps weren't on under the WS. He had 100 jumps. The recommendations are there for a reason, Ws is an extra element that might make you forget other things. My first WS flight, done at 400 and something jumps wasn't scary at all. I was very current and had instruction, so I had a flight plan and knew the different routines for exiting and deploying. I had no stability issues, and could quickly take the pull altitude down from extremely high to what is normal for WS. This wasn't because I have talent, but because practice helps everyone. Don't worry, you'll get stupid and bad advice ALL THE TIME in this sport. Part of learning skydiving is finding out who gives good advice and who you shouldn't listen to. Jump and keep current, and you'll get there!

Hey! Aren't you the "barrel roll" guy? I had a PC hesitation on my RSL deployed reserve. No worries, because I was so high, but there would have been less chance of that happening if I had gone in and pulled that handle, as it gets rid of the burble by putting me in a less than perfect belly to earth position. And why NOT pull the handle? Relax, you can die if you mess up, but it will probably not be by bullet. I'm a BIG, TOUGH BIGWAY FORMATION SKYDIVER! What are you?

Hell, I'm happy to see anything over my head. I don't ever really notice the color. Makes me even dumber. For a main canopy, make sure what ever you jump has bright colors, contrasting stripes and/or other schemes that make you more visible. Solid black, gray, green, etc. are very dangerous choices. I'd avoid camo for the same reason. I ordered a really beautiful pattern with gold and red and red inside the gold. The first time I saw it, I was like "WOW! beautiful!", and gave it a name and everything. Now I don't see the color at all, it's kinda orange-y, but I don't look at the color, I just look up to see if it's square, there, have no broken lines dangling around and no people in it. It's very visible, though. Which is good. Neon yellow, gold, pink, any rainbow combinations, contrasting cells are all good choices. I used to own a black Sabre1. Good thing my jumpsuit was so brightly colored. And if I'd cut that one away over the forest at my then home DZ, it would have been a complete writeoff. Sure you can have a white canopy, but I think it's a really good idea to have some contrasting colored cells in it. White isn't a really bad color. Black, grey and navy are. Relax, you can die if you mess up, but it will probably not be by bullet. I'm a BIG, TOUGH BIGWAY FORMATION SKYDIVER! What are you?

The trick is getting the new people straight off AFF hooked by jumping with them. This seems to work at my home DZ and we've got a good population of up and coming RWers. If you go to a DZ away from home, I think you should look for somewhere that offers organizing. That helps. What about trying freefly? I did, and it's fun. See if you can find time and money to do some coached freefly jumps, it's worth it.

You'll get different advice from different people regarding body positions: The 4-way people will recommend mantis, it's a naturally faster position than box man, and it's also easier to turn, so it's great when you need to move around a lot, like on a 4-way jump. On bigger jumps, it's actually better to fly a box man. This might require more weights or a faster suit for the slow falling people, as it's slower naturally. It also doesn't turn so easily, which is an advantage on big jumps, which are 1-2 or 3 point skydives, it's more stable and helps you handle hard docks and less than perfect flying from the people around you better. The 4-way people may say that mantis is the only "correct" flying position, but this is not true. There's more than one way of doing it, so don't knock good ol' box. @Jaffo, yeah, it's completely possible for bigger guys to jump small women, as long as the dress code suggestions in this thread are followed. Relax, you can die if you mess up, but it will probably not be by bullet. I'm a BIG, TOUGH BIGWAY FORMATION SKYDIVER! What are you?

On a formation skydive, everyone needs to wear appropriate clothes/slowfallgear/weights to match the fallrate. This is part of formation skydiving, and is almost as important as flying skills. You learn it by trial and error, and you'll eventually land on something that you'll wear on most jumps, and then adjust if needed. Sure, you can fly fun jumps with no weight or clothes adjustments, but by doing that you really harm your chances of success, or even of the jumps being fun at all. I would say it's mainly the smaller person's problem, she needs to wear something more suitable so she can keep up with normal sized people. That means a weightbelt. Her natural fallrate is not going to be what is normal on 95% of the jumps she makes, most skydivers aren't her size. She can learn to compensate with body positions, but that way she'll only learn bad habits, such as the dreaded "Chicken wings". Everyone I've met who learned to fly underweighted has had to unlearn the bad habits afterwards. De-arching while the light person is trying to dock will allow them to stretch out their hand to pick up a grip while at the same time stretching out their legs to fly in, so that way it makes sense. It would work great in a 2-way, but I'm not sure if it would be effective when you're gripped in something bigger. You didn't say how big the formation was, but all formations with a big hole in the middle make fast bases. This would also make it harder for a very slow falling person to dock, but they are great for people dressed for or built for a more normal fallrate. I think it's just one of the things that can happen on mixed groups of fun jumpers, I don't think you could have done anything differently to make it work once you were in the air. It's also problematic to ask people to add weights directly, you can put them in a situation where they're suddenly afraid of how their canopies will land with that. People usually have to figure out if they need weights and how much themselves. I never tell anyone to add x amount of lead, but I might say that it looks to me like they're underweighted if it's really obvious that they are and it's a serious training jump.

I like a skydiving discipline that isn't so popular where I jump, so now I'm going to the US of A from Norway all by myself to do it. I like Bigway formation skydiving, and that apparently isn't everyone's cup of tea. Go follow your dream, you'll meet other people who will like skydiving when you go to a dropzone, and who will want to talk about skydiving with you. Everyone else will not be so interested. But it's about what YOU want to do, not about what impresses your friends, right? It's a very social sport, all the fun parts depend on finding someone to jump with, I think you'll have no problems finding skydiving friends.