When i started skydiving 20 years ago tunnels were only available for flat flyers, they didn;t have the power for freeflyers. I can remember the flat flyers complaining about paying an extra $1 to go from 12500 feet to 14000 feet. Jump prices then were $24 to 12500 feet $25 to 14000. The only way to get good at freeflying was to do lots and lots of jumps. With the tunnels now you can learn to freefly in hours. But tunnel time doesn;t count for canopy time and swooping is were its at for me.
redgy the amount of swoopers who picked up mini wings and got themselves into some serious **** and continue to affect the pg community negatively via site closures etc is pretty crazy not so bad here in aus but the storys i hear from abroad are crazy.
i was living with a pretty good base wingsuiter who after a month of getting his pg licence was takeing off in catabatic winds down a mountain. absolute hardcase crazy **** but he explained how you guys live in seconds not hours like us gliders. still, monkey see monkey do was hard flying with him having a fair few more years experience then him and having to reign myself in as he was taking off on fullsize glider in 25 knot gusts etc and im super conservative so i can see how a realatively new skydiver can pick up a speed wing with little knowledge on the meteorological nature of the launch seeing there mate go of and them thinking theyll just do the same and end up in ****.
ive been busy trying to lighten all my toys and was surpriseing to see a full size full strength 26m glider is pretty much same weight meter for meter of a 14m speed wing. the spruiking of all the lightweight alpine gear just doesnt seem to add up all that much. im starting to see the old saying that id just be better off skipping lunch for a few weeks then forking out another couple k$ for lightweight gear.
indoor flying tho is ticking that box just jam my flight suit into my helmet and another important on that is what to do when its raining/night
cant help but feel the whole IBA road to instructor level with all the stages is where 80% of the business actually lies. i thought kitesurfing was a bit money hungry and alltho ive managed to pay off and make more on every single doller ive ever spent on kiting i just feel like if i were to invest in the several years to become an iba examiner or trainer i just cant see how i would be making enough money teaching to pay for the cost of becomeing an instructor. level 1 sure but if you look at the requirements for the higher levels its something like 36 months + a further 24 months. i can see myself getting bored of grabbing grandpas dangley bits every other minute trying to stop him from headbutting his way into the darwin awards.
