Jump #14
As to the fact that Midwest would be closed on Sunday & Monday for the holiday, I decided to drive up there right after work on Friday. Which in hindsight, driving through Detroit at rush hour is NOT fun… getting there was 10x more dangerous that whatever I could do one I got there!
Anyhow, by time I got up there and met up with Mike, my coach for the weekend, we walked through the jump on the ground. Â The jumps we would be doing were called “Swoop & Docks”, basically, he would have to dive out about 20 feet away, and 10 feet below, and I.d have to go to him and take grips (AKA dock on him). He said that this was one of the most important parts of the coaching because being able to safely approach a formation in the sky, without slamming into them, is very important…
On this jump, we had time to do four S&D’s, but each one I was trying to rush out so I keep doing them too hard & fast. The idea is that you push your legs straight out behind to give yourself forward movement, but then about 5-10 feet away, to put your legs back to a neutral position and just ‘coast’ into the dock.. But it’s tricky. Right when you come close to a person there is a column of air coming up around that person (and yourself). The two columns will repel each other… So the trick is, you have to put out the legs to build speed, then coast into the point where you hit the column of air, then legs back out to ‘push’ through and take grips… He said, with practice this looks very smooth… just like making a nice controlled stop at a stop sign.
Anyhow, it was a fun jump, but needed more practice… unfortunately we’d just make it on the second to last load, so when we landed the last load was already going up in the air… beer time! More jumps tomorrow.