It’s been over a year since my first “hump day jump” (7-9-08, #57) and I can certainly say they’ve turned into being one my favorite days at the dropzone. It seems there is a different group around and a different pace. It’s not about cranking out the jumps and turning the loads like on a busy weekend. Today was one of those days, slow and relaxing, only two jumps, but less is is sometimes certainly more.
As soon as I got to the DZ I could tell the day was a little more hectic than most, Franz was running manifest himself, and it seemed the phone was ringing off the hook. Rather than bug him to see the next load I could jump on, I just hung out for a moment, next up to the counter was a student looking for coach, good timing. We were quickly manifested and starting some ground training for his jump. Kent had a good jump and was able to get an adjusted fall rate & dock and a swoop and dock checked off his A card.
After that, Dale was putting together a small way with some of the newer jumpers around this year, I of course, was glad to jump into the mix!
The sad part about days like these? For me, I know they’re numbered.. my boys will be back to school in a few weeks, and I’ll be back to a weekend jumper 
Tags: Cat-G, coach, jump numbers, Skydive Tecumseh
Time for me to start catching up around here. The last few weeks have been a blur of jumps leading up to my recent 300th, but before I get ahead of myself, let me start with where the the story last left off…
The Inaugorial Jump for Diabetes at Canton Airsports in Ohio! I’d been looking forward to this weekend and a chance to really come down and get to know a new dropzone after having had a brief introduction a few weeks previous. And as expected, I came away with a lot of new skydiving friends that I’ll be looking forward to jumping with again. At first take Saturday morning, things weren’t looking to well. We had expected a Caravan to be flying loads by 10AM, so after waking up to get there bright and early, we were disappointed to hear the Caravan had been delayed due to maintenance and would not be arriving until 2PM.
So with 4 hours to spare, we had time to plan the best ever four-way dive. Then someone asked to join, so we planned the best ever five-way dive. Then someone asked to join… and yes, we went to a 6 way then 7 way, before finally settling on an 8 way before the plane finally arrived at almost 5PM!! The finally dive started with a BFR (Big Fucking Round) then with two going into a two way base, with four people sidebodied off the base, with two stingers on either side, next point the stingers come into the be the base, the satelites turn 90’s to sidebody the new base, and the old base backs out to be the next stingers! It’s a fun dive when it goes well, lucky for us that day it’s also fun when it doesn’t go well! Luckily that video I forgot to turn off so I didn’t upload it.. it’s one for the personal archieves!
Next was a three way cat fly-arounds with Ashley and Fuzzy. Log book entry says simply enough “Exit Good”. This shows why you need to keep positive pressure on a grip (don’t pull/hang on it) else when you let go of the grip, you’ll fly off backwards!
Next up was a fun two-way with Ashley, basically, the goal was just to play keep way, and no -- she never caught me 
Of course today, now wearing her booties for a few jumps, she seems to think she could catch me.. that will be a jump for another day!
The next morning started with a fun five-way with me, Ashley, and a few new guys we had met there, Dennis, John, & John. They each easily outnumbered me in jumps and experience, and I think both me and Ashley were able to learn a lot from the dives we did that day with them. In the first one, I know we had a dive plan, but Ashley was determined to come onto my side of the formation at exit, so the rest of us did a bit of improv to keep the rest of the jump going.. spider, round, open accordian… who says it has to be slot specific anyway!
After the previous success -- aww shit, I showed you the video, didn’t I? We decided to increase our odds by adding three more into the mix, enter Fuzzy, Dave, and Don. Now I won’t name names.. but found it rather funny (actually hilarious really) that the ONLY person that went low on this jump, was the 50 jump wonder who swore he needed five pounds of lead to keep up with us.. As an extra challenge to myself, as the group exits, you can hear my turn and give a two count before I followed.
Next we decided to downsize again and tried to be serious. Down to just Me, Ashley, Dennis, Fuzzy, John, & John. I think we did a lot better. The spider exit came off the door so well, I actually went low anticipating I’d have to catch up with a tumbling mess, but once I got back into the formation (on the second attempt -- first try I almost came up under the formation, I had to back out and come up a second time) we got a three way donut, each with a single whacker, then the donuts released and we flew each donut/whacker pair into the reverse with the previous whacker become part of the next donut (yes, I know this probably sounds really confusing for my non-skydiving audience -- more reason to come jump and learn!) then we got into a round before breakoff.
After that success (yes, we finally had a success!) we decided to debrief and try the same jump again, which once again, went off much better. The next exit didn’t go quite as smoothly, and by time the formation built I was on the wrong side of it, none the less, I think we had a good jump, and a good end to a great weekend of jumping.
This post would note be complete with out mentioning Rich Simenc. The Jump for Diabetes was of course hosted by Canton Airsports, but it was the brainchild of Rick -- he spent many months organizing and recruiting venders, supporters, donators; he sold raffle tickes, 50/50 tickets, and jumped his a** of (as he had many people donating on a “per jump” basis).
All in all, after the prizes were paid out, he was able to make close to a $5,000 donation to the American Diabetes Association. I salute your efforts Rick and as you know, I among many have already volunteered to both attent and assist in the 2nd Annual Jump for Diabetes next year -- just let us know when, where, and what you need us to do!
Tags: Boogie, Canton Airsports, Caravan
Well, the jumps have picked back up over the last few weeks, and trying to balance that with work and the kids at home has been tricky – much less trying to make sure I get everything documented here! But no excuses, after a few posts in rapid succession this weekend, I’m hoping to get as timely about blogging as I am about logging them!
Starting back two weeks ago I had a great day jumping at Tecumseh – as I’ve been jumping out of town a lot lately, I really appreiciate the days that I get to jump back at home. On a Wednesday, the weather was great, and the Otter was flying! As soon as I drove into the dropzone I saw people gearing up so I rushed out of the car to see what the call was.. 5 minutes! Sure, I could make that 
I jumped with Rob, whom although still on student status was just knocking off the last few jumps to 25, he already had his A license card filled out, so we just went up and did a simple dive, sidedock, round, sidedock, round.. he is still working on staying in control of his levels, but the jump went well with four points.
As soon as I got down on the ground Manifest pointed Ben, a fresh AFF grad student my way. After going over his log book we decided we would be doing a Category G dive. We had to wait for the gear he needed to be avaible, so while he waited, I jumped the next load to go up with Dale, Jon, and a few less experienced jumpers. It was a fun jump – one that pointed out that the amount of fun has nothing to do with the number of points.
Once back on the ground, I went through the ground prep with my student Ben and we got geared up for the next load. He did really well, completing both docks requiring an adjustment in fallrate, as well as one swoop and dock. Then at the bottom end of the dive, signaled breakoff right on queue and turned his 180 and had a great track away.
After landing I thought that would be the last jump of the day, but Dale was trying to get one last load up before sunset. It was about time I finally figured out what was going on with my camera, it had some how filled itself with just the canopy flight (not the freefall!) from the first jump, nothing else had been recorded! Anyway, with the days video’s lost I thought I would test out the picture mode on the GoPro for the last jump, we ended up doing a sunset six-way full of experienced jumpers – 4 points
A great way to end the day.
Tags: Cat-G, coach, GoPro, license, Skydive Tecumseh
After a long weekend home with my boys at home, it was real nice get out to the dropzone on Monday for a few jumps. The weather didn’t look very good in the morning, but after checking up on it throughout the day things seemed to improve at bit, though by early evening it looked like there would be full cloud cover. So in the early afternoon Ashley and I left for Skydive Tecumseh hoping to get a few jumps in during what we thought would a short window of good weather. Ends up the weather stayed nice the rest of the night, but can never hurt to be sure!
The first jump were some fly arounds with Glenn and Ashley, always a good and fun jump to practice fall rates. The second dive was a tracking dive with Ashely.
Tags: fly-arounds, tracking
Well, this should tell you how busy this week has been for me, I finally blogged last weekends jumps on Thursday and Wednesdays jumps today! And if you’re wondering how I had time to jump on Wednesday if I was so busy… well, good question, but it seems I can normally fit some freefall into my schedule.. I mean, it only takes 60 seconds to get a jump in, right?
The first jump was with Larry and Glenn, a classic three way Larry special skydive -- a circle into an open accordion, then breaking the grips, and rotating the pieces.. over and over..
On the previous jump Neil was on the plane doing his last student status skydive to jump his first pack job.. upon landing he earned his A license and was able to jump with us for his first licensed jump, his first jump with non-instructional staff, and his first four way… (haha, can we say BEER!) This was the first time I’d seen him jump and was really impressed with both of his docks. Also, watch his exit at about 12 seconds into the video, he had his legs out a bit too much which was causing him to roll forward and loose stability, but with some quick thinking on his part he grabbed his knees and tucked into a front flip and then came out of it right back into a dive.. very nice Neil -- but next time keep your feet on your ass when diving!
Not sure what happened to Glenn and Neil after the last dive, but it was down to me and Larry for the last dive of the night, we tried the same dive plan that me and Jon scored 29 points on a few weeks ago, and it went off well, not quite as many points, but still a great dive. The video cut out just before we got the 12th point, but as i recall we finished that cycle right before the end of the dive, would have been 15 points.
With that dive done, it’s put me at 275 skydives so far, so I’m starting to put some thought into where and what I want to do for my 300th skydive.. any ideas? Also, yes I’m aware there is an awful whistling sound in some of the video’s this week. The locking mechanism of my GoPro camera got a small crack in and I’m waiting for the company to send out a replacement part. Until I receive the part to fix it, when the wind catches it right… well, you can hear what happends..
Tags: 4-way, GoPro, license, Skydive Tecumseh