During the event the DZ welcomed skydivers from the UK, Norway, Germany, France, Greece, Bulgaria, Holland, Italy and Poland.  The FS organising was taken care of by Marco Arrigo and Mike McNulty. The freeflyers were kept entertained by ToraTora’s Martijn Van Dam alongside Jim Harris and Dan Parker of The Bad Lieutenants VFS team. Locals Pablo Rua and Rob Krystofiak were on hand to look after the wing suit flyers.

The FF organising mostly consisted of head-up and tracking jumps, although for the more experienced flyers there was also the opportunity to get involved with some VFS, space ball jumps, tracing and pylon racing. A highlight was a sweet 15-way mixed head-up/head-down sunset load.

Everyone who attended the event had easy access to load organising. The mornings often starting with the lower experienced flyers in smaller groups, building to larger groups and more advanced skydives as the day progressed. With the smaller group sizes it offered everyone the chance to get really involved in the jumps, and for those that were not quite at that level we were also able to offer some 1-on-1 coaching during the boogie.

Martijn Van Dam sums up the event nicely:

“I really enjoyed the friendly atmosphere there, and the helpful staff. All has been done to provide the jumpers with as much jumps as they would like to make. The aircrafts are really fast and the extra altitude (15.000) ft is the cherry on the cake.

Certainly an event to put in your calendar 2012!” 

The pilots experience made it possible to spot the formation with such precision that all the flyers could land safely back on the Drop Zone. An incredible job done by the pilots taking into consideration that the aircraft formation was composed of two Twin Otters, a Beech 99, a Dornier and a Pilatus Porter running in at ground speeds of over 130 knots.

Overall it seems that everyone enjoyed and learned a lot from this freefly experience. A very high technical level was displayed by all participants. It is all very promising for the future … see you in 2013.

Babylon FreeFly

Excellent coaches and organising – with Mikey and Jim on the roster, we were already off to a flying start but add Mat Hill (Kristal), and Håvard Flaat (Skywalkers), and you begin to move into cherries-on-icing-on-cake territory. All these guys are not only great coaches and flyers, but they were all able to quickly understand the dynamic of the group they were working with, ensuring a great mix of challenge and fun was injected into each jump. At the end of each day, everyone was encouraged to congregate in the bar to see what cool stuff had made it to the day tape and Jim and Mikey also put on a few events at local restaurants, which promoted a good social element to the boogie.

The jumps and the jumpers – this was 100%, not-from-concentrate, no artificial additives, pure freefly goodness! Each morning started with the same formula – a choice to do head up, head down or tracking – but the organisers really pushed the boundaries with their groups. There were tracking pylon races (around a lead and rear tracker), space ball jumps, innovative head up transition jumps, steep tracing dives, vertical sequentials, massive two and three tube carveroos, two plane 24way tracking jumps – the list goes on. Every jump was lip smacking delicious, and my mind was blown at how they just seemed to get better and better as the boogie went on. Finally, it was a great bunch of people attending the event, and we all enjoyed jumping with old and new friends alike. Everyone in the groups I flew with came away beaming, having learnt loads and having a huge amount of fun doing so.

Dave Geffin

Volare ended the competition 12 points behind with an average of 11.8, Team VFS15 took the bronze medal position.

For more information, please visit: http://thebadlieutenants.com/

French team Kristal took gold with an average of 8.3 over the 7 rounds, close second came Norwegian team 42 freefly averaging 8.0 and the bronze medal went to the Tunnel Rats with an average of 7.5.

This won’t be the last we see of Kinetic in international competition, watch out!!

20 of Europe’s most accomplished freeflyers, including members of Babylon, Volare, The Bad Lieutenants, Skywalkers and Dark Side Freefly amongst others, came together at Skydive Spain in mid-September to take part in the second ever Euro-Sequentials event. The aim was to push the limits of head-up/head-down sequential formation freeflying. The flyers were split into 2 groups of 10, again led by Mike Carpenter and Fabian Raidel, with Rolf Kuratle and Andy Lovemore on video.

The jumps generally started with 2 or 3 head-down points which would place several flyers in out-facing slots, allowing them transition down to and in-facing head-up position, before continuing with mixed head-down/head-up formations. We also played with levels, moving lines over lines either parallel to each other or with a rotation. Mike and Fabian had come up with some great ideas which the group then helped to develop over the 4 days. The G92 Dornier allowed for many interesting exits to be attempted including a 10-way round, 9-way compressed accordion, 2 rounds (2 x 5-way) and 3 rounds (2 x 3-way and a 4-way) bringing the pieces together after exit. Only the 10-way round remains on the ‘to do’ list.

We did some really fantastic jumps, often not quite making to the last point which reflected the challenging nature of the skydives. The difficulty level was right up there, pushing each group to the limit, just as it should be.

Thanks to Lover for organising the event and Mike and Fabian for dealing so well with all the hot-shot freeflyers… see you next time!

For more information, please visit: http://www.eurosequentials.com

Jim and the Outbreak Freefly School is now back at Skydive Spain for the winter season after a great summer of travelling and jumping around Europe. If you want some top notch coaching and loading organising you know where to come!

For more information, please visit: http://www.skydivespain.com

The UK head down formation record attempts began with 3 days of warm up jumps organised by Adam Mattacola, Jim Harris and Martin Reynolds. Lots of people came along to brush up their skills and take the opportunity to do some great jumps, of course all had one eye on the bigways to come at the weekend. As people arrived we compiled a list of participants, watching it grow to as many as 40 by the time Friday night and the eve of the record attempts came along.

On Saturday morning we kicked off with a couple of jumps for the base group of 14 to build confidence before going larger. Happily they equalled the previous record within 10 seconds of exit and on their second dive were doing multiple points. Things were looking very good.

Our first record attempt was 24 using 2 G92 dorniers. Unfortunately this didn’t work out, with people getting lost and a few small equipment issues. We moved a few people around and went for it again. Still, not quite there. With the day getting on the need to put a new mark on the board became more pressing, so we went back to the drawing board and made a few minor changes to the formation, reducing the size from 24 to 22.

This attempt went beautifully from exit to break-off. We didn’t have much time to spare as Charlotte Kemp picked up the last grip to build the first 22-way head down formation ever built over the UK. With this we finished for the day, all looking forward to going for 28 the following morning.

Unfortunately the UK weather decided that 22 was enough for 2010 and Sunday was blown out all day. A real shame as with the talent that we had on the bench we would have definitely gone considerably bigger with a few more jumps…

Thanks to everyone who came along to take part in the event, especially to those guys that didn’t get a chance on the record, please come back next year… we need you all if we’re going to go BIG BIG BIG!

For more information, please visit: http://www.thebadlieutenants.com

Jim had the pleasure of being Cougar bait for the FF Nationals, teaming up with Jane Henderson and Karen Bain to take part in the B category. It was a great competition in which we battled it out for first spot with RAFSPA Lightening throughout the competition. They showed some fantastic flying and very controlled compulsories to take Gold by just 0.8. The Cougars put in an awesome performance with a minimum of training and showed great potential for the years to come.

I’m hoping to see some of these guys in the A category very soon!

http://www.skydivingchampionships.com/