| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Skydive Spaceland News, Events & Photos
Back to the Future: 100-Way Diamonds a Success! Skydive Spaceland hosted the Back to the Future 2008 100-way diamonds event April 17-20. The goals were to successfully build a 100-way opposing diamond and a 100-way facing diamond, neither of which have ever been completed. The event attracted 153 jumpers who participated in the 100-way formation event including the Alpha team, which was organized by Scott Latinis, Kirk Campbell and even Lee McMillian. The planning for this challenge began several years ago with the intent to take big way formation skydiving to next level. The Organizing Team & Captains consisted of BJ Worth, Tom Jenkins, Larry Henderson, Kate Cooper, Roger Ponce de Leon, and Jim Jenkins. Also Jim Alkek can't go without mention, as he was responsible for lots of the organizing and communicating between the team members prior to the event. Grounded by weather the first day of the event, the 100-way participants performed meticulous dirt dives and safety briefings. They focused on honing their techniques: Fly quickly to your slot, maintaining eye contact with the proper lines of the formation, stopping with no momentum, picking up the appropriate grips, and flying the full formation. As Kate Cooper stated, "you need to fly your booties off" on these dives.
The record for a completed facing diamond is 64, which was built in France approximately 10 years ago. The degree of difficulty increases tremendously with 50 people backing into their slot. The closest 100-way facing diamond was attempted on Sunday afternoon on the last skydive (we had to stop for weather). This formation was so close to completion. One jumper was low and a few jumpers were just about to finish off the formation, but then it was time to break off. Just as the captains were top shelf, so were the videographers. Andre Veselov (Russia), Willy Boeykens (Belgium), Dave Ryder (Dallas) and our very own Brett Thomas and Eric Boyd (Spaceland) did an amazing job documenting this event. Special thanks goes to Brett for his extra efforts and for taking care of the captains during special viewing. The event was an overall great success and addition to big way history. Thank you to all involved and especially the packers for no malfunctions! Note: A Spaceland visitor posted some photos of the breakoff, etc., on Flickr. Back to the Future Participant Statistics
FREE Skydiving Seminar May 10th: Introduction to Freeflying Presented by Stephen Boyd Jr. Whether you are a recent graduate or looking to learn outside your discipline, this seminar is for you! Learning to fly your body on all axes is truly total body flight. Topics will include multiple safety aspects, how to begin freeflying, and specific techniques that have taken this three-time national champion to the top. Join us after jumping on Saturday, May 10 for this valuable seminar! Brian Germain Canopy Courses in May Two courses have been scheduled:
Both courses will be the general canopy skills course and will be taught from The Parachute and its Pilot, which can be purchased at the Spaceland ProShop. The course is primarily classroom-based with an allowance for two jumps per day weather and time permitting. There is availability within each course, and the cost of the course is $230 per person plus jumps. Please contact Manifest to register. For more information on Brian Germain, please visit his website at www.bigairsportz.com. Parachutists over Phorty (POPS) Sequential Record Camp, May 16-18 They're back… POPS will be here doing 70 + ways and turning points. If you would like information about this event or considering becoming a POPS member, go to www.thepops.org or email Jim Alkek at jimalkek@yahoo.com. As the website states, "You don't quit skydiving because you get old, you get old because you quit skydiving!" As promised, TSL is alive and well in 2008. We are working hard to make sure that there are competitions for teams this season. It's imperative that RW teams be in the competitive environment prior to the National Competitions. This is what you need to do.
These registration prices stayed the same as from 2 years ago. You resister for the full season or if you are going to make just one meet, there is a price for that as well. Check out www.texasskydivingleague.org for more information regarding rules, handicaps, teams, etc. Full season registration must be done by May 15. The first meet will be May 31 (4-way). This meet will be held at Skydive Spaceland as well as the 5th meet (Championships). The locations of the other meets depend on how many teams register from that drop zone. As of now we have been communicating with Dallas and San Marcos as other host facilities. Once again, it all depends on how many teams resister from the potential host DZ. They might all be held at Spaceland. We promised TSL this year and we are going to have it. More meet dates:
People are really excited that TSL is taking place this season! Tell your friends and get your team registered.
The Lew Sanborn Accuracy Meet has done much for the sport of classic accuracy over the past 14 years and continues to do so today. The event is for all jumpers who aspire to compete against some of the world's best accuracy competitors, and competitors of all skill levels have an opportunity to showcase their accuracy skills in different divisions. Remember, this competition is open to all skydivers. There is a sport category that all canopies/skydivers can participate in. This event will benefit the Texas Children's Hospital and the American Cancer Society. The day prior to the event, many of the competitors and event staff will pay a visit to Texas Children's Hospital to visit with the young patients, answering questions about skydiving and passing out toys to the kids. Did I mention that Lew himself will be here? He holds the honor of having earned License D-1. D-1… over 50 years of continuous skydiving… one of the great pioneers of our sport. Come on out and meet Lew and have him sign your logbook. Load Organizing Every Second Weekend of the Month Spaceland has load organizing every second weekend of the month, all year long! If you would like to receive email updates regarding LOAD ORGANIZING @ SPACELAND, email leahblache@gmail.com. Skydiving Seminars Geared to the New Jumper The second Saturday of every month, we will be holding seminars at the end of jumping. These seminars will focus on newer jumpers, but everyone is welcome! If you have any requests or ideas for seminars, please contact instructor DJ Marvin: djmarvin@skydivespaceland.com. Congratulations to Brian Menard! Brian along with all our other 2008 first quarter graduates were entered into a drawing for 35% off a Mirage Container and Brian's name came up! Congratulations to all our first quarter graduates for all your hard work. Keep an eye out for our next newsletter to see what incentives we have for our next group of graduates. Want to jump this Tuesday? Get online and let people know you will be out. Some of you have seen our online forum, but many of you have not. This is a great way to get to know your fellow jumpers, catch up on event announcements, buy and sell gear, and see who's doing what. Many people look to come out to jump and aren't sure who will be there to jump with. Find out who will be out this weekend and plan some great skydives. And you can get $10 to full altitude -- to find out how, look on the forum. We will also be hiding a free jump there; be the first to find it and get a jump for free! Here are a couple of awards/records that you made possible here at Spaceland. I've probably mentioned these awards in the past but would like to share them with you again and say thanks to all who make Spaceland "Texas' Premier Skydiving Resort!"
You might have noticed in the past that we've gotten lots of spam activity on the forums. We've put some measures in place to control automated spambot activity, and so far they seem to be working out. Please feel free to visit the forums with much less concern for X-rated posting. :-) Need to save a few bucks? Manifest before 8 a.m. and get your jump for $10--our early bird special! (Experienced jumps only, not applicable to student training) FRIDAYS: DISCOUNTED FREEFLY COACH JUMPS WITH GOLD MEDALISTS SPACELAND ANOMALY Spaceland's own 3-time national champion freefly team, Spaceland Anomaly, is already working hard training for the 2008 Nationals. Want to get some training with these gold medal and world record holders? Each Friday, Anomaly will offer coach jumps for $35. You pay your slot, you pay us, and we go. No other fees! Don't miss out on a chance like this!!! Contact trent@spacelandanomaly.com for more information. Although we have upgraded our infrastructure, aircraft and facilities, Spaceland hasn't had an increase in jump ticket prices since 2002. Oil prices have gone up to over $100 per barrel and this affects our operations. Effective immediately, due to this increased cost of doing business including energy and fuel costs, we are raising all jump ticket prices. New jump tickets will be $22 to altitude and $12 for Hop and Pops. Team prices will also be affected. 4way is $79 per jump, 8way is $120 per jump and 16way is $270 per jump. All 4way exit camps will be $69 and 8way exit camps $101. An exit camp is considered anything 10,500 ft and below. When talking about rates, there is still one way to keep your jump prices a little lower. There will be a limited number of 100-jump packages available for $2,000. There are only 20 block packages available, so first come, first served. LOOKING FOR A FRIEND TO FLY WITH? Leah Blache' is in the process of compiling a database of new jumpers who are looking for weekend organizing and organized "mini-events" at Spaceland this season. Organizer Leah Blache is asking for those new jumpers who are interested in #1) organized weekend fun jumping or those interested in #2) connecting with others interested in forming rookie teams to contact her. She is also asking for the veteran jumpers to forward any names and contact info of new jumpers to her. Our goal is to make sure there is something exciting available at Spaceland for the new graduates, and those who may have recently moved to the area who are looking for a home DZ with new friends to jump with. Sound interesting? Contact Leah at: leahblache@gmail.com.
ARCHIVED NEWS, EVENTS, AND PHOTOS
At Skydive Spaceland,
we're continually improving our facilities to keep you
skydiving in luxury! |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Thirteen structured jumps were completed with each skydive having a specific objective to conquer the diamond challenges. The 100-way Opposing Diamond was completed on Saturday afternoon on the seventh skydive. The completion of this great challenge was a testament to the excellent talent of the big-way skydivers and the preparation of the Organizing Team. The 100 jumpers worked together by reading the status of the entire formation and adjusting their body positions subtly and correctly throughout the dive. Then it was onward to the next objective, the Facing Diamond.
