Tandem-itis

People warned me about this. When I started flying tandems, pilots started telling stories about "someone" they knew who ended up never flying solo any more, or getting sick of flying, or...or....or a bunch of other worst-case scenarios because they were jealous that I was going to get paid to go play in the sky (at least that's my theory, ha ha).

My case of tandem-itis isn't too bad and is easily curable. It has to do with switching gears...let me explain for the non-pilots.

Paragliding wings are rated from beginner (big, fat stable wings that rarely collapse and practically fly themselves) to competition (skinny twitchy wings that have great performance but need constant attention in the air). Wings are now rated from A (beginner) through D (performance). Most tandem gliders, including mine, are rated "B", which means it's pretty stable but has good performance. My solo wing is a "C", which although is only one level higher is a noticeable difference. Also, the heavier you are on your wing the less it moves around, so on a tandem you tend to cut through most of the bumps in the air.

What this all means is that I'm so used to flying around on my stable tandem wing, heavily loaded and really only spending 10-30 minutes in the air, that yesterday when I went flying in slightly turbulent conditions on my lightly loaded intermediate wing...I got spooked. Not a lot, but more than I needed to be. Every little twitch & rustle concerned me and I couldn't figure out why. With over 100 flights this year you'd think I could just cruise through any conditions the weather gods threw at me, yet here I was whimpering at the smallest bumps.

After an hour of airtime I landed and contemplated on what just happened. My conclusion is that since I try to adapt to change fairly quickly I also tend to move on or 'forget' my actions in the past. For instance, after a day or 2 at the competition in Oregon, I got into cross-country flying mode & was staying up in rougher conditions than I would normally. When I came back & started flying tandems, I switched it off & went back into boating around looking for smooth air to keep my passengers from puking. But when trying to fly back in thermic conditions yesterday I was stuck in a tandem headspace and had lost that confidence so recently gained from flying in rougher air.

Knowledge is the first step I suppose. My goal is to be a well-rounded pilot, which means being able to glide effortlessly between tandems, solo, acro, cross-country...whatever the case may be. My transitions definitely need work, but at least now I know what I need to focus on. Today looks like a good opportunity - my friend may have a tandem for me and then after I can free-fly and as the wind is forecast to pick up later there may be a chance to practice some acro. Nothing like trying to fix everything at once!

Tandemonium

Tandem Launch
copyright - http://www.sarahbournephotography.com

Looking out the window at the rainy sky it's hard to believe that just last Saturday we flew 20 tandems in one day. We're supposed to fly 5 more today so I'm sitting here willing cloud base to rise higher than the mountain so we can have some fun in the sky and introduce more people to this amazing sport.

One of the most common questions people ask about tandems is about the take-off. "Don't your legs get all tangled up when you run off the mountain together?" Luckily for me, a new paragliding student has a partner who is an amazing photographer and she came along one day to snap some pics. The one at the top of this post is just fantastic and does a better job showing how it works than I can attempt to explain with all my hand gestures and lots jumping around. As you can see the passenger is in front, and as they start running the wing comes overhead and we run off in perfect harmony...ideally. The 'tangled legs' come in to play if the passenger stops running before we've left the ground, or even worse if they sit down (yes, it happens!). But as you can see from the photo, the take-off run is smooth and tangle-free...a perfect beginning to an amazing experience.

Life is pulling me in many directions right now, but the one constant in my life is flying. Paragliding offers so much - quiet meditation when you're alone on a smooth flight, sharing and teaching when taking someone with you, or a good mental workout when you're trying to figure out where all the lift is that day and trying to optimize your air time. You get the benefit of hanging out with friends before and after the flight, yet get alone time while soaring through the sky. As my own world is changing all around me, I'm grateful for the amazing gift of flight I've been offered and what it brings to me. I hope you all have something that creates the same kind of joy in your life.

Rat Race - Day Seven

I am EXHAUSTED! Usually paragliding competitions are held for 7 days and they only expect about 4 to be flyable due to weather. We flew every day (except that one windy day) and my flying endurance has been pushed to a new level. Wow.

Today was a cat's cradle course around the valley landing at a local winery so that retrieve would be easy for the last day. I had to spend a lot of time over at Rabies Ridge again, we had 3 points to hit over there and I flew out to land early about 4 times because of some nasty rough patches of air. But each time I left I would end up finding a really nice, gentle thermal that would take me up high and I'd go for one more turnpoint. On my last low save of the day my friend Vikram joined me and helped map the thermal that took us high enough to get to goal together. It was so much fun flying with a friend - we were hollering at each other as we flew into goal.

Overall standings: I was 4th woman out of 10 and 18th overall out of 77 in my wing category. I'm still a little overwhelmed I made goal 2 days in a row and 3 times total this whole week after coming here for years and never making it farther than about 15 km along the course. Hopefully I can retain all the skills & knowledge I received this week and keep flying well at home.

Rat Race - Day Six

I did it again....GOAL!!!

Today's task took us over to Donato's, a local pilot's home/Landing Zone that's been a personal goal of mine to reach one day as the locals always talk about flying over there. The course was 22km from cylinder-to-cylinder and I think I was the 11th one in out of the 22 who made it in. It was a pretty good day for points so I'm sitting in the top 20 overall right now and I think I'm second woman, which is a far cry from 2nd from the bottom where I usually end up.

One of the girl's on my team threw her reserve parachute today, right when it was my turn to launch. Someone called about the deployment over the radio and although her ride down looked great it was really unnerving to watch. She threw it in a spot that's known to be fairly rough (I've seen a couple of reserve rides there over the last few years) and she supposedly landed in the only good spot around on the back of the mountain. I felt better when I heard her voice on the radio saying she was fine, but later heard they were taking her in to get checked out. One of the guys in the Race also threw today, I saw him at HQ last night so he's fine but haven't heard how my girl is.

So today was full of mixed emotions - ecstatic to make goal again but sad since I was supposed to make it there with my team mate. I did get greeted when I landed at goal by 2 other good friends who made it there first and we couldn't stop hugging & giggling...it wouldn't be the same to make it to goal & not know anyone.


Alex and I beside ourselves (and each other!) at goal

Rat Race - Day Five

This one's for Veronica....the Dreaded Rabies Ridge got me again!

It was a tough day weather-wise with sharp-edged bullet thermals & no way to get high unless you had the cajones to cross to Burnt ridge low & scratch out of there. I never got high enough over launch to get to Burnt at a height that felt safe to me so I went on glide directly across the valley to Rabies with a couple of friends. We spread out to attack the ridge side-by-side so if one of us found lift the other two could also get saved, but we hit that invisible windshield right in front of it & slid down to the Hunter's landing zone. I found the 3 of us a little thermal over the LZ but the winds had picked up & the thermal just pushed us back towards Burnt low so we had to admit defeat. We weren't the only ones though, it ended up being a low-scoring day due to a lot of pilots bombing out & not many making goal (I think only 12 did).

The task was pretty exciting though - the "baby" Sprint group's task was 93km! It was a cat's cradle going to Mount Isabella behind Rabies Ridge, then back to the mountain behind launch, and then a pass over Burnt ridge. We were supposed to do the course twice then land at Longsword Vineyard, and the Race group had to do it 4 times so everyone was going to fly together. The cylinders around the Sprint's group were huge though (6 km around the 2 big mountains) so the course only ended up being around 30 km when you flew it cylinder to cylinder. We all got a big adrenaline spike looking at the task board in the morning though!

It was disappointing to not even get the first turnpoint today. There are a few of us who have made goal for the first time on different days this week and we're all pumped to do it again. With the weather and conditions switching every day you can really see who the best pilots are and it's fantastic getting to fly with the top guys. Both Nick Greece and Matt Beechinor flew their whole course plus did a tandem with local camera crews right before or after flying their races. That's a level of endurance beyond me right now, between the physical & mental workout of even trying to fly the task I can barely crawl to the keg at the end of the day!

Rat Race - Day Four

Not much to report today. The wind picked up progressively after the first group (Race) launched, and after most of the second group (Sprint) launched they cancelled the Sprint task. The Race continued for a while longer but was eventually stopped.

That's it. The winds are still blowing but are supposed to die off by tomorrow bringing those cooler temperatures & maybe some instability. Time to go put aloe on my sunburn...

Rat Race - Day Three

The TV crew interviewing the organizer of the Rat Race

It was forecast to be the hottest day of the year so far and I'm hoping that the weatherman is right and things will cool down a little. It hit at least 35 C according to one thermometer I saw. For flying here that translates into a high pressure day, which essentially puts a lid over the whole sky squishing the thermals down and compressing all pilots into a zone 1000 feet high over launch. Not a lot of room when there are over 80 of you in the air at once!

The film crew who caught me getting into goal were on launch today and right after the pilots meeting they came over to interview me. They asked some good questions and I think I answered about 80% of them fairly professionally. The other 20% of the time I was a total spazz so hopefully they edit it enough to keep me from looking like a complete dork, ha ha. It was kind of funny, every time I turned around on launch there they were - filming me hanging with the girls, setting up my gear, and then they followed me all the way through the launch line. Just before I took off the camera man ran to the edge to get footage of me taking off and flying over him. Luckily I had a good launch and climbed out pretty quickly.

Only 4 people made goal today and no, I wasn't one of them. It was hard flying - only 31 pilots out of 83 got beyond the 5 km minimum, and only 17 of them got into double digits for distance. It was challenging in a fun way though, I had a great crossing to Burnt, a few low saves & just missed the Rabies turn point. The guy in front of me who dove in to the cylinder ended up with the same points as me so that's a nice validation of my decision to not push in there low and potentially end up in a tree or outlanding on the ridge, which happened to about 5 people today.

Overall I'm doing pretty well, definitely my best results so far. I'm 5th out of 10 women (CJ is beating me by 1 point!) and 27 out of 83 over all. There are still 4 days of flying left, plenty of time to accumulate more knowledge and put it to use.


My view of the first turn point (Burnt Ridge). Lots of gliders below me still at this point!