More supporters!

When I decided I was going to compete at the Canadian National Paragliding Championships this year I wasn't sure how I would be able to do that without going into a whole lot of debt or even if I could get the time off.  Things are all coming together now and looking back at the past month I'm in a bit of disbelief and a feeling a lot of gratitude.

First off the management at my part-time retail job has been incredibly supportive.  They understand that paragliding (instructing, tandems) is actual work and have been so accommodating to my flying schedule.  They gave me the week off to go to this competition even though it's getting close to one of our busiest times (back to school and our end-of-summer sales).

Then of course Skywalk came along with a new wing and the offer to join them as a Team Pilot.  I began thinking about approaching more sponsors and started drafting request letters.  During this process I kept in touch with Flyte Park, the company who produces the Microvario.  I happened to buy a Microvario earlier this year as it was the best-priced one on the market and was so impressed with the quality and the service that I asked if I could be a dealer for them through Jet Set Paragliding here in Western Canada.  The owner and I have been working together ever since and bouncing ideas off each other as we both grow our companies.  When he found out I would be competing at the Nationals and was looking for support he offered to be a sponsor!

It's great to have companies standing behind you that have products you believe in.  As mentioned in previous posts, the flying weather here has been less than stellar, and my Microvario works so well in the light and "scratchy" lift we've been experiencing.  It's helped me to stay up longer and thermal more efficiently, and as this video shows it's a great learning tool for my tandem passengers as it helps them learn about lift and sink:

Thank you Flyte Park for your support!

Sponsors!

I am excited to announce that I am now a sponsored pilot!

Recently I was asked by Skywalk Paragliding if I would consider being a Team Pilot and fly one of their wings in the Canadian Nationals.  Of course they wanted me to try the wing out first so asked what size (and colour) I would like to demo, and I was delighted when it arrived only a few days later from their offices in Germany.

I had to wait to try out "my" new Skywalk Cayenne 4 (EN-C)...the weather was not cooperating, and by the third day I couldn't wait any longer and took it to the park to do some ground handling.  It inflated like a dream, and after kiting for a little while I was even more impatient to fly it!  Finally we had some sun and I was able to sneak in a quick flight before running off to my part-time job.

My new Skywalk Cayenne 4 

I couldn't have asked for a better day.  As I stood on the take off, the wind was blowing perfectly straight up the launch, small clouds were starting to form and I was going to have the whole sky to myself.  3-2-1...the wing came up smoothly overhead and I ran into the sky.  A thermal was waiting in front of take-off and I turned in circles until I was looking down on launch, waving thanks to my driver.  Some clouds were forming to the east, so I flew under them and soon found my view getting hazy.  A step on my speed bar and I was soon out of the mist from the cloud, giddy over the instant bond I felt with the Cayenne 4!  Sadly I had to go land and head to work, but a perfect touchdown in the landing circle made it easier to bear :)

Between work and the weather, I squeezed in a few more flights over the week.  To represent a brand fairly I wanted to make sure I had a good feel for my wing.  Other pilots flying with me those days must have wondered what I was doing!  I was flying in and out of thermals, turning sharp then flat, and letting wing tips collapse just to see what happened.  It reacted so smoothly - no scary moments at all - and the feedback from the wing was easy to understand and use.  I loved every moment of it and wrote to Skywalk telling them I'd be happy to join their Team.

I may not be a hard-core "comp pilot" (not yet anyway!) but I think that's part of the philosophy of Skywalk.  Not everyone wants to be a competition level pilot - but everyone wants to have fun, be safe and enjoy their time in the sky.  That's one of the reasons that Skywalk and I are a good fit for each other and why I'm happy to help promote Skywalk in Canada.  Let the new adventure begin!

Inspiration

Inspiration is one of those things in life that is as wonderful to give as to receive.  It seems I've been surrounded by inspiration lately and would like to share some of these stories.

Our flying community is still a small one...you can show up anywhere there are pilots, announce that you are one of them and like magic you are instant friends.  This happens online too, and I now have flying friends around the world I haven't met in person (yet!).  One of these paragliding girls has been reading my blog and supporting my efforts to develop and grow my business.  She has impeccable timing, sending along a message that she "tweeted" about me or posted a link on Facebook just when I'm having a moment of self-doubt.  She recently wrote and said that through my blog postings I inspired her to follow her own big paragliding dream...to just go for it!  I can't even begin to tell you how amazing it felt to be the one inspiring someone, when I have so many people I look up to myself, including her.

I've also begun paragliding coaching, which is where I work with pilots who are newly signed off that would like some one-on-one lessons on developing their skills.  Unfortunately in our little flying community there tends to be animosity between the different instructors, and just like in high school people end up in little 'cliques' hanging out only with the school they learned with.  One reason I decided to coach signed off pilots is so I can help break that barrier and encourage everyone to fly together.  When I taught my first course on how competitions work, I was really happy to see pilots from different schools and surrounding cities too.  I had 3 pilots who learned from separate instructors approach me afterwards about coaching, and am working with one of them now.

This particular student's goals were to improve on a variety of skills and be able to fly confidently in the Canadian Nationals in August.  We've been working together for 4 or 5 sessions and last month he went to his first small competition...and finished second!  I was so excited when I heard about it, more excited than if I had won myself!  We had a session shortly after that and he met another of his goals (a small xc at our local site) and when I went to pick him up I was bursting with pride again.  I see why people get into instructing, and hope to keep doing it for a long time.

My list of people who inspire me grows daily, and through their support I feel I can accomplish anything!  I'm incredibly lucky that my boss at my part-time job totally supports me and calls me on rainy days if they need someone to cover a shift (she knows me so well already!).  I have mentors in my everyday life who have skills in sales, marketing and design who help me with the business side of things.

Each and every pilot has something they can teach others, no matter if it's their first flight or they have been flying for twenty years.  You all rock :)

Dream big!

It feels like forever since I've posted any flying pictures.  It also feels like I haven't flown in a very long time...although honestly it was just last week.  We've had so much rain and wind and general gloominess this spring that it still feels like the flying season hasn't really started.

But that means more time to work on my business (yay!).  Luckily I came in a "close second" when applying for the full-time position at my part-time retail job.  Looking at my finances I had decided a full-time job was necessary (especially with no tandem money coming in) so applied and was really hoping to get the position.  It went to a girl with more experience, and after getting over the ego deflation of coming in 2nd, things started looking brighter.  Especially when I flew 5 tandems the weekend after I found out.  Then I was flat-out *relieved* I didn't get the job.

Then my first order of t-shirts and varios came in!  I was so excited I took a bunch of pictures.  Here's everything sorted with invoices:

Excited how the t-shirts turned out:

I still have to take proper pictures of both sides of the shirts and also product shots of the Microvario in action for my website but like I said...it's been so yucky outside!

Even Bob misses paragliding

My mom lives about an hour away, so I drove in to see her and ended up visiting with 3 different friends who live in the area.  All of them were immensely supportive of what I'm doing and gave me great advice...so although I'm technically alone running my business there is such an amazing group of people surrounding me that I know I'll succeed.  It's hard sometimes to ask for help as I'm an only child who likes  doing things myself.  But you really can't do it alone!  I've met some fantastic new friends that I'm doing business with and it's wonderful being able to talk about our dreams of how we want our companies to grow.  Competition does exist in the paragliding world of course, just like anywhere else, but I'm lucky to have avoided that so far and just seen the other side, full of support and encouragement.  I think I'm going to like it here.

Business Woman Emerging...

Here I go! I've been flying tandems for a couple of years now, and last summer I was lucky enough to work full-time at a paragliding school and flew over 150 tandems for them. Since my certification I have also worked for myself and wondered where exactly my tandem and instructor licenses would take me. Teaching students from scratch hasn't been my first focus, although I do love teaching the basics at ground school (ground handling, etc). It's also quite an expensive option, as the instructor needs training gear (school gliders, harnesses, helmets, etc) and besides, my friends have a good school already with all the facilities.

So this year I decided to focus on training pilots who were already signed off with their "novice" rating, but were looking for more guidance and information. I was approached last summer by a couple of pilots about this option, and this year decided to go ahead and DO IT! I put a note up on my website and started working on my plan.

In the mean time, a newer pilot approached me with some questions about competing and suggested I put on a course for those like him who had no idea what it was all about. He offered up a meeting room at his worksite and voila! About a dozen pilots attended, were really supportive of my idea of continuing to teach classes and courses and a handful asked about the intermediate coaching program they saw on my website.

In his now-famous Standford graduation speech, Steve Jobs talked about looking back through your life and seeing how all the dots connected to get you where you are today. I'm having one of those moments now, and am excited and feel I'm on the right path, even if it is currently a little crooked as I weave through financial hurdles, outside jobs and logistics.

In addition to my coaching and tandems, I'm setting up a web shop so I can offer cool flying items - things I've been looking for but often have trouble finding. The first items I'm selling are my company T-shirt and the Microvario, an audio only vario that only weighs an ounce! I bought it so I wouldn't have to keep switching my gear between my solo and tandem wings and was really happy with it so asked Flyte Park if I could carry their product.

Here's the link to my website, and even though I don't have web design experience I'm pretty proud of it. I'm still working on the shop & figuring out shipping costs and all but if you want to order something please fill out the contact form there & let me know. My first orders are going in soon!

www.jetsetparagliding.com

Thanks so much for your support so far, I'm having a blast on this journey and hope you're all able to find that inner fire that pushes you to keep following your dreams,no matter how crazy they may seem to somebody else!

Making everything better

Life is constantly changing. Most of the time it's gradual...you get a haircut, start taking a night class, meet different people and then one day see a picture of yourself with your shiny new hair and shiny new friends and think, "Wow, things have really changed". But some moments change everything in an instant. My little flying community recently had one of those moments. There was a bad hang gliding accident on Saturday morning that shook us all. I am grateful I didn't witness it directly but just hearing what happened & imagining it still makes me feel sick to my stomach. And even though it involved a hang glider and not a paraglider we're still such a small tight-knit group that having something like this happen at my mountain makes this personal and even more devastating than hearing about it happening somewhere else. Luckily it's been raining every day since and looks like it will be for the rest of the week, so having to even think about flying right now isn't something we have to deal with. My heart is warmed by comments made by pilots new & experienced, talking about how we're going to look out for each other more and put aside differences like what flying school or club you may be affiliated with or what type of glider you fly. No one ever wants anything bad to happen to those they share the air with, whether a close friend or mere acquaintance. As each day passes, it's a little easier to look forward and concentrate on what we can do better instead of dwelling on the nightmare of this unfortunate accident. Each day it's a little easier to look forward to a new direction in paragliding...teaching and sharing more, and rebuilding our sport from the ground up. You could even say we have a chance to renovate our sport. As much as we pride ourselves on being "free flyers" and "free" of all the rules & regulations present in other forms of aviation, I think a lot of what we do is because "it's how it's always been done". And as for a lot of things in life, that doesn't always mean it's the best way. I'm terribly guilty of this myself, and coincidentally have been working on changing these beliefs in my personal life...changing things I've done a certain way without ever questioning them. So now I'm waiting for the time I can be excited about flying again, and will start to build a better paragliding (& hang gliding) sport along with my fellow feathered friends. Soon I will be excited once again to experience the thrill of sharing the joy I get from flying with excited passengers on tandems, and to share my knowledge with pilots looking to improve themselves. Paragliding has completely shaped my life as I know it - I'm who I am today because of it - and I don't want that to change. I believe life is about finding what makes you happy, and despite everything, paragliding is that thing for me. I hope to share it with others again soon and even bring a little more happiness into their lives.

Finding Direction

It's the beginning of April and I've only had 2 flights this year! I've missed a good day or two but mostly the weather just hasn't been playing nice, with high winds and then a big snowfall blocking the drive up to launch.

My blog has been also been quiet as I've been working a lot more outside the house so I can work less when tandem season starts. I should re-phrase that, I hope to be able to work less in my non-flying jobs when the sun shines. Flying tandems is so much fun that I forget it's a job most of the time! My business is also coming along nicely, recently I designed and taught a course for pilots called Introduction to Competitions since both the Hang Gliding and Paragliding Nationals are being held a couple of hours away from my main flying site this summer. A lot of pilots were interested in learning what exactly was involved in a competition, and a handful of them interested in becoming true competition pilots which is fantastic! I love seeing our competition scene grow. Canada needs to represent!

As for my own flying, a few things are still up in the air which will determine my path this upcoming season. I was really hoping to attend at least 2 FAI comps this year, but 2012 may have to be more about saving money, building a solid base and supporting others in realizing their flying dreams. As long as I can zoom around the sky on a sunny day, hopping from thermal to thermal I'm sure I'll make it. I'm not giving up yet though, life is definitely full of surprises!