Hi there, everybody. Welcome to another episode of the Cloud Base Mayhem. I am hitting the road by the time you get this. I'm going to be doing a bunch of flying all over the Pacific Northwest, and then we'll eventually end up down at Applegate for what used to be the Wood Rat. I hope to see many of you there. We'll be taking the gear on the road, so got some fun talks lined up for that. But today, I've got a really cool show with you. He's now a third time on the podcast. A good friend of mine, Nik Hawks, who saw the Rockies Traverse a few years ago, got super inspired to fly. The last time we did the talk with him, he'd had about 10 hours. Now he's up to about 85. He's chasing it pretty hard, but he's recently had two pretty scary incidents, both of them hitting the deck and walking away.
Pretty lucky. He's kind of built like me, like a wombat, so I'm sure that's a good thing. I'm sure that helped. He's a super physical guy, but we talk about all kinds of things that I think you're going to dig. We've been getting a lot of requests from people who listen to the show to dig into more kind of the lower hours ones. This is really dedicated to kind of that zone called the intermediate syndrome, which is a huge zone. Most people never get out of it, but that kind of zone where you're overconfident and underskilled, and that's definitely where Nick is. He's doing everything right. In terms of training and ground handling and chasing mentors and learning, and he's really a sponge. He's really a student of the sport, but had these two incidences and had to deal with coming back and fear.
These are all things that any pilot will deal with at some point. I think regardless of where you are, whether you're a beginner or an expert, you're going to get a lot out of this. We go into a little bit of the controversy with ground handling. We get into how to approach people that are better than you are for advice. Mentors, I guess, call them. We talk about assessing your own skills, spirals and wing overs and Kleenex from a 360. Some of the stuff you heard in the last podcast with Fabian. Really important things there. Then he checked in with some of his friends who are really skilled athletes, both in paragliding and other sports, to find out what they saw in his incidences. He's really trying to delve into these and figure out what went wrong.
We do that as well. I think we learn a lot from these. There's no pain in these ones. Like I said, he walked away, so these aren't scary incidences. They're just things that happen when you're flying, and I think we can all learn from them. I think you're going to really dig it. As I've said in the last couple of shows, we've got this store now on the Cloudbase Man. We've got these really cool Patagonia shirts. My first round of shirts were under exceptional for sure, so we've got some new ones that are made by Patagonia. They print them and everything. They're super cool, really lightweight, nice fit. Check those out. There's another way to support the show. We've got men's and women's, and we've got these great hats by Annika Herden, fellow pilot. She makes these recaps. They're all out of recycled materials. Every single one's totally unique, so check those out. They're a ton of fun. Let's get into it.
I hope to see many of you at the Applegate as we get into summer here. The season is on. The weather's been terrible here in Sun Valley for the last couple of months, so I'm excited to get on the road and get some hours. I hope to see many of you. I hope to see many of you in the sky here shortly. Until then, enjoy this great talk with my good friend, Nik Hawks.
Nick, awesome to have you back on the show. I think you're the only person that's made three appearances. I really appreciate that. This was kind of an opportune time because, as you know, we just had the accident with Ben. I seem to be surrounded by accidents lately. It's kind of wigging me out. I know you've had a couple of really close calls. We're going to kind of dedicate this show to... Intermediate syndrome, but I think it's going to be relevant for everybody. I know it certainly is for me, and hopefully I'm beyond intermediate syndrome at this point, but why don't you walk me through... First, hello. Thanks for coming on, but also just walk me through these last two incidents you've had.
Sure. So we'll start with the perspective. When we first talked, gosh, two years ago, I was like a zero-hour pilot, and then we did one where I was kind of a 92-minute pilot. 10-hour pilot or something around there, and now I'm at about 85 hours. So still, you know, maybe just entering intermediate syndrome and just getting out of maybe being a novice, just to kind of get people an idea of where I am. So the first one was at Palomar a couple months ago. I was, I think it was a fly-in, and I took off. I was really excited, super stoked. The first probably mistake was really impatient, and I saw everybody kind of futzing around. On launch, at the time, I was, I don't know, maybe a 60-hour pilot, and I just said, kind of get out of my way and launched off first.
It happened to work out for me right away, and I thermaled up, and, you know, you can kind of look down when you do that and get it right. I think it is a really exciting feeling because you realize that you made the right call and you felt good, but still, it's a stupid move to be such a new pilot, and there's really good pilots on launch who are just being smarter and kind of taking their time and letting it all......acclimate to the site. But they saw me climb up, and then everybody started launching off, followed the spine back up to the top of the mountain, and without any planning or foresight, decided that that day was a good day to try cross country for the first time. So you can see all the kind of mistakes adding up pretty quickly. Had a buddy of mine in the air who's maybe 80 to 100 hours ahead of me, so much more experienced than me.
He came up to the top where I was kind of thermaling and dithering around, and he's like, Hey, dude, let's take off. Let's go down and fly a little XC. And I was totally psyched and nothing on his part, but I felt some peer pressure, like, oh, I got to keep up with this guy and make sure I'm progressing. Went down the ridge and kind of let him... He took off at one point, made a smart move, and I was just enjoying the view, and it was also new and different to me. Didn't see that I was drifting back behind the ridge. I was about 300 feet up and just kept going further and further back over the ridge. It was really... The upside is it was really beautiful, and it's cool to see up there, but got to the point where I hit some turbulence probably coming up from over the back, or sorry, coming up the slope of the ridge.
The wing collapsed, and then as you've noted in a couple other podcasts, I'm still so new that I don't have a great memory of what happened. Other than that, I kept trying to open it by doing these really huge flaps and almost stalls, and it was, you know, looking back on it when I'm sitting in the comfort of my own. It's the worst thing to do. I should have just put my hands up and let the wing sort itself out, which I'm sure it would have done, but I basically fought the thing the whole way down. I had plenty of time to throw my reserve. I thought about it and didn't. You know, you see, like, all these things stacking up. I have done a fair amount of static line parachute jumps in the military, so I had a sort of idea of how fast I was falling, and I felt like it was okay to hit the ground at that speed, but still, you know, by rights, I should have thrown the reserve.
Fought that thing the whole 300 feet down and then got... Really lucky when I landed. Landed on a really steep embankment up on, I think, S2 is the highway up in Palomar. That was a little bit sandy, so I landed about two feet up on that, hit the ground, banged my head pretty hard, but everything, you know, some scratches, some bruises, and a little bit of a limp, but the wing was totally fine. It landed in the road, which is a little bit scary if a car had been coming around. Pulled off the side of the road, balled it up, and hitchhiked back. I thought at the time it wouldn't affect me at all. You know, I'd heard about fear injuries. And then realized that over the next kind of month and a half after that, that I was really nervous in the air, and there was such thing as fear injuries. They were real, and they took some time to heal from.
Break down a fear injury.
I think you talked about this with Belcourt, but basically the idea is that, you know, just like if we break our leg or break our arm, we expect that it's going to take some time to heal, and we're going to have to give it a rest, and it's going to be in a cast, and we're going to do some physical rehab. And I'd heard the same thing with mental injuries. I'd never experienced anything like that, you know, that sensation of falling out of the sky and having no one there to help me, and even if they would have been, they couldn't have, because it's all on me as a pilot. And then hitting the ground, you know, seeing that come up and hit the ground was pretty scary, and it just informed my flying in a pretty negative way for a while after that. I think I flew again the next day and thought, like, oh, I'll just get back on the horse and shake it off. But I was really, really nervous.
I was nervous for a while, and it just took a lot of flying in both calm and, you know, steadily rougher conditions. So I spent time out at Torrey. I spent a lot of time ground handling and kind of getting reacquainted with the wing and just getting exposure to wear away that fear and get back down to the joy that I'd found before.
So time, exposure, that's a good one to me is exposure. One of the things that I notice with my flying is it kind of comes—fear comes in waves. And I'm always happy that it's around, because that's what keeps us alive. So it never totally freaks me out that I'm scared. But I find that, you know, if I'm rusty or, you know, even last year and then 2015 training for the X-Alps, I'd go through these periods where they usually would coincide with flying, you know, day after day in pretty sketchy conditions. You know, like when I'm over in the Alps and trying to learn the course and, you know, you're just trying to fly as much as you can. And you're flying.
You're flying
days that you would be in the X-Alps. You know, you're trying to mirror. So they're not necessarily very friendly days. They're not days that you typically go recreational flying. And I've really tried to figure out why sometimes it's just I have the bell cord bring it, you know, and then other times I'm thinking about the ground constantly, constantly checking my reserve. And I'm constantly like, you know, having these—playing out these terrible scenarios in my mind about, you know, what if, what if, what if. And I've learned. I've learned to not really shy away from those too much because I think it's, you know, I think it's a really good thing that we have fear. But I just find that it's interesting that it kind of comes and goes. And mine really build on hours. You know, if I'm flying a lot, that initial fear, like kind of beginning of the season fear fades and it goes away.
And then it's replaced by this feeling of getting it and gotten it. And I think that's what you're talking about with exposure.
Yeah. Yeah. I just realized after that. The first one, then I just had the second incident and it was this time coming back from that second one has seemed to be a little bit faster on the second incident. It wasn't as bad as the first, but just having been through that recently and knowing what it took to get through that. And we also, you and I have talked about this idea of the big four, which comes from performance psychology. So goal setting, self-talk, visualization, and arousal control. So using those four things, the goal setting, whether it's like, hey, I want to do this. I just want to have a flight where I'm having fun, or I just want to have a flight and just make sure I don't get hurt and kind of get through this first part of healing this fear injury. Self-talk, like, hey, I got this. That's something that you say all the time that I hear in my own mind, or I can do this, or I'm flying well or flying smoothly or whatever your words are that you say to yourself that are positive.
Visualization. So that's a great way to get a lot more exposure quickly and super safe. You can sit on your couch and visualize either the accident, what you could have done better the next time you see that. Or you can visualize that perfect flight. And so that gives you lots more exposure without having the actual risk of being in the air. And then arousal control. And I've used this one a ton. The idea of four, four, four, four. So a four-second inhale of breath, a four-second exhale, and doing that for four minutes is supposed to be the equivalent to eight minutes of sleep for your brain. And I've used that when I've been in the air and kind of taken either like a really strong climb that had me a little wigged out. Or a little collapse and just focusing on that breathing part. And that'll get me back into a good headspace and kind of ready to go again and bring it again.
I really liked Adele Honte's views on that too. You know, she uses these mantras, you know, in the air. So, you know, some kind of a scream or a shout or, you know, it could be something funny. It's just anything to kind of maybe take you out of the moment a little bit. You know, when you watch paragliding from the ground, you're like, wow, what a yawner sport. Totally, yeah. And I find those things. I've been using those as well. And I like the four-for-four. I think that that really helps. It's like a little meditation in the air. You just calm things down. I always know that I'm getting nervous when I start standing up in my seat. You know, when I start, you know, my shoulders come out of the back and I'm not relaxed. And I'm like, oh,
okay, time to breathe. Yeah. I teach that four-for-four constantly. I just did a bunch of stuff or a session with some Red Bull athletes yesterday. And they've got all kinds of kind of complicated. Complicated mental psychology stuff they've heard from the shrinks. But that is the easiest thing to remember. I mean, everybody can remember four seconds and breathing in and out. And it works, you know, 80 to 90 % as well as any of the more complex stuff. So it's just something really useful for all of us to have in our toolkit.
What were you doing when you kind of recognized? We'll jump to the second one here in a sec. But after the first incident, when you realized, like, wow, I've actually, you know, I'm not getting over this really that fast. What were you doing non-flying related to kind of help that? You mentioned visualization.
I was doing the visualization so that it's funny because I'd heard the podcast where you talk about doing kind of relaxing things. And I talked to Bill Belcourt when I was up in Salt Lake City last summer and asked him, like, how do you recover from a fear injury? He's like, oh, fly fishing and kind of taking other time. And I just, I didn't even think to do it. It's funny. We have so many solutions in our head. But unless they're top of mind, we don't use them. So I was just. I was just focusing on coming back from that first one with getting lots and lots of exposure and then lots of visualization and kind of trying to remember what it had looked like. And that was one of the kind of curious mysteries was that I'd had the crash. I was the only one there. I was the only observer. And I couldn't really remember what had happened with any great clarity.
So, yeah. So clearly, you know, that brings me back also to Adele's talk that you were obviously overwhelmed. You know, what was happening was way beyond your skill level. And maybe it sounds like, you know, very your classic intermediate syndrome is you're overconfident for the skills that you have, you know, so you were, you know, overconfident in launching first. Although, you know, I'm going to give you a break here. That's also how we learn. And, you know, I mean, this whole scenario obviously could have gone a different way and it wouldn't even be a scenario, you know. So that's the funny thing about flying is, you know, the one. Obviously, this wasn't one mistake. It was a whole bunch of them. But, you know, the biggest one was not throwing when you were 300 feet off the deck, you know, like, okay, wait a minute.
I don't have this. Yes, of course, you should have put your hands up and, you know, on the glider you were on. You know, you do that on the glider I fly, you'd be dead. But, you know, it was all these different incidents. But, you know, at the same time, you know, you don't really know to not take the line you did until you have more hours, you know. You know, to an experienced pilot, yeah, that's not a good line, but that's how we learn, you know. So it's one of these things where it's like, I mean, I've been really thinking about this a lot lately and that, you know, that there's just some things you can't avoid. And, you know, in your case, you know, you got this jar of coins and you take one of the luck ones out and you add one of the experience one. And it's where do we run out of the coins? That's what we never know.
Yeah. Yep. I mean, those things, those same thoughts have been running through my mind. And I totally agree. We've got to have these experiences. And the safest way to have them is to kind of set them up and manage them at an SIV. But, you know, I look at myself and SIVs are time and money. And I'm, you know, always short of one or the other. And so it's figuring out like, okay, I can get in probably one a year. And that means the rest of the year I've got to figure out how do I practice those skills and make sure that they stay sharp so that I'm not going out for, you know, six or nine rides a year and relying on that for the rest of the year. The other 98 % of my flying time. Yeah.
I've got more to say about that. But let's jump to your second incident.
Sure. So this one was, gosh, two weeks ago flying out at Blossom, going back and forth over the ridge. There's one other pilot in the air, one on the ground. And both of them saw this clearly. I went over a part that is kind of known to be a little bit thermic and bumpy. We call it thumper. It's the second of the two house thermals there. Took a 50 % collapse. Heading, gosh, north on the ridge. And the collapse was to the outside.
I'll tell you what I did do and then what I think I should. To the outside.
So the left side. You were going north, the left side of your wing. So it was spinning you away from the hill.
Yep. It spun me away from the hill. Okay. So what I did was I'd been flying a bunch and I thought I could kind of smoothly go with my wing and sort it out rather than wait the open side. So I went with it in this big turn away from the ridge and then came back towards the ridge. So I did this kind of 180. Almost 270 and then I realized, okay, I'm losing altitude pretty quickly. I had my hands up, which I'd learned the first time. And I think that's probably what saved my life more than anything else or saved me from huge injury. And I, even though I wasn't doing the right things fast enough, I was maintaining, I was much calmer than the first incident. So now I'm coming, I do the 270 back towards the ridge and then I start to wait that broken side. And by that time, almost the entire collapse had come out.
I didn't have enough time to turn. I had to turn back away from the ridge again and so I came in in this kind of skidding half turn with the wing kind of up on its side as I came into the ground and hit, you know, definitely not a light, beautiful landing, but, you know, also not a full PLF and just kind of skidded in and collapsed the wing down into a nice open spot and kind of got lucky again. But it happened really fast. The two pilots who saw it were way more shaken than I was at the time. They were both visibly shaking. Um, yeah. And that one was just like, dang it. I knew better. I knew I'd gone through the SIV. I knew to wait the open side and to pump out the broken side. Um, but what I'd done is had my hands up. And then when I was trying to pump out, instead of pumping out one side, I did both sides.
So it ended up working out okay as far as me not getting hurt, but it was another lesson. Like I won't do that again. And I'm glad I didn't get hurt learning that.
Yeah. And in some ways, you know, it always depends on the configuration and the cravat and where things are. But in some ways, you know, hands up while this time it worked out, it could have sent you in a pretty radical spiral, um, you know, without breaking that flying side. Um, so yeah, I mean, so that, I mean, this one's just rule of thumb and rule of thumb is so hard to do in an actual incident. And that's why SIV is so incredibly important. But, you know, if it's 50 % or less, even a little bit more than 50 % or less, you know, you can fly totally straight. That's, that's really. A non event, um, and on almost every wing. Now, if there's a big cravat and it's pulling a bunch of, you know, it's kind of like pulling a bunch of break on the non-flying side, then that, you know, can maybe be a little bit different, but, you know, for the most part, if it's, if it's not a monster whack, it's just a matter of weight shift and very carefully breaking the, the flying side.
So you can fly straight and sort it out. You know, um, if you're, if you're low and, uh, you know, then, then things change a little bit. We're pretty low, but it sounded like you could fly, you know, away from the hill and, and sort it out if you're on kind of a ridge soaring setting. But of course, you know, uh, plan B is just throw instantly and, you know, and, and take your, your ego takes a little bit of a hit, but you're okay. Um, but you know, the, the only time really you go with it is if it's really big and if it's really big, then that's the only way to get it out. Because if you don't, if you try to fly straight, you're going to spin it. And, uh. Uh, and, and wrap up. So if you, if you go with it, usually about seven to 70 around, it's going to pop, it'll pop out.
And, uh, you know, you can fly away, but again, that takes skill number one, but also recognizing it and immediately doing the right thing. Um, and that's, you know, typically I think people are, are, and I'm actually still learning this. I learned it a lot from farmer down in Valle this, this year at the, at the Menarca, but you know, when you're on glide, you know, the really good gliders. The, the folks, you know, doing really well between thermals are, it's, it's like kayaking, you know, you have to be incredibly loose in your lower body and just be moving with the wing and moving with the harness. And, you know, the tendency is to, oh, left side drops a little bit, then you lean back to the right, but that's the opposite of what you want to do for efficiency and for safety.
You know, you want to go with the wing and you want to go with those movements. Um, you'll end up hitting your brakes a lot less. You'll end up hitting the. Bees a lot less, you'll glide much better and you'll wait the wing correctly. So it's kind of the opposite of, you know, what the brain wants to do. Um, so just like kayaking, you really have to just be loose in the lower lips, you know, like a hula dancer kind of thing. And, uh, you know, so, but yeah, in this case, you know, for sure could have just flown straight and with a little bit of weight shift, especially on the wing, you fly a little bit of weight shift, a little bit of break kind of flown straight and then pop it out. And it's a, it's a non-event. So yeah, that one. That was lucky.
Yeah. Super lucky. I, there's a couple of points that came up first, the wing I fly because someone's going to ask is a gin Carrera plus, so it's a nice high B. Um, and then the second thing was, I, I think it's important for me, you know, me as a listener to your podcast, because I listened to all of them to realize that a lot of times you're talking to really advanced pilots and thinking and working on really advanced techniques. And so two things I'd been working on. A bunch, I think this was with Marco that you guys had talked about flying around without brakes on, and it wasn't the way it wasn't the stuff that you said. It was just me as a new pilot thinking like, okay, then I've got to fly around without brakes on and really work speed bar. And again, it sounds obvious sitting at my desk, not do that 75 feet above the deck, you know, off the Ridge, because at the time I was working really hard on kind of keep my hands up as much as I could and flying without breaks and really weight shifting.
And then the other part was, I, I think. I remembered you talking about going with those currents as you flew around and not so much fighting it. And I just had built that into my pattern. In an incorrect way. So what I should have been doing is kind of sitting on the brakes a little bit and having a much better feel, and also not had that idea of like, oh, I'm going to flow with all of these these patterns, even when I'm close to the ground. And so, I mean, a lot of this just being a new pilot and not knowing when you're you're incorporating something incorrectly or something. That's. for a different scenario or something that's more advanced than yeah really
really good point i wish i we had brought that up there you know miles talked about that a little bit when in his uh reserve incident down in valle you know like the you know what is scratching to some pilots versus other pilots and you know you know this this whole this whole concept of scratching and being low you know when trey had his accident here a couple years ago he put himself in a really dicey place pretty lee side super low trying to scratch you out because you know there's 13 pilots up super tall and it's probably the best day of the year so there's all this kind of peer pressure it's it's a good day he's kind of blown the move um and you know i it's he put himself where we all have put ourselves in one time or another and uh you know luckily most of the time that works out but i that that incident changed how i approach flying you know i i now i'm going okay i've blown the
plane i've blown the plane i've blown the plane i've blown the plane i've blown
it and uh this wasn't my day and you know and the reality is if he'd just gone out over the valley to land you know and given up that kind of dicey position he probably would have got a ripper out over the valley where he had plenty of room to work and and gone back up to base you know so uh you know no guarantee but again it's something we all do but you know that one time out of 50 you're going to pay the price or probably less than that even but yeah really good point you know i you know when i'm ridge soaring it's you see it in the accidents in places like tori you know i i think that the complacency factor of ridge soaring or pacifica or any of these places where you have super laminar air there is no easier places to fly in the world and yet you see accidents all the time and so you know what's going on well it's you know after a few minutes in the air it's oh i've done this a million times this is boring i'm gonna take some pictures and you know the the reality is you're low to the ground and uh you know you're you're you're you're you're you're you just have to be really sharp all the time and really paying attention to it whether you're you know it doesn't matter where you are you're low to the ground and that's a different scenario so yeah that's a really good point you know when you're low to the ground you need pressure and the brakes all the time just you know you just can't afford uh a collapse or a frontal or anything yep
so the last piece i've gotten this kind of first set of notes is is pattern recognition
came from my buddy chris about that but i i think this is what we're talking about is is recognizing these patterns and for us new pilots there's so much information coming in that we're just kind of figuring out what a pattern might look like and that goes so you know in the big picture it's like ridge soaring versus mountain flying and then in the smaller slightly more granular picture for pattern recognition i'm realizing that i just had no idea how sensitive i had to be able to feel the weight on both risers
and when i hear the more when i hear more experienced pilots talk about they'll say oh you'll feel it goes light and i you know it's just experience lots of experience is feeling like what is light and what is too light like what do i not need to pay attention to what's just the wake of a tandem that doesn't really matter and what is you know the wing collapse because i'm not flying around looking at my wing all the time um and and being able to feel like what's going on and translate that correctly is really important so that just that building up that pattern recognition
and that's it that's a really good segue into our next um and our next segment which is kind of self-assessment and again i i have to bring up adele's talk she i thought her her idea of you know getting you know writing out you know here here's 10 things about flying you know risk and mental attitude and all the you know everything that goes into making a really good pilot and you know getting off to your five you know pilot buddies and going hey where do i rank on these you know getting this kind of self-assessment but let's let's get into that like that um the self-assessment side um you you specifically talked about you know uh mechanical skills like wing overs weight shift maintaining a course spirals um building and exiting cleanly let's get into some of that sure
so these are things you know i think you
got to think about them with you know being able to see what's going on and what's going on and what's going on and what's going on and what's going on and what's going on and what's going on and what's going on and what's asking others to look at what you're doing and that's the point that i'm getting at now is is being you know constantly asking other guys like hey i'm going to do some wing overs can you watch them or i'm going to do these spirals and try and exit in a straight line can you watch this and tell me what i'm doing and i'd been doing a half-assed job of that before you know sort of digging for information but not really caring and thinking that my own assessment was enough so i think of let's see every time i fly that there's got to be for me a purpose or a mission to get better that day. So running up the hill, I think like, what am I going to do today with this day? And a lot of the times I'm still not experienced enough to know exactly what's going on in the air until I get into it.
So on days where it's really laminar flow or we get a glass off at Blossom, which is where I fly most of the time, I can do a little bit more as far as playing around with wing overs or spirals and clean exits, which I got from the last podcast, I think. I think, gosh, I forget his name. He was talking about, yeah, I can see 90 % of a pilot's skill on how cleanly he exits a 360. So I started incorporating that and like, okay, if I can do a hard 360 and then go out straight and super clean. And I realized, you know, when I tried the first one, like, oh man, I'm way off on this. But constantly looking at those two and then pitch stalls. So just going, you know, swinging back and forth and seeing how big you can make those swings. Those three things are the three activities that I'll do every time I have a little bit of clean air or a lot of altitude
in order to see like, hey, where am I and how comfortable am I? And just those weight shift, I call them wing overs, you probably wouldn't. They're not high enough. But that shifting side to side and really trying to feel that balance as we go through all three axes seems like it really helps if I get into bumpy air later on. It's like, oh, I've been in this position before and I can manage my way out of this and the stress is much lower.
Yeah. You know, we've heard about wing overs over and over again on the show. I was thinking about the other day because a friend of mine posted, you know, that he was working on wing overs and had some video and I, you know, tried to be very kind to say like, hey, those are turns, you know, those aren't wing overs. You're doing some weight shift and that kind of thing. And that's exactly what you need to do. Like, you know, I was giving him applause. That's totally it. You know, I mean, it's not a wing over unless you're upside down. But it's, you know, they're just a caution. To the listeners that they're really technical. They're very difficult to get right. And if you screw them up, they can go batshit on you really quick. So, you know, work up to it, take your time, have the height. But I like this idea of, you know,
of having four or five maneuvers. I would have stalls in there for sure. So spirals, you know, 360 clean exit circles, you know, real flat circle with, you know, it's like a, like a, thermaling type of circle, wing overs. And then acro stalls, which are, you know, not full stalls. They're a real quick stall and tail slide and then release. You know, I think these are just part of, down below we're going to get into, you know, what kind of skills do you need to have before you go XC? You know, that to me is your, that's the foundation. You know, you really need to be super comfortable at those. And, you know, in retrospect, like it always is, in hindsight, you know, with Ben's accident down in Nevada,
I said, I won't go into it again because I gave a long brief in the last podcast about what happened there and all the little things that led up to that accident because there's never one, it's not ever just one thing that happens. It's a bunch of stuff. But I, you know, one of the major ones there was that he was flying new gear that he hadn't stalled. And, you know, so he didn't know where the stall point was on that wing. That wing was way different than what he was, than the other wings he'd been flying. And, you know, I think that really impacted that day. You know, if he, you know, Jocky Sanderson way back 10 years ago in his performance flying, you know, one of the things he recommends is, and one of the things he does personally is as soon as he gets a new wing out of the bag, he goes and stalls it.
And, you know, like flies off the hill, gets some height and stalls it. And that just shakes all that out of there. You learn so much about the wing and about you. And so it's, you know, it's a way to get this kind of self-assessment because you're right. Sometimes you don't have enough people around, like here in Sun Valley, we don't have enough people around to do much assessments because there's not that many pilots. But, you know, I think that it's a very important thing that I've been personally lately really encouraged to do that because it's, you know, it knocks down that ego a little bit and it makes us realize that, you know, we maybe not, we aren't as good as we think we are.
I
guess the part that I get is I remember hearing about stalls over and over in the podcast and thinking like, oh, I'm going to do them. Then I went to the SIV, did, I don't know, two or three of them, maybe four, whatever. Not enough to know them, but just to be exposed to them. And since then, I don't feel like I've had enough altitude to practice them. So as an 85-hour pilot, I think you got a lot of people like me who are in, you know, somewhere between 50 and probably 200 miles
an hour.
And I know a lot of the guys I fly with have way more time than me. And they're kind of, I don't want to speak for them, but they seem to me to be uniformly against stalls. And it may just be because most of the time at, say, Blossom, we're not getting, you know, high enough where you say you're a thousand meters over and you've got the altitude to practice. And that seems like a totally legit reason to not try them. But for, you know, and of course, folks flying Torrey, you've got, it's 300 feet, so that's probably not appropriate either for the new guys. So it's really thinking about the advice, you know, that comes through here and where to do that and where to practice that. And I remember hearing, I think you talked about Jockey
stalling a wing immediately before. And I think that's really good advice for, let's say, a thousand-hour pilot who is totally dialed in. Like, that's not a big deal. Like, that helps them understand the wing. But for me, there's no, no, there's no effing way that I'm going to take a wing out of the bag and stall it. So just thinking about, like, where this advice comes in and the context of the pilot. And from, you know, what I think about that is, okay, the next SIV I do is going to be this heavy focus on spins and stalls.
Yeah, great, great points. So first with Jockey, you know, that was definitely geared towards, you know, ENV pilots and people who are learning. And I think the advice that he gave, you know, all those years ago and that DVD, it would be the same as today. So yes, I'm pushing hard for people to basically learn their wing and learn spin point and learn all the things that you learn from doing stalls. That said, you know, where you fly, that doesn't sound appropriate to do that at all. You know, your first stalls have to be with an instructor, have to be with somebody in your ear, coaching you out and have to be, you know, have to be over the water. Absolutely, for sure.
And, you know, until you get, you know, not to Theo LeBlix level where he's doing everything over the dirt, you know, until you get to where they're really a non-event, you don't want to do them over the dirt. And that takes a lot of time and a lot of money. Like you've said, if you're doing toes and stuff over the water, we like, we don't have a lot of gondolas over lakes here in the States. So it's not like, you know, you can go to Europe and just do it with laps. But what I think is important to distill here is that if you don't have that, you know, your self-assessment should just automatically be, I need to be really careful if I'm going XC because, you know, XC is just going to put you into bad places.
It just, it's automatic. And, you know, you will fly in rotor, you will be in the lee, you will find yourself, and too much wind, you will push it too far someday in a gust front, you know, you're going to make mistakes. And that's how we learn. And, you know, if you don't have, you know, really rapid descent techniques, like if you can't properly spiral a glider, if you can't get down fast, you're going to be in some serious trouble. And, and if you're flying in rotor and in lee, if you don't have a really solid tail slide and, and, you know, really solid flyback, and, and then release, you know, when you're at the right time, you don't have a reset. So you don't have a way of good way, a fast way to clear cravats.
So, you know, big cravat, you end up in a, you know, really bad spiral. You might pass out before you get to your reserve. So these are just the realities of the sport. And so people that, you know, a very, very good friend of mine, Nate Scales, who is an amazing pilot, you know, hasn't done more than a hand, full of stalls and 30 years of flying. So can you get by without doing them? Absolutely. The difference there is, is I don't ever see Nate lose his wing. He lost it a few years ago on a 12 meter day here in Sun Valley and had to throw his reserve. You know, he broke a bunch of a lines, you know, pretty scary incident. Yeah. There was a reserve and it was a non, non event. But, you know, this is another kind of self-assessment thing.
And I'm glad we're talking about self-assessment. If you're, if you're having frontals, if you're having collapses, you're not flying very well. And, and so you're on too hot of a wing or you're just not on it. And my, my best example of that, you know, like I, I just, you know, I have found in the last few years, I don't, I very, very rarely ever have anything happen with my wing, even when it's really, really rough. The exception to that was when I came back from the first X-Alps, you know, we had these just day after day after day after day after day after day of amazing conditions here. And Nate had his intermountain wide open thing going on. I was flying my X-Alps wing, which I had just put in the ocean in Monaco right before then. So it was probably way out of tune.
And I was having massive blowups every day because I was exhausted and I could tell that I was like a half a second, quarter second, whatever, just too much of a second behind everything. And so this is where that whole like self-assessment thing is super important. You know, like, Hey, I just don't, I don't have this today. And the thing that Ben's accident really woke me up to is that it just, you know, and I've been saying this, but it hasn't really sunk in for years is it only takes one time, you know, like your two incidents that you had, obviously they could have gone totally differently and that's the end of your flying career or something worse. And so, you know, I think all these things, you know, but especially self-assessment is super important.
So let's finish up with one more piece of self-assessment on it and then give a recommendation. The last piece that I've got for kind of thinking about where I am and where I feel like in my progression is where I'm comfortable flying, right? So if I'm comfortable flying at Torrey, that's great. Torrey has been super useful for me to come back from these fear injuries and also to kind of take a day off without being complacent, but really to go there and say like, okay, I can really relax here and remember what I did. What it is to enjoy a flight and go back and forth and, you know, cruise out over the water and do a couple of spirals or little turns, you know, and come back in and get a lot of practice in at one time. But knowing also that I can be really comfortable at Torrey and then going out and sight flying a ridge
or soaring sight like Blossom and maybe be not so comfortable. And those are two different things and two different levels of competence. And then going out to, you know, from there, like, okay, a glass off there is, you know, another level of like, okay, I feel pretty good. I feel pretty good out here versus being in the mountains in the early afternoon right now when it is pretty bumpy and disorganized. And if I can be comfortable there, like, okay, that just kind of knowing where you can be comfortable can really help you self-assess clearly. So you don't think that you're really good because you've been flying a really smooth, a really smooth wind sight for a while. Does that make sense? Yeah.
Yeah. I mean, I, and again, this kind of comes back to learning, you know, right? I think Nick Greece had a, had a pretty scary incident here a bunch of years ago and it really freaked him out, you know, really bad fear injury. He walked away, he was fine. But, you know, he had to do a whole bunch of things. One, leave, you know, he wasn't comfortable flying some valley. He had to step way down on a wing. He went from a comp wing down to a high end B. He had to, like you said, go back and find the fun in it. And I, I think there's a real danger in our sport. For, you know, as you get better, you start, you just keep setting this bar differently. Um, farther, higher, better, uh, you know, you start worrying about X contest scores and stuff.
And, um, you know, and I think what Fabian said is just so valuable is that, you know, it's number one has to be fun. And, and so you have to find a way. And I think that's different for everybody. I think with your military training and your background and your, you know, your, um, emphasis on excellence and training that, you know, your, your way back to fun is probably going to be through the training, you know, is, is going to be through the, okay, I've, I've, I've split apart this, this puzzle here a little bit and I got to put it back together and, and that's part of the fun.
Yeah, yeah, totally.
And, and I think that that comfort thing too is, let me get back to your, your original point, you know, flying a place that's comfortable or finding comfort, comfort in flying. Um, is really, really important, you know, that I, I, I've been realizing lately, we've had, you know, two months of just horrific weather, you know, just no real, no XC potential. It's overdeveloping every day. Um, you know, it's really easy to, easy to get down about that, but at the same time, it's providing all these opportunities to, you know, do these little mini hike and flies and fly between the storms and do some ground handling. And I've been flying this single surface wing a lot, which is totally different. So weird and, uh, and a lot of fun. And, you know, and I think that that's, you know, as, if, as long as we look at all that as building skills, then, you know, it doesn't matter that you're not getting the 200 K every day, you're, you're, you're doing these little things that are, you know, that remind us of how special this is.
That's what we have to do is just constantly be landing going, this is really special because
it is. Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's an amazing thing for sure. So the self-assessment piece kind of fishing, finishing it off. I think, um, I liked Adil. Adil's a recommendation, ask other people, but if you're like listening to this right now and thinking, what can I do is the next time you land, pull out your log book and write down, what did I do? Right? What did I do wrong? Where do I need to improve and answer the questions, take the time and do it. It'll, you know, may take you half an hour. Um, but that's, that's the way to self-assess is, is to actually sit down and do it and not just half-ass it on the way up the Hill or think to yourself like, ah, this guy, Nick's an idiot. I really know what I'm doing because that's exactly what I thought. As well.
Yeah. You, and you even, I, I pointed that out. We had a good laugh about that when you said, you know, your, your initial assessment of the first incident was, was that, you know, you know, I, I thought I had this and, and I was like, you know, we never have this, not, not you, not me, not anybody, not even Chrigel, you know, it's just, it's just this constant state of learning. And so I think if we get to that kind of complacency level, we're like, yeah, I'm feeling pretty good about where I am and things that's probably dangerous. You know, that's probably a time. It's a time to reflect and move back on it. Um, let's talk about mentors real briefly in that whole scenario as well. You know, pretty much most sites in the world you go, there's going to be someone better than you are. Um, and it's just part of the sport. I have never run across anybody who's not willing to share and is not willing to, you know, when I was kind of first coming up when I first moved to sun Valley, um, you know, I was getting a lot of pretty, not so subtle hints from Nate and from farmer, from greasy.
Yeah. And he was here, you know, that I was pushing way too hard and I was just excited. I was with these guys and they were way better than me and I was in sun Valley and, and, uh, you know, and they were, you know, they were luckily willing to share, but also I, I I'd like to think I was willing, I was willing to listen, but that has quieted down in the last few years because I've gotten better and, uh, and they're probably like, oh, well, he, you know, he's, he's doing his own self-assessment, but I'm trying to be really mindful to, Hey. Hey guys, you know, what am I doing? Right. And what am I doing wrong? And how could I be better? And I think that you just need to keep that as part of your repertoire. And, and I think that, um, don't be shy to all the new pilots out there.
You know, we've all the, the, the guys that, and gals that you look up to that are, that have tons of hours and been doing a long time. They owe it to you. They owe it to the community to, um, share that knowledge. So don't be shy. They absolutely will. You know, that I have, I've had. Some of the guys like Russ Ogden and, um, jockey, these guys that were, you know, used to be team pilots for the British team. That's actually like code for the British team. You know, they, if they're at a world cup and getting ready to launch and some new pilot comes up and ask them about something, they have to stop and answer the question. That's just what they, you know, they'll, they'll be late to their start. They'll, you know, they'll screw up their sequence just to help them out and help that pilot out. So don't be shy. We, we love it. You know, the, the opposite is.
Actually scary to the mentors, you know, when you see, you know, a Nick Cox bust through the, the, uh, you know, in that first incident you had, you know, bust through everybody and take off, that makes us kind of nervous. And, uh, you know, we, we, in some ways, you know, I'm proud of you for doing that because again, that's how you learn and you're confident and confidence is everything. Um, but it's, you know, don't be shy about asking people that are better than you are because I've never met anybody. I mean, this podcast is proof of it. I have no one. It's ever said, no.
Yep, totally. So just to be specific with, um, with how to do that as a new pilot, cause some people may not have the conversation skills or, or not think about this is when I get up on launch, there's almost always someone else there. Cause you know, we can all see the conditions in San Diego. It's pretty easy to get around is I'll ask the guys there. Uh, what do you see? What do you think about conditions? And then have you seen these conditions before and what happened? Yeah. And they're, they're kind of used to it now where they're like, Oh, here comes Nick running up the hill. He's going to, I'm sure he's going to ask me his fucking questions. Um, and I'm just like, Hey, these guys have years of experience. Some of them been flying 30 years. And if I ask them what they see, they've pointed out all kinds of things to me that I never would have noticed, um, and what they're thinking.
And, and a lot of the times it's just this, like, I'm getting the vibe from them. If they're a little bit nervous and they can't articulate it, then maybe it's time to, to hang out and chill and talk about other, you know, other things in flying. And, and just wait until I feel a little bit more of their, their calm energy coming through or that their conditions calm down. And then we can fly and have a really good time together. But what do you see? What do you think? Have you seen this before? What happened?
I love that, Nick. I mean, I think that that's, you know, it's a very, what's the word I'm trying to look for? It's a, it's a very non-intrusive way to get a whole bunch of information. Um, and I mean, curiosity is something everybody loves and, uh, Oh, this, this pilot's really curious, you know, and, uh, not what should I do? How should I do? How should I do that? It's, it's, you know, like, Hey, I mean, I think you're going to learn a lot from that. And again, not to bring up Ben's accident again, but I, one of the things that I really struggled with after that accident was that I didn't do, I didn't do that to him that day at the, at the launch, you know, that I think that would have been a really appropriate place. He and I have talked about it since, and he was pretty confident that day. He wasn't nervous. It wasn't any of the things that I, I assumed he wasn't very confident because of the incident the day before, but, um, but he was, he was feeling really good about it.
But I think it still would have been very appropriate for me or for him to ask those questions that you just said, you know, what do you see? What do you think? Have you seen these conditions before and what happened? You know, we, we had, none of us had ever flown that site. So some of that wouldn't have been that relevant, but it would have been a great time for him. And I, you know, there was no real hurry. Um, it was, you know, the day was on, we were definitely trying to get in the air, but, you know, we could have taken five minutes there and I might've been able to flesh out some insecurity. There are, or something, you know, that, that maybe would have just changed the trajectory. Um, so I think those things are, I think those things are really important to use the, you know, some of these people you're flying with literally have thousands of hours more experience.
That's a lot of time.
Yeah. Yeah. And I, I've ended up getting all kinds of extra information, not just the answers to those questions. Cause that, that starts the conversation. And for me, you know, I love flying because it is so lonely. Um, but at the same time, I love the time. On the ground with these pilots, cause everybody's different, but nobody cares what you do. And you, you end up learning all kinds of things about flying and setting up your harness and how you wait it and what you might do. And, you know, I, I think of climbing up a thermal off of launches as these hip clawing turns. And I talked to one of the other guys about, he's like, oh, I think of those as fading one eighties. And you just, you get more and more perspective and more and more of this kind of pattern recognition explained in different ways too. And it becomes a much stronger, clearer understanding. Of, of what's going on, what you can do and how you, how you move through this guy.
Yeah. And I would, I, you know, I would say too, that I think a big aspect that people don't often think of, of, of, you know, Belcourt's concept of bringing it is that it starts way before you launch way before it starts the night before when you're looking at the weather and you're getting a good night's sleep and you're getting super hydrated and you're having a really good meal and you're going to bed early. And then in the morning you're going through a really good meal and you're going to bed early. And then in the morning you're going through a nice routine. You're checking your weather. Again, you're making sure there's no school boy errors. You know, you're not forgetting your gloves, your hat, your helmet, all the stuff, your oxygen, whatever you need for that day. You're not in a hurry. You're not in a rush. And when you get to launch your, your calm, you're laughing, you're having fun, you're, you know, you're shooting the breeze with your buds.
You're waiting for it to turn on your checking and checking and checking your gear over and over and over again. You're making sure that, you know, there's nothing more annoying than launching and your various not on your spots, not on your, you know, you're not your radios on the wrong frequency. You don't have your gloves in the right place. These are all really dangerous things to have happen right after you launch, you know, especially in a place like some Valley where it's just totally full on. As soon as you step into the sky, you know, you, so all that bringing it, you know, when we were the day of Ben's accident, actually, you know, really good friend of mine from, from salt Lake. Adam was driving for us and, you know, he, he came over and he was trying, he was like, Hey man, you want me to help you out with these knots in your wing? Well, I was clipping in and that's not a time where I break that routine, not for anybody.
Um, and so, you know, as part of being a, you know, an experienced pilot, whatever you want to call it, or somebody with a lot of hours is, you know, you can, I, I won't, it won't screw me up to say, no, I don't need help or yes or whatever. Like I'm going to stay in my routine, but I purposely said, no, not right now. You know, I'm, I'm doing my thing. So it's part of that's just learning to not be shy. You know, you, you, you, that's the last, you know, you don't want to forget to clip in. Um, so all these, all these little things that are, that really add up to bringing it by the time you're in the air, you've done all this stuff beforehand. That's right. You can't go back and go, oh, there was that. And there was that. And there was that. And there was that. And there was that because there's all, there is always that stuff.
When you have an accident, there's always those things. And so I think developing a, you know, um, I guess that'd be progression, but developing a flight plan that works and something that you, you stick to, and that starts before you get in the air. That's really important.
Yeah. I agree. I think that another way to think of it is I think of myself as a, as a professional pilot, right? Even if I don't get paid, I don't do any of that, but it's, it's a profession and it's on me to become the best I can be at that profession. And I approach it just like I would, you know, learning how to be at a world-class marketer or a pistol shot or anything, you know, a chef is just, you go and you practice, you have your routines, all of that stuff and just treating it, I think much more, much more professionally than for me, it's just so dang dangerous that if I don't treat it with all that respect and I don't treat it as, as a job that I want to be really good at. Um, to me, I, I don't think I could do it as a hobby. Yeah. I
agree. I mean, I think that the other thing too, that I think, um, is often maybe overlooked is, is that kind of woo side of flying or, you know, the, the, the mental side that, you know, some people tap into much better than others, but we all have it is that little feeling in our gut. Um, you know, I cannot say how many times that I've known people. Yeah. People that have had accidents that, uh, you know, we'll talk about, man, I had this feeling, God, listen to those feelings. There's something, there's almost always a feeling that, that precludes something bad. And, you know, there, I have had feelings like that many times where I've gone into fly and I've, and I've identified them as, you know, this is a slight lack in confidence because I haven't been flying.
Now. Now that's different than a deep troubled, knotted up gut. You know, when you have a deep trouble, knotted up gut, or just something that's just like, you know, the beautiful thing about our sport is there's always another day. And, and I think that there's just never anything wrong with going, yeah, today's not my day. Um, you know, cause like I said, it only takes once.
Yeah. It's an interesting to think thing to think about is that I started flying at, I don't know, 38. I'm now 40. And I think I, I feel like I've got. Probably. 15 years of really hard flying and probably 25 years of flying if I'm careful and get after it. And that's plenty of time to be the best pilot I can possibly be. And so even though I want to rush every day, I want to get out there every single day, fly nine days a week and 30 hours a day. A lot of times I'll just say, Hey, I'm going to take flying off my plate today. I got other things to do. I'm really distracted or, or I'm not feeling it today. I was too scared or, or the weather's not right. Or I'm not going to push it. But, and thinking in that, that unusual concept for most of us humans thinking on the scale of decades allows us to be really at peace with making those decisions that in hindsight are really clear, but are, can be really difficult to make when the future's laid out ahead of you.
Cool.
Let's move on to ground handling your, your buddy Brad from black diamond, a climber had some, some really good thoughts about your incident. Let's get into that.
Totally. Yeah. So Brad was a paraglider long before I ever was, um, he's up in Salt Lake city, really accomplished climber, a super cool dude. He's kite skied across Baffin Island. He's a, an all around adventure and fantastic attitude. And when I told him I was getting into paragliding, he's like, Hey, I think you're really going to like it, but be careful. And I got super psyched on ground handling. I was like, dude, I'm doing a bunch of it. And he's like, he told me at the very beginning, he's like, ah, don't worry about ground handling. It's it's meaningless when you're, when you're in the air, like it's good for the very beginner, but it's not that great for everything else. And he and I had long discussions at it and I'd come back and listen to this podcast and you and I did a session on there in a podcast on ground handling. So I felt like he was, he was missing something, even though he's far more experienced than I am.
Um, do you want to, you want to read out what he wrote and then comment on it? Yeah.
I mean, there, it was, it was funny when I got the email from you last night, you know, that was the first sentence is that, you know, ground handling is useless in the air. And in my, my initial thought was this guy's an idiot. Yeah. The
rest of his
email. No, he's clearly not an idiot. He's got some really good thoughts and I, I I'm excited to talk about them. I do disagree. Uh, and, and not totally he's, he's correct in that, you know, flying is a lot different than ground handling. Yes, absolutely. But what ground handling, so what ground handling does is a couple main things. It does a lot of things, but the, the, the main thing is, is that most accidents happen launching. Um, and when you, when you look at the statistics, it's very real. It's rare that it's actually, you know, something that happens in the air, it's, you know, it's the broken ankles, the broken legs, broken backs, somebody blowing a launch and, you know, turning the wrong way or whatever, and that's something ground handling will just eliminate. Um, so, you know, if you do a lot of ground handling, if you're sexy with your wing, if you're just tap dancing on launch, then, you know, most conditions, uh, are, are manageable because of your, your ground handling skills.
And if they're beyond that, the other thing is, you know, it, um, you know, that you've, you've done a lot of ground handling. This is too much wind. I've never done it in this much and you don't fly, which is great. So, you know, I think that for that reason alone, ground handling is just super important. Now what he and I, I think disagree with is that, um, you know, in the air, he, he says it's, you know, it, it's not important at all because, you know, the, the, the wing is doing different things. True to an extent, um, you know, where I would disagree is that all those little things you're doing to keep a wing inflated on the ground are the same things you're doing in the air without so much the pendulum force, but you know, I, I, it's still quick reaction stuff
and I would hazard, you know, not even hazard. I'll bet you for sure. I think my, I think 100%, you know, the people that do a lot of ground handling have less collapses, have less incidents in the air. You know, I don't think there are statistics that can pack that up. Um, but. You know, when I look at somebody like Chrigel, uh, you know, he spends an inordinate amount of his time ground handling and that's all the proof we need. So that's my opinion on that. Now that being said, the rest of his email, I think is just totally spot on. You know, I love this concept of SIV basically renting. What does he say here? That's a, uh, yes,
SIV clinics are sort of like renting skills and it's great way to learn, but how to own those skills is the question. Um, yeah, I love that, you know, my, I think that, you know, when you talk to acro pilots or you talk to SIV instructors, you know, or in Fabian's last podcast, he said it really, you know, articulated it really well that, you know, the first time is just like kind of clearing the cobwebs and it's basically a scent assessing, you know, uh, where somebody is mentally, but it's, you know, if you keep doing it over and over again, which I am a big proponent of. Then. And yeah, you're, you're, you're in a sense, you're initially you're renting the confidence and you're renting a lot of those skills that could potentially get you out of stuff, but also with practice, it's making you own it, you know? So it's just mental training.
I think Fabian talked about that really well that, you know, he was talking about that. They, that often it's just a maneuvers thing. People think of it as just a maneuvers thing. It's way more of a mental thing, you know, on the last day of an SIV, the full stall day, you know, look around. There'll be 20 people in the course and no one's talking, it's like the day of silence. It's like the day of the dead, you know, cause everybody's so nervous. Um, and you know, it should be the opposite. It should be seen as super fun because it is, and kind of a non-event, I mean, it's way easier stalling than it is to do a wing over. So, um, yeah, I mean, I, I, I really like that part of it. Um, maybe you want to talk about some other things in, in, in his email.
Sure. Yeah. I want to talk about the ground handling piece. Um, one more time, cause I think there's a, um, a perspective on it that I had missed initially and that I thought that ground handling was a panacea, a fix for all things. And then if you were really good ground handler, you were automatically a really good pilot. And so I think the, the separation part is, you know, I know Brad and he's, he's really good and he's also pretty impatient, um, is he was like, Hey, I want to get in the air. But the separation part for me is like, look, I will still do one day a week of ground handling and put my time in and make sure I'm coming back to that. And practicing those things over and over. Also realizing that a collapse, you know, if I 50 % collapse the wing ground handling and I do it on purpose, that's way different than doing it in the air and it being an unexpected thing.
And it doesn't mean that the ground handling won't help it. It'll help it a ton because you can have that pattern recognition and then the muscle memory triggers a lot faster. But I had thought when I had initially kind of been exposed to this concept of extraordinary amounts of ground handling. That it, it would, it would fix everything and talking to Brad and having a better understanding and more experience, like, okay, it's, it's important part for me. I think it's a fundamental part of flying well, but it's not the only thing to be really good at. And it's not a guarantee that you'll react correctly in the air because they are slightly different things.
Yeah, I would agree. You know, I mean, I think if you have the option of one or the other, SIV is way more important. Um, a hundred percent flying again, I want to break this down. Like. When we, again, when we look at the statistics and you probably see it there at Torrey, um, you know, people get hurt on launch and they get hurt on landing, um, and, and. Ground handling is not so important in terms of landing. Landing is decision-making. Ground handling is easier to get. And it's, and it's one of these things that, you know, typically as people get more and more, you know, more and more hours, they do it less and less. And I think that that's dangerous. Um. I, I stick with my original, you know, our original talk that it's just incredibly important and the guys and gals who are good at it are just better pilots.
Um, Josh Cohn a classic example. So I think it's, I think it's really important, but yes, I think SIV is way more important, um, in terms of flying, but you gotta get off the ground fly. So yeah. I mean, I think that he's, I think he's dead on, but, um, you know, I don't think he's dead on, but I, I also think that it's not something we need to park too much to the side.
Um, so he talks about fear. Brad talks about fear. Yeah. Um, he's a, he probably wouldn't agree with it, but he's, he's pretty darn close to world-class climber. Um, and he certainly climbs with really, really good dudes and, and I'm sure he pulls his weight. So when he talked about fear, it made me pay attention because I thought at some point, you know, you get good enough and you stop being afraid and you just kind of focus on being excellent. But he says in climbing, I'm afraid of falling, but I've learned to either take it or not. I take daily controlled falls to help instill that things will be okay. Or I care so much about doing the route that falling is far from the first thing on my mind. And as long as set safety requirements like you ever met, then I go for it and sort the details out later. So there's two different ways that he manages that fear. And I think that's those useful things you think about, how do you make your progression and then how do you focus your mind?
Hmm.
Yeah. And I w I like it too. It reminds me kind of Laird Hamilton's, you know, whole kind of philosophy on life. He's got, it's, I mean, it's more complicated than this, but he talks about doing one thing every day that scares you, um, just because it keeps you sharp and, uh, and it's, you know, we, we don't get lethargic that way that, you know, if, if we press ourselves every day and it doesn't have to be paragliding, but you know, for, for those of us who have climbed, we know what Brad's talking about intimately because, you know, taking a lead fall when you haven't climbed that much is absolutely terrifying. You get two feet above your last point. It's a point of protection. And you start wobbling, uh, if it gets hard because you haven't fallen much. And the only way to get over that fear is to fall and trust the gear and, and trust your placements and trust that you're technically doing what you're supposed to be doing because, and also if you fall and you fall like a stiff board, you're going to hurt stuff.
You know, you gotta be relaxed and that's, you know, very, very few people do that naturally. Um, and I think that's the same case in, in paragliding. You know? Yeah. And is there any other way around this than training? I don't think so. I mean, I think, I think like, like he points out, some people are just naturally better at staying calm. Um, and they're, they're like, you know, that it's something that happened to me very early on in life. I identified and other people did as well. When things get super hairy for me, my heart rate plummets, you know, this is obviously not something I'm controlling, you know, with my mind. That's just subconscious. That's what happens. So that's this flight or fight kind of, uh, response in me is doing the right thing.
But, um, I also think that that can be trained and, and I think it's just something we have to, you know, like I said, it doesn't have necessarily have to be paragliding, but you know, back to the kind of ground handling thing, I think we can do, uh, you know, once we have it totally wrapped in 10 kilometers an hour, we can bump it to 12 and we can bump it to 14. And kind of just keep pushing that envelope a little bit more. So when you need it, you got it.
Yeah. Let's see. Um, he's got a couple more points in the email. He talks about visualization being important. Um, we talked about visualization earlier, earlier on when we talked about the big four, but it's just nice to hear that all of the really good dudes have these, these common points of performance and visualization is one of them. So thinking about, you know, what are you doing to, to imagine your flight, um, before and after? Do you do it and kind of figure out what you're, you know, where, where you can, uh, where you can practice without fear of being injured physically?
Yeah. I, I, I like, uh, Theo De Blic thoughts about that when I, I mean, he was talking specifically about reserves, but you know, that every single day he has this in his mind that this might be the day I throw, because that just sets the foundation for, you know, that, that might, it may happen that day. So it's not a big surprise. Um, you know, and I think if we have, if we have a, if we have a, if we have a, if we have that approach to every aspect of that flight, you know, that, um, even the ridge, you know, the mellow glass off late in the day, that if we take just enough time to recognize that we are still flying, this is still dangerous. Um, this still may be the day where something could go wrong, then we're ready for it. If it does.
Um, I, I think that you're just, you're setting that kind of, again, this is back to that kind of, uh, you know, starting in the very beginning. Not just when we step into the sky. Yep. I like that a lot. You know, that whole visualization side of it that, um, you know, that you see yourself performing well, you see that it's going successfully. You see that it's got a successful outcome. You know, people have asked a lot on the show, how do you avoid the whole ground suck crew? And, uh, you know, at Chelan a couple of years ago, when, when Eric had his, his bad accident Jason did tell, did as well. Um, you know, there was, there was, before those accidents, there's, you know, on the way up to launch, there's always people talking about how bad the day looks, you know, that this looks scary, that looks bad.
This looks, you know, it's like negative energy. You'll never, you know, that's, it's not our place to, you know, quote unquote, fix somebody like that, but you can do something about it. You can get away from it. And I think that's really important. There have been many times in my flying career where I'm around somebody that's kind of doing the ground suck thing. And if I can't get away from them, I will say something, Hey, this isn't the right time for that, man. We're going flying. It's, it should be exciting and fun. It's going to be awesome. And, uh, that alone just, you know, make somebody smile. If you're positive and you're optimistic, usually it's going to work out.
Yeah, totally. Totally agree. I think some of the stuff that I do with that, just as an example is if people are, I feel like, I feel like they're, um, maybe being fearful unnecessarily, you know, people hearing this may not like it, but I'll say, I don't see how anything could possibly go wrong today. God himself couldn't come down and screw this day up. And they'll just start laughing like, dude, you're, you're screwing up the whole day. But it seems like it breaks the tension and people start to realize like, Oh, maybe I was getting in a little too deep. Now, you know, part of that is just the attitude and the energy that I bring then. And that reflects, you know, coming through in that statement and people see it for what it is. But if you have this kind of stock phrases that you're using to, to break that tension, um, they can be helpful. And then the other thing is if people are being super negative, I've found that asking them questions about what is driving that energy and just kind of meeting it directly.
So if they're like, Oh, it looks like a really crappy day, or it's super dangerous, like, Oh, why do you say that? What's making you say that? What are you seeing specifically that, that drives that? And a lot of times I've seen kind of people back off because they've built that pattern in themselves because it keeps them safe, but it's not actually a useful pattern. And when we examine it, they're like, well, you know, actually this could be a really good day. And, you know, I think I'm going to unpack and launch and let's, let's have a good time. And so you don't have to do any rah, rah stuff at all. You just have to ask them specifics. Yeah.
I want to be careful here too. I, my, I had Will Gad's voice singing in the back of my head when I said, you know, if you just want to, if you just are optimistic and positive, it's probably going to work out. Now that's not, that's a little, that's kind of dangerous talk. That's like, you're, you're pointing out earlier that I was talking about ground handling is going to save everything, you know, they, uh, or that stalls are, um, you know, I, I do very much agree with Will Gad's point, you know, the positive power of negative thinking, you know, it's, there's nothing wrong with considering what could go wrong because like in your case with that first incident, had you been more thinking that way, you wouldn't have put yourself in the Lee. Um, you know, so as we develop hours and time and skills, you know, we're constantly assessing, okay, where's the safer place to be here?
Where's the place that's going to have a better outcome. And that might be, you know, and I'm always talking about for continuing flying, you know, if you constantly take the safe decision, you'll be on the ground. Um, but so, you know, you're, you're definitely walking this balance beam to an extent, but, um, you know, I, I don't think we want to just be blindly optimistic, but we want to be positive.
Yeah. That's, it's supposed to be fun. Yeah,
exactly. So
we got, uh, kind of two more things. I think we blasted this, how to fly in practice piece is we've talked about having a progression plan, um, and, and those things that are important. So being able to do those weight shift, uh, turns or wing overs, um, you know, probably to be honest for me, they're more like these deep turns, um, those spirals and flat circles and basically just writing out what's going to work for each person, what they need to work on. Cause what I need to work on at 85 hours is not what someone else needs to work on at 20 or 200, but having that kind of progression plan, like what am I going to do today to get good? Um, and then I was going to skip to this piece. That's been bugging me lately is, uh, I don't have a pod and
uh, kind of vulnerable and honest as you feel stupid flying around the sky in a chair when everybody else has a pod. And I know it's like a, you know, high school thing. I'm not the cool kid, but I started thinking about the other day is like, I could spend, you know, two grand or whatever on a brand new pod with shipping and tax and all the rest, or I could do another SIV. And as soon as I thought that as like, Oh, don't be an idiot. Like there's no, that's not even a question. The SIV is by far the more important thing. And it's just so easy. I mean, I think independent dude, but obviously I get sucked into peer pressure and looking cool just like everyone else. And as soon as I had that thoughts like, ah, I need to do way more training before I worry about looking cooler. Yeah.
I mean, this whole thing with gear is, is, uh, is actually starting to kind of bum me out. You know, the, the number one, um, unless you're at a really high level, it just doesn't make any difference. I mean, most of Will Gad's, you know, state records that still stand today were done in the late nineties, you know, they didn't even have Um, so, you know, that, that, you know, that there's this whole thing and Fabian said this really well, there's this whole thing about performance and I got to step up, I got to get a better glide and I got to get, you know, it's just bullshit. Uh, you know, and you, you can do so much on with so much less. And if you have, you know, if money is an issue that should absolutely be spent on training, then, then gear, you know, this, this whole, like stepping up to a higher class wing.
It's dangerous and it's stupid and there's no reason for it. And, you know, you're, you're, you're basically trying to skip over the foundational skills that you don't have. Uh, and you're just taking on an enormous amount of risk. Again, it's back to the fun thing. You know, it's, um, I've used this analogy too much. I'm sorry for those of you listeners who listened to a lot of the shows, but it's like, it's, to me, it's the same as kayaking. You know, you don't go to a class four river until you're nailing every single Eddie backwards on a class three. That's just, you know, that's how kayaking should be approached. And the same thing with paragliding. Um, you know, I, if you're going to go XC, then, you know, you need to have all of these skills because it's going to go pear shaped on you.
And so, you know, so much better. And, you know, the statistics bear this out and, and this is a really, this is a really good thing. I mean, you know, the, the large majority of pilots in the world are flying ENBs. That's a great thing. Um, and especially in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, these days, because they have so much performance, your Carrera is a rocket ship compared to what we had 10 years ago, you know? Um, and so it's, it, it's great that there's all this passive safety and stuff, but it's, you know, I, I think that, um, you know, X contest, which is a wonderful thing, but you know, these databases and social media and bragging and, you know, everybody putting out their stuff is, is forcing people, not forcing. I mean, this is, you know, back to the whole pilot and command thing, you know, you're the pilot in command.
And if you don't have those skills, then, you know, you don't belong in a pod. Um, so the pod thing really is, I mean, unless you're racing, unless you're, uh, you know, the, the, the performance difference just isn't big enough to warrant going to something that's, you know, you're, you're much more likely to have a, have a twist in a pod just because of the dynamics and the physics. Um, and it's just not enough to warrant, you know, if you're flying a, uh, an ENB, it doesn't matter that much anyway. You know, um, it matters at the world cup level. It matters if you're on a CCC glider. Um, you know, it matters when you start flying over a hundred K consistently a little bit, you know, you know, it does affect your glide, but you're absolutely right.
Uh, you know, fly the stuff that's fun, fly the stuff that has the amount of safety that you need. Um, and, uh, okay. Maybe you don't look as cool, but that's cool in itself.
Yeah. I mean, it's super cool to be able to walk. So I'm, I'm happy with, well,
I mean, it's just, it's bad-ass. I mean, go kick all those guys' asses on a, on a seat harness. You know, that, that, that's the shit that makes you look cool.
Yeah. Yeah. No, I, I really didn't want to admit that, but I figured that would, that might be useful. Cause I, I bet most of the people in pods now are in pods because it looks cool. Not because it actually helps their performance.
Yeah. I mean, most of these, most of the people, I mean, most, almost all, uh, wouldn't be, you know, that, that little bit of performance difference could way more be made up in, you know, thermaling skills, gliding skills, uh, strategy skills, thinking skills, performance skills, you know, they just, they're missing all that stuff. So the pod doesn't make a bit of difference.
But I'll give it to you. It does look cool. Okay. Um, let's, uh, I mean, I think one other thing I should
say about that. Um, they are warmer as well. I mean, so there's, I mean, there, there, there's basically two things that are, that are better about a pod is one, they're a little more aerodynamic and they're a lot warmer. Um, so, you know, if you're flying big XC flights and you're flying in the Sierras or somewhere where you're getting really tall, then yeah, okay. That does make a big difference. But, you know, look at some of the videos of, uh, John Sylvester flying tandems across the care quorum at 7,000 meters. And, you know, we don't,
we don't need them. We can just wear more clothes. Cool. I mean, looking at paragliders on pods got me into flying, but at the same time it's, it's knowing what they're useful for. Yeah. Okay. So let's, um, let's take this little turn at the end. I think that covers most of the intermediate syndrome stuff. Um, and we'll finish up with the eating for mental performance.
Yeah. I'm glad you brought this up. Um, you know, the first time this really struck me in the head was at the world cup here in 2012, the weather was terrible after the world cup, we had an open right after it. And, uh, I heard Josh and, and Nick and Russ Ogden and some guys that were just, you know, gods to me then and still are. And they, they gave a bunch of really valuable talks. And one of them was on food and water. Um, and this was more specific to in flight, you know, taking a sip of water at the top of every thermal, you know, making sure you're eating every hour because you just, you don't recognize it. You feel like you're really on. And then suddenly you're on the ground four hours into the flight and you realize you haven't really eaten or drank anything. And that's why, uh, you're just, your, your brain needs all those fluids to work and, and your, and it needs the calories to work.
Um, but I think that what a lot of people miss is the pre flight, um, kind of stuff, you know? So, you know, if you're having a whole bunch of beers the night before and you don't get a lot of sleep and then you just have some coffee and go flying out, you know, how can you expect to fly that? Well, I think we need to think of, you know, flying like we are, like we'd be training for a marathon because that's what it is. I mean, it's, you're in the air, for seven, eight, nine, 10 hours on a huge flight. Um, and so that's, you know, your brain, okay. It's not marathon physical, but your brain is burning energy, uh, cause you're just constantly assessing everything and it's scary at times. And so, um, we've got to take care of that side of it. And Adele mentioned this as well.
It's also the physical side of it, you know? So if we bring in the physical side, you know, people think of paragliding is not very physical, but you know, the, unless you're doing the ex Alps, okay. They're right to an extent, but you know, I think if we take care of our body and our mind, then that just equates, you know, you're, you're on the, the seesaw just vaults you into higher performance. So, you know, I learned a lot and actually with your help with the last ex Alps about, you know, uh, using protein and fat a lot more than carbs. But I, I mean, I think that, um, and kind of being fat adaptive, almost like in a, in a ketogenic, uh, zone. And I don't think that we need to go that far for paragliding, but, um, you know, I think that eating really well, uh, you know, at least the day before flying is, is going to have huge impact on performance and which is of course safety.
Yep.
So when we talk about eating well, you know, many people have many different diets and ideas of what eating well is, where I usually start with this with, with pilots is asking like, how do you feel after you've landed? What are you craving? And a lot of times they're, they're usually craving carbs. They want some chips or some burgers or in fries. And that's just a signal to you that you were using a lot of, of energy to go through that flight. So the first thing is learning to listen to your body and realize, you know, that 20 % of the energy used in our body is used by our brain. So that means that if you're going to fly, you're going to be able to do a lot of things. If you're going to fly for a long time, you're going to need to have some energy on board to, to fuel that. Now, whether that's more carb centric or more kind of fat, fat adaptive stuff, I think, you know, I've obviously on the fat adapted side, but I think both of those things can work as long as you're really thinking about them and planning and testing to see what works for you.
Cause we're all a little bit different. There are guys who, and girls who are winning, you know, uh, world-class level races, eating all kinds of diets from fruitarian to paleo to bread and cheese. So I don't think there's one kind of perfect diet, but certainly learning to listen to what is going on in your body is really important. And then across the board, it seems that sugar and alcohol consumption are, are negative. So I know that, you know, going out and getting beers afterward is, is a pretty popular thing for me. It, it, it's a wrecker, uh, completely screws up my, you know, my next two days, but just thinking if you want to fly really well, if you want to take this on as, as a profession, if you want to be super serious about it, then you're gonna have to pay attention and figure out what works for you.
And you don't have to do just what I say and, you know, go paleo or not drink beer or whatever, but just pay attention to what, what works well for you. And one thing, just as a starting point that I found, if I land and within half an hour, uh, have a tin of sardines, like the rest of my day goes really, really well. Um, I can eat them fine. They, they taste good to me. My wife finds them revolting. So obviously it's not for everybody, but to me, that's like a clear indication that kind of the fats and the proteins are what I, I work with best with after landing. So it's a nice place to start as far as post-flying nutrition.
Yeah. Uh, farmer talks about, you know, landing after a huge flight. He talks about the alien world. And the first time I really experienced that, uh, in a big way was, uh, I was doing these, trying to do these big triangles with Bruce back in, I think it was 2012 and fish, uh, and the Volus, you know, so that's the North side of the world. And, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and the biggest mountains in, in the Alps. And there's this classic triangle that you go down to Martin and then you cross the Valley, the, uh, the Volus and you go up to Zermatt and then cross the SAS and come home. And then it's a big FAI triangle. And I think that at that time, it was the longest flight I'd done. It was like just shy of 10 hours, maybe it was like 10 hours and five minutes or something. I mean, I landed, it just, it was almost dark. It was just wild, you know?
And I landed and just had this insane out of body, like, whoa, you know, I could barely stand up. And, and at the time I was like, oh, that's the alien world, man. That's so cool. And the reality was I was just radically undernourished, you know, I, you know, I had been so focused in my brain, you know, like I gotta, I gotta do this triangle. And, you know, I, I didn't, I never noticed that I was just, you know, I was massively, my glycemic index was awful. And, uh, and, you know, I just needed anything. It just needed food and I should have been doing it, you know, during the, during the, during the, during the, during the, during the, during the, during the whole flight. But yeah, I mean, I, you're right. I think it's different for different people. Um, I, I think, you know, we learned something about oxygen here a bunch of years ago when, when farmer got wicked hypoxic at like 13 grand, you know, super low.
And that was back in the days when, um, you know, no one even really flew with oxygen yet. It was kind of like this cowboy thing. Ah, we don't need oxygen. And, uh, and then, you know, one day for whatever reason, a couple of beers the night before, not a great night of sleep, you know, didn't have a breakfast, uh, hiked up to launch instead of drove, you know, so he wasn't really in a great place anyway, probably physiologically. And then, uh, what's that stacking
up the errors,
exactly all those little errors. And then all of a sudden, you know, they hadn't even gone over trail Creek, which is like 20 K out. And, uh, you know, he called Nate on the radio to check in and Nate was like, dude, what? I can't understand anything you're saying. You sound like an idiot. And he kind of checked himself. Cause you know, when you're hypoxic, you often feel fine. You don't know it. And he called back on the radio and he's like, dude, you sound like a four-year-old. What is wrong with you? And within minutes, he couldn't feel all the way to his shoulders, you know? So he had to land his glider by like Jesus Christ pose. He put his arms all the way through the toggles past the elbows because he couldn't feel his arms and, uh, kind of slowly spiraled down to the ground. And then as soon as he got to the ground, of course he felt better, but whoa, that's wicked scary, you know? And that was just purely, food and sleep, you know, these, these things.
But again, it's, um, these little things add up and you, sometimes you don't know that the really scary thing about Perry Latin is like kayaking. You can't stop mid waterfall, you know, uh, you know, you're committed. And so you got to stack the odds in your favor and, you know, like your guy's company, paleo treats, you know, just having, having some real food on board, but also way, you know, hours, days before a potentially big day is, is really important.
Yep. I think that's, that's probably the last piece to hit with this food thing is if you want to go way deeper, understanding that it's not just the meal before or the food that you eat during it, it's the entire lifestyle. And if you, again, if you want to get really good, then this is an area where you can make really big gains, um, not in flying technique, but in being able and ready to execute flying. And so if you have figured out the diet that makes you feel, look, feel and perform the best, then, you know, you're, you're a step, a few steps ahead of people who are just like, yeah, I'll totally smash burgers and fries and beer. And I'm a great pilot. So I don't need to worry about it. You know, this, this performance pillar, uh, you know, it leads to better restoration when you're sleeping or sorry, this food pillar leads to better restoration because you sleep better.
You're thinking more clearly, you've got clean fuel to burn for your brain and your body. Like there's just so many, pieces that it underpins in the rest of your flying career. So it's worth it to investigate and kind of take a hard look at what you're doing eating wise and nutrition wise that may affect your flying.
Absolutely. Totally. Uh, Nick, as always such a pleasure. I really appreciate this. I, I, I dig these emails and if you don't mind, let's check in with those guys and see if we can put them online. I think they'd be great in the show notes for, for people to read and, uh, kind of understand why we dove down those, those particular rabbit holes. And, uh, thanks, man. I, I, I feel like, uh, you know, you've taken a couple out of the luck jar, you put them in the experience jar, just don't drain the luck jar.
Yeah. I didn't think it applied to me, but that's, that's the curse, right?
You're
a pilot. It's going to happen. And it's, it's just, it's great that the outcomes were the way they were. But, you know, I, I think like Brad pointed out, it's, uh, you know, the, the really good pilots and the, and the folks who stay, you know, healthy for their duration, are the ones who have the incidences like you've had and figure it out. They don't just walk away and forget about it and chalk it up to luck, you know, just you're delving into it and you're, and that's really important is to really break it down, understand it. Like you said, do some journaling, talk to other people, talk to better pilots, you know, where'd you go wrong? Cause you, we always do. And, uh, you know, I, I just had, I I'll close on this. Uh, we did a little hike and fly here a couple of nights ago with a buddy of mine. Who's a real low, hours pilot and farmer who's an insanely high hours pilot and just a really gifted athlete and amazing pilot who I'm just always learning something from.
And, uh, you know, we all launched late in the day. It was super mellow. I was on my single surface wings. Those guys were both on many wings. And, uh, we've got this golf course problem right now where we're not, we used to always just land on the golf course late in the day. Cause there's nobody playing and they, the sun Valley company has decided they don't want us doing that anymore. So we're not supposed to land there anymore. And a couple of people have gotten threats to, you know, have their gear conference confiscated and stuff. So that's part of our, you know, rules here at the club. You can't land on the golf course. And a farmer went right out and did a bunch of loops and a whole bunch of acro and landed on the golf course. And I thought, God, you know, that's a, that was bold. And I wonder why he did that. Well, the reason he did it was my buddy and the other guy and I went down and landed back in this Canyon where we're now supposed to land.
Um, but we're always super vocal to everybody, all the new pilots that come into town, like, Hey, if it's ratty or nasty or not good land on the golf course, you know, I mean, big deal and say, you're sorry, be really nice to everybody and get your car and go home. And, uh, you know, just don't, don't put yourself in a terrible position just because of this rule that we can't land on the golf course. And cause it's a much safer, better place to land. So when it's mellow, yeah, don't land on the golf course, but when it's kind of dicey as it was that night, you know, there was a wind that was kind of cross wind coming in, um, that we felt when we were up on launch. But when, as I got lower, I didn't think it was that bad. And then it ended up being kind of hairy, you know, not super scary, but just, you know, a little extra risk for sure.
And, uh, in both my buddy and I landed and it was no problem. We packed up and went in and Matt ran over and got in his car right away, just in case anybody saw him land on the golf course. But, you know, he made the more mature. Move. And, uh, you know, still after all these years, I'm just, I'm still learning. I got in my car and shook my head and go, God, that was unnecessary risk that I just took. And, you know, I should have landed on the golf course and said, sorry to everybody. So, you know, these are little things that, you know, that are just so hard to get and understand unless you're participating.
Yep. Totally. Always be curious. Love it. Love it that you're still learning and sharing that. Oh man,
so much. Nick, thanks again. I appreciate it. Uh, all the best. To you and, uh, best of luck and, uh, keep being safe and, uh, keep pounding out those hours and training and, you know, as always appreciate your thoughts. Thank you. Thank you.
I hope you enjoyed that. Uh, really cool talk and some, some great things. I hope that that's really helpful. Um, please share the show with others. If you think something's in here, I get these emails constantly from people that are saying like, Oh dude, the show saved my life or saved me from injury. That's what this is all about. It's just spreading good knowledge and, uh, or if you don't agree with anything, or if you have somebody you really want to hear on the show, reach out to me, uh, cloudbasedmayhem.com is where you'll find all that information. It's also where you can find where you can support the show. All we ask for is a buck a show. This is a listener supported podcast. I am super excited to report that we're now over 600,000 downloads. If you can believe it, as we approach episode 70, that is really, really cool. So words getting out there. I appreciate it, but yeah, tell your friends, talk about it on the way up to launch.
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