When most people think of College sports they immediately envision Football, and Basketball and all the fanfare of the playoffs and sponsored bowl games, but how many people think of Skydiving?
The National Collegiate Parachuting Championships have been in existence for 43 years and have been a source of inspiration for college students throughout the United States to train and prepare for this major event.
Each year teams from colleges such as Georgia Tech, Texas A&M, Ohio State, and the Army and Air Force Academies show up and test themselves against each other. They compete in six events ranging from "style and canopy accuracy" to new events like Sport accuracy and freeflying. Each event tests a distinct ability of skydiving. Style is an event where one person demonstrates a sequence of turns and backloops and is judged on speed and the accuracy of the maneuvers. Canopy Accuracy is an event where the competitor demonstrates his ability to precisely land on a target... to the nearest centimeter! Two Way and Four Way are team events where the entire team, made up of two or four people is judged on the number of times that they can complete a set sequence of formations in 35 seconds.
Starting a collegiate skydiving team is not as difficult as it sounds but it does take a commitment of time and money. If you have a few friends that show an interest in getting a team together get them to try a jump with you. I'd recommend that you all schedule a Tandem Introductory jump as a group. This will give you a feel for the environment of freefall and help everyone make a decision whether or not they want to continue. Once that first big step is taken, your team has to learn to skydive! This is best accomplished through an Accelerated Freefall course (AFF). AFF is a training method where after a 6 hour ground school, you don your own equipment and after a short plane ride, jump with two instructors, who assist you through the minute long freefall. The progression is seven "levels" long and can be completed in as little as 5 jumps. After the AFF training you need to build up your jump numbers to 20 freefalls to qualify for the United States Parachute Associations "A" license. Now you are qualified to compete at the Collegiate Nationals and can represent your school nationally without being 7 feet tall or a 250-pound lineman!
For more information on learning to skydive or starting a collegiate team contact the United States Parachute Association at 800-371-8772 or Skydive The Rockies at 866-400-0960 or www.skydivetherockies.com. |
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