Attempting to Sit fly!

A car accident (ironically on the way to a skydiving training session) has kept me out of the sky for the time being and it will probably be another couple of weeks before I am fit enough to be confident that I can flare properly and can do all my EPs if needed.  Nothing major, the x-rays showed I have strong bones with no hairline fractures, but the bruising means my elbow occasionally screams "Ow!" at me if I overdo it, which is not really something that I want to experience in the air or on final!!

I've also skipped FS training for the time being as I don't want anyone to be hanging off my right arm just yet.  Not really an issue as Point in the randoms so I'll be back training with Aeronauts at the end of the month, but am staying out of the 8-way shenanigans this week :-)

Instead, I am focusing on the free-flying, or in my case, otherwise known as 'stranded beetle' flying :-p  After a further 30 mins at Basingstoke tunnel on Monday and 20 mins today, we have got the wind speed up to around 80% and I'm learning how to self-correct my back-fly.  I'm finding it more difficult to be stable in back-fly than in sit, though Paul says that is normal.  I've had a few attempts at turning by myself on the net - it was fine at 75% and then suddenly got a lot more dramatic when the wind speed was turned up a few notches, ha ha.  I did a bit of flying around the tunnel though I struggle with keeping my left knee out (partly due to an inherent twist in my spine) which then means I either side slide or turn, depending on what else is going on with my arms and torso.  I also managed to fly backwards (legs out, arms in) but struggled with forwards (legs in, arms out) as I got stuck on the net.  The video shows that I'm not actually stretching my arms back nearly as much as I think I am either, as I'm allowing the wind to push them upwards off the net.  
Discovered that my default of a stable belly-to-earth position when things go wrong really really doesn't work at free-fly windspeeds, lol.  Feels weird to deliberately flip onto my back but pulling my arms and legs in is very effective at dropping me back to the net if it's all going pear-shaped. 

Paul hasn't yet let go of me in sit-fly but we did a lot of practice of the position and did exercises where we matched hands and brought the arms in and out, whilst maintaining a good posture (all with Paul standing on my feet on the net!).  He did turn the wind speed up and steer me around the tunnel a bit during our last couple of rotations and I was mostly able to keep my balance - the corrections feel easier than in back-fly but that's probably because he has hold of my knees so I'm only really having to be concerned with my arms and torso.  

I've got a lot better at walking in the tunnel - it's going to be relatively easy to walk at FS wind speeds now I can do it at free-fly speeds, lol.  

Got a week's break now before my next session, so will be using a wall for support and attempting to hold the sit position to get my quads stronger in the meantime.  

And I will be 'supervising' Mayhem's 8-way efforts at Bedford tunnel from the comfort of the viewing area tomorrow :-)