Date: Sun, 18 Jul 1993 17:50:15 -1000 From: jeffy@syrinx.umd.edu (Jeffrey C. Burka) Message-Id: <22d5ln$a96@umd5.umd.edu> Organization: University of Maryland at College Park Subject: the "whoa!" factor... In article <22260v$1ab@pogo.wv.tek.com> daveb@pogo.wv.tek.com (Dave Butler) writes: >I was flying my new Tracer (thanks for the recommendation Jeff). Glad you like the kite... >A little while later that Tori Tako flyer came over and asked me "How the hell >are you taking off from a nose down position?" It turns out that he'd been >flying completely on his own for about a year, and all he could really do were >basic moves like loops, figure 8's and ground passes. Interesting point. It's becoming fairly common for folks to offer to let me try out kites I've not yet flown. In those situations, I usually end up doing a lot of tip stands, floats, stalls, and what not to see how the kite compares to what I'm into (Pros and Tracers). I often end up hearing "I didn't know this kite could do _that_!" There's a lot to be said for just *seeing* what a kite is capable of. It doesn't matter if the move is easy; if the flyer doesn't know it exists, they won't try it at all. Learning radical tricks and figuring out new ones is a self-perpetuating joy; the more you can do, the more you experiment. And it's learning that first little bit and opening the door that makes it possible. I'll never forget the first tip-stand I ever saw. I was driving along 17th Street along the Western Grounds of the Washington Monument on my way to my normal parking spot. TC Powers was flying, I belive, a Spin-Off and he had the kite balanced on a tip out at the edge of the window. I was completely flabergasted. Talk about expanding horizons! >Another example is the Revolution [...] >The move that I've found really impresses most >non-kiters is to take the Rev to the top of the window, aim it at the ground >at top speed, slam on the brakes about 3 ft off the ground, and hover. Interesting. I was talking to a fellow about this very move today. Two months ago, he stopped in at the Kite Loft in Bethany Beach, Delaware. He told me he's always liked kites but had never flown any modern stunt kites . At the store he saw the Rev promotional video, and made an impulse purchase of a Rev II. The single most prominent thing in the video that convinced him to make this purchase was the power-dive-into-a-hover. He was amazed later that afternoon to find out just how trivial that trick is for the flyer to pull off. His frame of reference, to which you refer, was immediately shifted toward slower precision moves and inverted stuff. I'd met this fellow once before on the Mall maybe a month ago. I'm not sure if he'd really seen me fly much, but I know we'd spoken briefly and I'd mentioned 3-D flying as well as some other stuff. This morning when I got down to the Mall, he said that he'd been hoping to see me fly so he could get a look at some of the more advanced stuff. This afternoon, I hooked him up with one of my short line sets (24') and taught him basic 3-D flying and some of the "secrets" to hovering and maximizing lift in a light wind. Despite only 4-6 hours of flight time on a Rev, he was throwing and catching the kite and mostly keeping it in the in in what most folks would consider the bottom range for a II. While Neil has a long way to go before most folks would consider him particularly competent on a Rev (you know, that stage where you no longer have to think about every shift in your handles), he found out that some really impressive stuff *even for someone who knows something about flying a Rev* is still quite simple. (Hi Neil, in case you've made it into rec.kites...;-) On a vaguely related note: well over a year ago, there was some discussion in rec.kites about flying a Rev one-handed. I was really impressed with the idea and gave it a try--and failed miserably. Not too long after that, I first saw Dave Arnold fly a Rev with one hand. I tried to get an idea of how he was doing it, and then tried to emulate it. I spent the next year continuing to fail miserably. When I first started heavily concentrating on Revs again about two months ago, I started to do a lot more 3-D flying than I had before, and I started spending a lot more time with both of my handles in my left hand. I was quite suprised 2 weeks ago to realize that I'd subconsciously learned to fly a Rev one handed. I can do so with either hand, though I'm much better with my left hand. It's the sort of "trick" about which I'm mixed between being blase and excited-impressed. On the one hand, I really don't give it any thought. I have to pay a lot more attention to what the *kite* is doing, but I don't really think about the way my hand moves the handles in order to turn it. On the other hand, when I'm flying with one hand the more intellectual side of me is running around, laughing its head off and saying, "You should be doing this!" It's all very odd. ;-) Jeff -- |Jeffrey C. Burka | "When I look in the mirror, I see a little clearer/ | |SAFH Lite [tm] | I am what I am and you are you too./ Do you like | |jeffy@syrinx.umd.edu | what you see? Do you like yourself?" --N. Cherry | = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =