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Dynamic · Mastery · The brief

Dynamic 401

Follow the leader into a carve

Following a leader through a carve, copying everything.

What the course is about

You'll learn to follow a leader through a flock and roll into a carve, copying their line, level and tempo at close range. Dynamic 304 comes first, because this jump opens with its flock and roll and keeps that tight formation all the way into the carve.
In Australia these jumps sit under both the freefly and the tracking and angle rules, which need a Certificate C and an approved leader. The drop zone safety officer decides how the two apply.

What comes before it

Screen 2 · What to watch

What to watch

The same short list the flyer sees on their card, in the same words.

3.3
Fly the carve through the briefed snake pattern directly behind the leader, copying the leader's orientation, line and tempo, tunnel-style lead-and-follow.

Can you fly a carve directly behind the leader, copying their orientation, line and tempo?

3.4
Replicate each of the leader's transitions with the same orientation and path (no trick busts).

Do you replicate each of the leader’s transitions with the same orientation and path, rather than substituting your own move?

3.8 Safety critical
Keep the group's carve inside its own airspace, monitoring the jump run and the straight-down groups throughout, avoiding them is entirely the moving group's responsibility, never theirs.

Do you keep the group’s carve inside its own airspace, watching jump run and the straight-down groups throughout?

Screen 3 · What blocks a sign-off

What blocks a sign-off

A safety-critical item marked not yet stops the sign-off, however good the rest of the flying was. The rest of the jump cannot make up for it.

Safety-critical items on the short list

3.8
Keep the group's carve inside its own airspace, monitoring the jump run and the straight-down groups throughout, avoiding them is entirely the moving group's responsibility, never theirs.

Do you keep the group’s carve inside its own airspace, watching jump run and the straight-down groups throughout?

Everything this course says about breakoff and deployment

1.5
State the breakoff plan, breakoff altitude, the back-flyer roll rule, and deployment altitudes, with separation complete at least 1,000 ft above the planned deployment height (a guide: 5,000 ft for freefly groups up to 4-way, noting most modern jumpers use 5,500 ft for any freefly group and will generally not accept 4,500 ft).
4.1
Initiate breakoff at the briefed altitude (within −0/+300 ft), rotating from head-up to a head-first orientation first if the jump ends head-up, then turning onto a clear radial while flattening pitch to a track; never back-track away while still head-up.
4.2
If on the back at breakoff, roll to belly only once on a clear trajectory with no one above.
4.3
Deploy at the planned altitude, inside the group's planned opening airspace, after checking own airspace.

Recording a sign-off says what you saw on one jump. Permission to jump, and anything the drop zone requires, stay with the drop zone.

Screen 4 · Conditions

Conditions

Where the evidence is allowed to come from, and how much of it there needs to be.

Assessment conditions

- Sky jumps from 13,000 ft or higher (recommended). Carving uses altitude quickly at angle speeds of about 270–400+ km/h.
A real group of 2–3 flyers, 4 at most, for the group criteria. Tunnel work is preparation only.
Video of every assessment jump is required for a valid assessment, from a dedicated camera flyer or leader-flown, with the flyer identifiable.
Equipment: a visual altimeter, a working audible (two recommended), an AAD, and freefly-suitable gear with a tight pilot chute pouch.
Conditions within the group's briefed limits, with winds aloft assessed in planning.
The assessor is an experienced dynamic or movement organiser, or a freefly coach current in mixed-orientation coaching, using this checklist.
Each criterion is marked Satisfactory or Not Yet Satisfactory.
Completion is recorded as a Mastery milestone only. There is no sign-off, it confers no privilege, and it gives no permission to plan, lead or join any jump.
Across your jumps, fly carves both ways and in both facings, behind at least two different leaders, partners or camps.
As a guide, it takes about 8 jumps within 12 months. Tunnel carving in both facings comes first (Tunnel to sky), and every counted jump is a sky jump.
If you already carve behind a leader, a freefly coach can assess you from your logbook, video and tunnel records, or on 2 jumps against the checklist. Without Dynamic 304, start with its assessment route.

Performance evidence

Debrief each jump on video for line busts and trick busts, and log one following fault and its fix. You've finished Dynamic 401 when you fly two jumps in a row that meet everything on the coach's checklist below.

Screen 5 · Debrief

Debrief

Safety first, then fun, then learning. In that order, every time.

Coaching priorities

Safety first, then fun, then learning. Hold the bold criteria to the standard above. Design the jump for the least experienced flyer in the group, and treat standing down when someone isn't ready as the right call.
Plan the session to be enjoyable: flyers choose this expensive hobby, and enjoying it keeps them in the sport. End each debrief on something that went well, with one thing to improve.

One fault, one correction

Ask for their read before you give yours. Then leave them with one fault and one correction, in their words if you can get them. One of each is easier to carry onto the next load than six points.

A jump marked not yet is a jump to fly again. Tell them that as part of the debrief.

Record this jump

Your notes for this course

Saved on this device only, with no account. They will be here next time you open this card.

This card is a summary. The full Dynamic 401 course page carries the reasoning, the sources and everything left off here. All briefing cards.