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F101 Flyer
Coach card Full course

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Foundations · Stability · The jump

Freefly 101

Fly your back

Back-fly as a position you actively pilot, not just survive.

What the course is about

You'll learn to fly your back with control: hold heading, change fall rate, turn, drive, side-slide, and transition to a sit and back. This follows Freefly 100, where back-fly is the freefly recovery position. Here you learn to work in it. In Australia, freefly training needs at least a Certificate B.

What comes before it

Screen 2 · What you are watched on

What you are watched on

The same short list a coach ticks, in the same words. Nothing is hidden from you.

3.8
Drive forward a briefed distance (guide: 5 to 10 m) and arrest the drive completely, finishing on heading with no residual movement.

Can you drive forward on your back, five to ten metres, and stop the drive completely with nothing left running?

3.10
Side-slide left and right a briefed distance, stopping on heading after each slide.

Can you side-slide left and right on your back, a briefed distance each way, and stop on heading after each one?

3.12 Safety critical
Arrest any unplanned drive on recognition, before it accumulates, and correct back toward the briefed working area rather than letting successive drives carry you out of your own column.

Do you notice unplanned drive early and correct it, rather than letting it carry you out of your own column?

Screen 3 · Safety and altitudes

Safety and altitudes

Everything here is a recommendation with a reason behind it. The drop zone you are jumping at, and your own limits on the day, decide what happens.

Safety-critical items on the short list

3.12
Arrest any unplanned drive on recognition, before it accumulates, and correct back toward the briefed working area rather than letting successive drives carry you out of your own column.

Do you notice unplanned drive early and correct it, rather than letting it carry you out of your own column?

Everything this course says about breakoff and deployment

1.4
State the altitude for ending work and the planned deployment altitude (breakoff guides: 5,000 ft up to a 4-way and 5,500 ft for 5 or more, noting most modern jumpers set 5,500 ft for any freefly group and will generally not accept 4,500 ft).
4.2
End the jump per the briefed protocol: on a coached jump, transition to belly, slow to belly fall rate and track 90° from jump run while checking airspace; on a solo consolidation jump, end the work without tracking (turn 90°, pause, slow down, transition to a belly orientation), dissipating speed over at least 1,000 ft before deployment, because a soloist's movement risks are already the dominant hazard.
4.3
Deploy at the planned altitude, at belly fall rate, after clearing airspace.

The altitudes here are the guides this site recommends, with the reasons on the full course page. Where the drop zone briefs something different, fly what the drop zone briefs.

Screen 4 · After the jump

After the jump

From the course's closing section, review.

5.1
Debrief against the declared objective using video.
5.2
Name the direction in which control ran out first, and its body-position cause, using the reference table below.
5.3
Log the jump with a reflection naming the unit and skills assessed (e.g. "F101 back-fly drive and slides"), the criteria results and one correction for the next jump.

One fault, one correction

Before the video, and before anyone else speaks, name the one fault from the jump and the one thing you will change on the next jump. Keep it to one of each, so you have one clear thing to fly.

Write them into your notes at the bottom of this card, and they will be here next time you open it.

Record this jump

You can record the jump yourself, because your own read of your flying is worth keeping. A record counts as verified once a coach signs it.

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 Freefly 101 course page carries the reasoning, the sources and everything left off here. All briefing cards.