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HU202 Coach
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Head Up · Relative · The brief

Head-Up 202

Demonstrate crest-standard head-up flying

The assessed crest flow: dock, front flip, back flip, dock, flown to a standard.

What the course is about

You'll fly the head-up crest's assessment jumps with a coach, each to a set dive flow and without help in the air, bringing together everything from Head-Up 201. This follows Head-Up 201, because these jumps test the 2-way skills it teaches.
In Australia, the two jumps are Stages 1 and 2 of the Freefly Training Table, the jumps the head-up freefly crest asks for. You need the crest for head-up jumps of more than three.

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.

3.7
Exit unlinked into head-up and fly to a face-off within 5 metres of the coach's base.

Can you leave the aircraft unlinked, in head up, and fly to a face-off within five metres of a stationary flyer?

3.9
Perform a front flip and a back flip on the coach's signals, returning to the sit on heading within 3 seconds each.

On the coach’s signals, can you fly a front flip and a back flip, each one finishing back in the sit on heading within about three seconds?

3.10
Perform a 360° on signal and re-take the hand-to-hand dock.

From the dock, on a signal, can you turn 360 degrees and then take the hand-to-hand dock again?

3.12 Safety critical
Execute the vertical recovery position immediately on any loss of control, re-approaching only when stable.

Through a whole assessment flow, if you become unstable, do you recover to back-fly, in the recovery position, automatically, with no going back in until you are stable?

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

3.12
Execute the vertical recovery position immediately on any loss of control, re-approaching only when stable.

Through a whole assessment flow, if you become unstable, do you recover to back-fly, in the recovery position, automatically, with no going back in until you are stable?

Everything this course says about breakoff and deployment

1.3
State breakoff (5,500 ft guide, the recommended minimum for any head-up group) and deployment altitudes, and the lost-partner plan.
4.1
Initiate breakoff unprompted at the briefed altitude (within −0/+300 ft).
4.3
Deploy at the planned altitude after visually clearing airspace, with separation completed at least 1,000 ft above planned deployment.

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 10,000 ft or higher (recommended), the two flows flown as separate jumps. Tunnel time supports rehearsal only.
Conditions within the flyer's cleared limits and suitable for a fair assessment, in the assessor's judgement.
Video of both jumps, coach-flown or helmet-mounted, with the flyer identifiable. The video is both the assessment record and the coach's witness record, so without it there is nothing for the sign-off to verify.
Equipment: a visual altimeter, a working audible (a second recommended), freefly-suitable gear to the Freefly 100 standard, a hard helmet, and an AAD (recommended).
The assessor is a freefly coach current in head-up coaching, using the published checklist, which the flyer sees in advance. The coach flies the coach slot and gives no help in the air.
In Australia the assessor is an APF Freefly Coach, the person the crest schedule requires to witness and verify the jumps. The drop zone safety officer co-signs each stage and the chief instructor completes the endorsement. Elsewhere, the national or drop zone equivalent, such as a British Skydiving FF1/FF2 evaluator.
Each criterion is marked Satisfactory or Not Yet Satisfactory, and the course Competent or Not Yet Competent. A single jump never completes the course.
A Not Yet Satisfactory on a bold criterion means the flyer re-flies that flow in full after coaching. For any other Not Yet Satisfactory item, the flyer re-flies only the affected flow.
Your coach will also ask you about the breakoff guides and their reasons, corking, exit order, your gear and the crest sign-offs.
If a jump falls short, you work on the fix with your coach and fly that jump again.
As a guide, start within 6 months of finishing Head-Up 201, allow 2–6 rehearsal jumps of the flows over at least two days, and fly the two jumps within 3 months of each other, all within 6 months. Tunnel time can rehearse the flows, but both jumps are sky jumps.
At the end you hold the video, signed checklist and logbook entry for each jump, your coach's notes on the questions, and a list of your recent head-up jumps. In Australia that is what the crest application needs, and the Australian freefly crest system explains who signs what.
If you already fly head-up 2-ways, you can skip Head-Up 201 and the rehearsal jumps with 20 or more logged head-up 2-way sky jumps as a guide, and video, a head-up grade from another country such as British Skydiving FF1, or International Bodyflight Association Static Level 3 records plus recent head-up sky jumps. You still fly both jumps with a coach.

Performance evidence

After each jump, mark yourself against the checklist from your own video before your coach gives their marks, talk through any difference, and log the jump with your coach's countersignature. You've finished Head-Up 202 when you fly both jumps and each meets 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 and never trade them for a pass. Keep the pressure down so the jumps stay enjoyable: a relaxed flyer flies the standard they trained to. Treat a Not Yet Satisfactory flow as a re-fly.
End every debrief, including after a re-fly result, 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

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This card is a summary. The full Head-Up 202 course page carries the reasoning, the sources and everything left off here. All briefing cards.