One thing I think sets Pure Paragliding apart is that we don’t just work on the technical side of flying. We work on the technical side, we work on sports psychology, and we spend a lot of time looking at goal setting, SMART goals and SWOT analysis so you’re developing both the technical skills and the mental skills at the same time.
You can read a book on the technical side of flying, but that doesn’t mean you’ll be able to do it. There are plenty of manoeuvres that are technically quite simple, but once you’re in the harness and things start happening quickly, it’s very easy to get lost.
You have to master the technical side. You need to understand roll, pitch, controlling rotations and how all of those things relate to everyday flying. That’s not just about SIV manoeuvres. It’s about thermalling well, flying efficiently and understanding what the wing is doing.
The problem is that all of that technical knowledge has to pass through the filter of being human.
If you’re under excessive stress, all of that technical knowledge can disappear very quickly.
That’s why we work on both.
Through repetition you build situational awareness. The first time you do something, the fear curve is huge because your brain is telling you that what you’re doing is dangerous. The second time it’s a little easier. Then it becomes easier again because you realise what’s actually happening. You know how much height you’ve lost, you recognise the movements and you stop treating the situation as completely unknown.
Anything you ever do in flying has to pass through that human filter. The question isn’t just,
That’s why we spend time on sports psychology as well as flying.
You don’t have to become an expert in sports psychology, and you don’t have to be a Red Bull X-Alps athlete to benefit from it. If you have a basic understanding of confidence, self-talk, your own triggers and how you respond under pressure, you’re already giving yourself more tools to work with when things don’t go to plan.
The technical and mental sides of flying can’t really be separated.
When something violent happens close to the ground is exactly when you’ll need those technical skills the most. If excessive stress takes over, all of that training can disappear.
One of my favourite sayings is:
You don’t rise to the level of the training you’ve received. You descend to the level of the training you’ve mastered.
That’s why situational awareness is one of our fundamentals. Under excessive stress, your natural instincts take over. Fight, flight or freeze aren’t usually the responses that help you fly a paraglider well.
The good news is that we spend far more time on the ground than we do in the air.
That gives us a huge opportunity to become better pilots before we even clip in. We can study weather, airflow and sports psychology. We can work on our breathing, understand our triggers and prepare ourselves mentally, so that when we do need our flying skills, we’re in the best possible position to use them.
For me, that’s why technical skills alone are never enough. You have to train the pilot as well as the wing.