Ernesto Gainza, Xtreme Flight company director
“We can't exceed the limit, because it's been set before”
Xtreme Flight is the only parachuting demo team practicing the extreme category
“The training of an extreme parachuting pilot is a mental process, much more than physical”
Ernesto Gainza breaks up with the usual look of a parachutist. He is not a giant, nor has his body full of the bulges of a well-developed muscular mass with a gymnastic work of three hours a day. He is quite the opposite. And however, this Venezuelan settled in Spain is not only able to do the same kind of parachuting that other parachutists who usually jump in the air shows, but also much more than them. They were the surprising team in the last International Vigo Airshow, when they threw vertically from the plane, going down at a speed of almost 140 kilometres per hour and, sustaining this speed, flied horizontally less a metre high from the sea water, for fifty metres long (controlling their speed and direction with one foot submerged), flied over the sand beach at almost 100 kilometres per hour and reduced brusquely their speed to zero, braking with the legs, the arms and the body. This is not the result of a plane crush with no victims, but the result of a maximum control capacity exercise. Some days ago, they've done again this kind of jumps in Malaga air show. Just watching them in person elevates the adrenalin level of the audience and Airshows stuffs have taken note of that.
They do much more than parachuting. They exceed the general parachuting notion, in parallel with the reduction of their parachutes size. This is the reason of their high speed. This is the reason of their strength and control display. In fact, they've exceed the parachuting limits. They actually are “parachuting pilots” and have broken into the Spanish air shows turning themselves into the dominant note on the present season, because they raise the “show” notion to the pre-eminent place it deserves.
AEROMAGAZINES: Xtreme Flight has just arrived to the Spanish air shows totally out of the blue, raising to the highest exponent the show concept...
ERNESTO GAINZA: The team was borne in past January and after sending over three thousand e-mails to Airshow stuffs in Europe, made our official first public appearance in Spain , during the International Vigo Airshow, on last July, before 400.000 people. So our first appearance in an Airshow was thanks to the vote of confidence of its director, Pablo González, who, after several talks, agreed to give us the chance to show to a real audience what the only European elite acrobatic parachuting team is able to do with a high performance parachute to offer a striking and safe show.
Do you really stake your life or the risk is a matter of training? Can you describe your usual training programme?
E.G.- I would dare to compare the parachuting and motor racing and in this comparison we would be the parachuting “Formula- 1” . Our parachutes have a surface of 6.41 square metres and a descent speed of 140 kilometres per hour, what let us to run hundreds of metres at ground level. You know that to control the manoeuvrability, the turns, the lift and the speed of our waves in miniature require the maximum concentration, because you haven't the less margin of error.
The Xtreme Flight training programme is based in the repetition of manoeuvres, in order to increase our muscular memory and our capacity for reaction, in every kind of situation. Twice a week, Madrid Xtremeflight members make one series of five training jumps, including parachuting flying in formation, aerobatic manoeuvres and free style. We also train four different landing disciplines: distance, speed, precision and free style. With this training, the group of pilots gains fineness and excellence, in manoeuvring with parachutes at ground level.
Stuntmen
You have worked for cinema industry, TV or sporting activities of reduced capacity. But jumping before more than 400.000 people, as in Vigo (Pontevedra), or 250.000 people, as in Málaga, and watching hard by the audience reaction, does it move to you to exceed the limits? Are you thinking about creating new aerobatic figures?
E.G.- When you work in cinema or television, the contracting party has a pre-established idea of the manoeuvres that wants for you to do. Without a real audience present, you don't get very nervous. Quite the opposite, when you jump in an air show, the team's top priority is to get the highest audience entertaining and also to spread an unknown discipline in air shows..., but ever into the safety limits. Our manoeuvres are well adapted for the best audience realizing of the “meaning” of the show and to get for them the best enjoyment.
We've got a maximum safety standard in our work. We never tackle any aerobatic figure without a previous training of at least twenty times. We can't afford exceed the safety limits... The limits have been set before the jumping show. Every plan change may go into failure or into a tragic crush. A situation like that would get tarnished the team reputation and would sadden the audience memories for ever. But we update our manoeuvres and aerobatic figures in every show in which we jump. That is to say we always present a series of basic manoeuvres and also several variations, depending on the number of jumpers, the light and air conditions, the size of the “air box”, the length of the runway and the kind of parachute we are using.
This is a very recent and minority parachuting category. How many parachutists do extreme jumping in the world? Do you keep in contact? Are all of you up to date of the development of each team?
E.G.- Well, by the moment, we are the one and only team established in Europe in this kind of high performance parachuting. A lot of parachutists can accelerate their parachutes, but also taking land at medium speed. However, that is not the same than accelerate to a very high speed and take land controlling your flying with no speed reduction, always in a safe way!
All over the world, there are two hundred professional “flying parachutists” like us, of which 150 compete in the different world circuits. Once a year, we meet in the “flying parachuting” world cup, organized by the International Aeronautical Federation, in whatever country it may happen, sharing knowledge, anecdotes and information relational. In the entire world, we are only three elite teams taking part in shows. One of them is in the USA . Other one is in the Emirates and Xtremeflight in Europe . Our team includes the best world circuit parachutist pilots settled in Europe .
Financing
How can anyone learn to jump in this way? What kind of parachuting school teaches it?
E.G.- Everyone who wants to turn into a professional “parachuting pilot” has to run a hard way for several years. And of course he or she will need to do a lot of coached jumps. Xtremeflight has a parachuting school settled in Madrid , where we impart pilot parachuting courses for basic, intermediate and advanced levels, for every kind of parachutist needs. But I want to declare that the training of one professional “parachutist pilot” is a mental process, much more than physical, because the most important is that every pupil must assume the consequences of his faults. That is to say that the important is to anticipate the situations, instead of ad-lib a solution in the last minute. Anticipate! Once the training is over, the parachuting federation to which the pupil belongs will test severely him. Afterwards, new exams will be necessaries to sanction the pupil for aerobatic parachuting shows using high performance material.
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