From Tents to Trophies: Understanding Acro Champion's Mindset on Ego, Glory & Drugs | Luke De Weert

Before we press recording, we were just talking about your background and how amazing it is. And I'm not going to talk about the windows that are visible, but I'm going to talk about the trophies that are hidden behind your head. Yeah, yeah. It took some years, but I'm really happy with it. I also, yeah, put them like a nice little stance and I'm happy how it turned out. And even like I got my medals recently done down there. So yeah, super happy with how it turned out. Tell us a little bit about it, man, That that's like, I mean, OK, you know, there's one thing about how good it looks, but there's one thing about how much

effort it took to get them. And, you know, athletics and swimming in the usual Olympic sports, It's a very different kind of learning curve and the trajectory of a career, what I meant to say. But your accolades have come in a very niche and in the niche of a niche. So what what was the story like? You know, except from everything else that you've mentioned on your website, which is really amazing for everybody was wondering, I'm going to list of these show notes. So click on that one to know more about him. Yeah, perfect. No, man. Yeah, well, it started actually already when I was like super young basically, actually before

I was born because my my parents went to Interlochen, to Switzerland before I was even born. My mother was pregnant of me and my father saw a paraglider there for the first time and that's basically the reason why he started to fly. So when I was really young, my dad was flying already for years and I grew up with it, but I never really did anything with it until I was like 14 years old. I did some tennis with my dad, but afterwards I started to learn and count on myself when I was 1415 years old and already quite. Yeah, first I realized that I really liked the sport and

especially I saw the videos from Theo to Blake and all the acro boys. And when I saw those videos, especially sounds of paraglining the, the video from Theo, I got hooked. And I was like I when I, if I do something with paraglining, I want to do acrobatics. And I started to get better and better and I was quite young as well. And at one point I just told myself I want to become a pro pilot. And I basically did everything in my life to dedicate myself to becoming step pro. And yeah, at one point I was like when I did my first season and I finished fifth in the Aqua

World Tour, I was like, I'm going for the win. I would like to to become a World Tour champion. And that's what I did IN2023I trained a lot, work mostly in winter just to play my seasons. Also, outside of the awkward training, I did a lot of work on like physical training and mental training just to yeah, to basically do everything I can or could to to achieve my dreams. Wow, man, love the way you put it, especially the pro part, because I, I think only blessed few are able to use that terminology in paragliding, yet all of us want to. I, I don't think there's any

pilot who's like, holy shit, you know, like it really fucking amazing if I can make money of this thing. But going pro in, in a sport like ours and especially coming from a developed economy, and I'm, I'm saying developed economy because I'm like, I, I made a huge move from India to Norway and the finances were just like 10 times different, you know, more expensive. Like the past thought that I was buying for like $0.10 was at least €2 or something. So I mean, what I mean to say is cost of living comes with the cost and changing dreams. It comes with the cost in this

economy. So like what was the work life balance when at a 14 year age you were like, you know, I'm I'm going to go all in. How did how did the finances and that like the difficult side which nobody talks about look like? Yeah, well, of course, I was quite lucky that my father was a pilot, so material wise I could borrow his Gladders, his harness and stuff like this. But just like, of course, to train Aqua by yourself, this is like you have to do it all by yourself. And at first, when I was younger, before I was 18 years old, I we basically just combined family holidays with

airline. So we went to places like firstly I had to do cross country because I started to fly and I went to NSC. But slowly after when I started to fly our crow, we went to Gerlitzen or something, saw the fork where in France, like places like this where we can could combine like family stuff, where we have a lake and nice touristic stuff basically. And then also something that, yeah, a place where I could fly acro basically. And I told myself and my, my dad, if, if I get 18 year, if I become 18 years old, then I would take the car and I just

drive straight to Argya. And that's what I did. I, I became 18, took the car and I just went there for two months. And yeah, I just basically earned money, saved as much as I could. So I could just go to Argya, train for a few months and basically come back. And afterwards I finished studying and then I did the same thing. And also some sponsorship came, material was paid, I got some gliders, which was really nice. So a lot of things were covered. I think what I what I really want to get to it is that if you want it bad enough, doesn't matter where you come from, what

the economy looks like, life will figure out a way you will make it happen, basically. Yeah, definitely, definitely. I didn't live like super rich when I was travelling because I was basically the first two years I was just in a camping in a tent with a super small car, like with a little furniture place, like just cooking, like all the basic stuff. Basically. I just had all the primary needs to have for for living basically. And then I just went to fly. And luckily Organia is relatively cheap because you don't need to pay a cable car or a shuttle or whatever. You just go by car to the cable

car, you take off, you land after the yeah, after the day and you go back home basically. So it's relatively cheap and I just try to make it as cheap as. Possible. Yeah, I think, I think that is one constant which everybody kind of shares in paragliding, be it be it any discipline, you know, cross country. I don't know about accuracy, but more or less like buying the glider itself is such a huge investment and the pull of the sport and everything that comes with it just like it's it's irresistible. But tell me a little bit about your training, Luke. You know, diving deep into 18 in a non conventional sport is

fairly, you know, when there's no set pattern, like for example, soccer or other usual sports, There are academies, there are coaches, there are like people who are guiding you and who have like proper curriculum, which has been designed by universities. And, you know, people learned into like in it for decades. That paragliding is like, yeah, your your parents were your inspiration. And then whatever YouTube or Internet threw at you was like, OK, that kind of told you what to do. But devising your own business plan. Maybe that is the good way to say, you know, if you want to make it your life. So what was the what was the

early days of chasing the dream looking like for you? And what, what was that aspect of life at that at that point in time? Well, of course, in the beginning it was just getting as much awkward training as possible. And what you say there's no path or no guiding to become a pro in paragliding because it's so niche and so new. But you can really look at other sports really well to see how they are doing it because it's not just about training like the the tricks basically. It's also about because acro is quite tough for the body. There are a lot of G forces and the, the brake back, like the

brake strength basically can be quite tough. Like sometimes you have to pull the glider and like deflate the whole glider, kill them, like kill it basically when you're upside down, it's quite tough. So usually when I was like 1819 years old, I started to go to the gym and then also train like specific exercises just to train certain places of the body that you use a lot in acro paragliding. And I started to look at other profiles. Basically a big example for me was stale the blink because he took it so serious that I also just looked at him and how he did it. And also just to like, yeah,

make your body inform like you went to for a hike and flies almost every morning. And I started to do the same just to get my body fit because the fitter your body is, the better your brain works as well. So you can better focus in the maneuvers, have better reaction time and stuff like this. So I really tried to look outside of the training also, yeah, other ways to improve my body for akro training itself. And this is just the physical part. There's also like a whole mental part for competitions and everything and how to train those things. Because in all that stuff I don't really train here.

I get I fly on the winch, but this is usually in summer and at one point my seasons got so long in the end it was like 6 months. So I didn't really train on the winch anymore. So I just went through the mountains to train a lot, but basically in winter I was here at home and I was like, OK, what things can I do here to still improve my paragliding and I could go to the beach because I'm a soaring pilot. That's how I started on the beach and I wasn't learning a lot of tricks on the beach which I could implement in my training

in acro basically like flying twisted and stuff like this. Of course I could not perform maneuvers, but there were like these small things like, for example, supplying twisted or sliding close to the ground, stubby touches and stuff like this to really, yeah, help this to bring it into the mountains basically. And also a lot of research. I was a lot of times on the Internet watching videos also about other sports and other athletes, how they did it, just full on research the whole winter long. So I. So basically obsession in the best way possible and dedication to your craft. And you know, like your name tells you what to.

To look for in that, yeah, like my whole life revolved around. Paragliding. At one point it was just paragliding, paragliding, paragliding. Like was really like, God damn. No wonder you have so many trophies behind you. That's like all these things. Yeah, No, but. OK, it's more than what meets the eye, basically. 100 percent, 100%. I mean, you know, we, we only get to see, I mean, I find the attention spans that we're using in short form content is picking up and people get to see like 15 second glimpses of this joker or twist or heli or whatever it is. But the amount of effort it goes

is not comparable to the dopamine rush that the viewers get in that like 15 seconds worth of a viewership. But one thing that I've been very curious about, Lucas, that every sport has an ideal body type. Athletes, for example, the ones who are track and field runners, they kind of, you know, have a certain physique, Swimmers have something else, bodybuilders have something else. But if we, if we try and look at paragliding, let's let's talk about cross country because I'm more into it and I think most of our audience is into cross country as well. The the top of the line pilots, for example, let's say the

French team and all they're fairly lead. There's no muscle marks on them, but there's no fat as well. And the ideology that I get is that OK, you know, the drag has to be reduced and even the arms kind of cater to that considering there are like, you know, submarines are coming along and like everybody is saying that you have to reduce the cross section area. But acro is strength based. As you said, G forces fatigue you and, and the ability to have for your core to handle those G forces will basically transition in making the clarity or let's say letting go of the brain fog

when shit hits the fan. You know how quickly you, you know where the handle is or how quickly you anticipate your next move and stuff like that. So how far are we from an audio ideal body type in acro where we actually see, I'm not saying buffed up guys, but I'm saying like muscular guys going out in there and and putting it to the ideal level that OK, these guys can't handle everything that that acro throws at them.

Yeah, no, of course it's hard to say of course, because the the sport is so young. But I spoke with Theo about this. Like what is the ideal body weight and the body type and everything? And like, if you're too tall, it's not so nice, but if you're too short, it's also not so nice. I would say, yeah, it's hard to say, but I'm 180 myself, like 180 centimeters, and this is quite ideal. I would say I'm not too short, not too long. Because what I've, what we've seen, if you're quite short and you have short arms, the brake range on your glider is really short. And sometimes you just need a

longer brake range. Like even myself, I sometimes have trouble with certain gliders that there, if there's a longer brake range, it's hard for me to kill the gliders. So I have to shorten my brakes to have the range basically. But I cannot make them too short because then I'll always be braking, which is also not nice. And for weights, I've seen people like, let's say 100 plus kilo people, I've seen it, yeah, not work so well because the heavier you are, the faster the glider moves. And like it will be more dynamic basically. So if you're too heavy, we always found out that it's also not really ideal.

It also damages the glider in a way a bit more because of the lines, Yeah, because of the weight and the G forces and the lines, like sometimes the lines break quicker, sadly enough. Yeah, basically. And if you're too light, then you tend to downsize in glider sizes too quick. This is also not the best thing because we always talk about wing load. And if you have like a certain wing load, the, the speed of the glider will always be the same. But this is not really true as well. There's always like a kind of a margin because even if you have like let's say a girl with which has the same wing load as me, I

would fly let's say a 16 square meter glider and she would fly a 14. The 14 square meter glider would still turn faster. Even though she, yeah, the wing load is the same, like the smaller the glider, it will still turn faster. And if you're just learning and try to get a bit of speed on the glider and you go and you downsize too quick, it will be too fast to learn basically. So this is also not really ideal basically. So it's really complex. I hope I'm explaining myself well, but I would say you have to be around like 75 kilos. It's good to have a bit more weight.

Let's say Ego Postakin, the Russian guy, he is like compared to the Akroto, quite heavy and you can see it in the way he's flying and it looks also really cool and really aggressive and really fast. So it's also a bit ideal for him, but I would say he is kind of on the Max side for the pros, I would say because if you're like a beginner or intermediate pilot, it also changes a bit. But I would say like 180 centimeter, 70 kilos around this area will be. What is Igor's body weight and glider size approximately like if you know? He I think he flies a 13 or 14

right now. I think he flies a 13 at this moment already. Not sure though, but 13 or 14 square meter and I think his stake of weight is above 100. I don't know it exactly, but mine for example is 1995. Yeah, but like 13 and 100 plus, man, that's a lot of exciting. It's crazy and he flies incredible. It looks incredible. Everything about it is incredible. So but yeah, I've seen people which are too light. They kind of looks a bit slower everything and you have less pressure in the glider. And this also if you want to fly super clean and impressive, this kind of can break you a bit. Let's slow you down in a way.

But yeah, we're still figuring out what what's the best body type. But I think around yeah, like how Theo and I look like our like how high how how tall we are and how how much we weighed. I think this is.

Want to say this, but you telling me that genetics play a role as well that who eventually gets on the podium in the sport?

Come on, man, you just explained it. It's a, it's a yes, right? Like, just just like, you know. Yeah, because we're, we're kind of talking about ideal body type, of course. And I would say you get some advantage, like if you have super, super short arms, you have a disadvantage. It's harder, of course. So in a way, genetics play a bit of a role. But I wouldn't say it's like the reason why people win competitions. Luckily, it's not like Formula One where you have the best car, you win the race. I. Mean the thing like I don't know if you have followed the civil resign moment that happened in

cross country paragliding like, you know, three months ago or something, but the biggest. Not so much. I mean, anyways, the whole idea was averaging the field and negating the glider effect, that bigger gliders glide longer and faster or whatever it is. They just perform better. And they said that people are ballasting up to dangerous levels and that is why it is compromising safety. So the point here is that if you're a shorter pilot, then no matter how value trained, a bigger guy can come in, put in less effort and still, you know, smoke you in the final glide and stuff. So there is a bit of tech

doping, I would say that some manufacturers can kind of pull and of course a little bit of genetic like levelling the playing field, I think is only like, OK, sprinting, you know, there's the only thing that you can buy is like cool spikes. It's. True. Yeah, yeah, definitely. Yeah. Now I think in acro it's more fair. I would say yeah, yeah. Like, because you just basically have to fly clean and smooth and have a nice flow. And these don't really come from genetics. Genetics just kind of give you a small advantage, but it doesn't like make you win competitions I would say because, yeah, you just have to do tricks. It's kind of I, I would say

compared to like skateboarding or snowboarding maybe like if you have a certain body type, you have a bit of an advantage, but it's all about the tricks and how to perform them basically. And this is all skills. Reminds me of Steph Curry. I'm I'm pretty sure a lot of people know about it, but you know, I don't know 5-9 or five ten guys smoking 6 plus guys in in NBA. And I mean he just plays to his strengths. You know, he just shoots in three pointers all the time and doesn't need to go in and dunk or kind of dodge the defenders and stuff like that. And that's like, I think like

we're coming back to the circle where it's like, it all comes down to how bad you want it and life eventually figures out a way to give it to you. Yeah, exactly, Exactly. No, I think acro is quite fair, which is really nice. You know, you just have to follow a good path. Downsizing properly, learning the tricks when mostly in a good order and manifesting a lot. Kind of, yeah. Just training, basically. Also mental training, visualizing and you will. Yeah, you can get a long way like genetics would not. I love the number of topics that you mentioned which we are going to touch upon. Manifesting, visualizing God. I mean, that is the reason why

you're here, Luke. But anyways, you know, before we go there, Luke, I have eventually realized the point that an athlete's ability to get better is not based on how hard you train. It's based on how well you recover and you have the ability to train again. People can resonate this to Rocky's, you know, Rocky Balboa's code that it's not about how hard you get it, but like how hard you get it and keep moving forward kind of a thing. So G forces and all of those things are insane. Some of the highest in any aerial sport, especially when it's an open cockpit. You know, you're exposed to the elements and you're just hanging

by strings and all of that. What which muscles get the most sore and what what is the best way to recover to make sure that you can go out and keep on pumping session session after session every day? For me always, I don't know if it it's different for other pilots, but for me mostly it was always my core like my my abs and my core was always like after session. They were destroyed basically. And, and my forearms, my forearms were like insane, like basically like bouldering. If you climb a boulder, you get like sore forearms. It's a bit the same in acro. That's why I think if you climb or boulder it, you have you also

train your your forearms a bit and you have like an advantage for training acro. But mostly this. And of course, a bit your shoulders, your your legs. I wouldn't say really your chest. I don't never had really pain and muscles in my chest, but mostly this, yeah. And triceps, but this is just for a specific trick, which is a misty flip because you have to pull it in a certain way and you need your triceps for this. So yeah, but upper body strength is is quite a quite a must. But mostly what I felt was core and forearms. I'll tell you the reason why I asked this is I think about a

year ago I noticed this huge difference. I just went absolute berserk on core strength. I was like, you know what, I'm going to hold the plank for 5-10 minutes, whatever the hell. I'm going to become super strong in core and see how it affects my flying. I kid you not, man, I was coring terminals so much better.

Yeah, for real. Yeah, I think even exceed it's the same because when you're flying, you're always tensing up a bit and it's always the core, mostly for us. It's also in helis and weight shifting. You're always tensed up like fully. And this is always, yeah, if you, I think if you train your core, you have a big advantage. It works. Because especially when it comes to like weight shifting with your hip where you're digging one side of the butt, you are activating your core. And if you're able to activate your core without fatiguing it, the a domino effect or whatever, like let's say our one off flight or our five off flight

across country, because the flights are going to last like 10 hours sometimes or in in competition, there are like 2-3 hours of high intensity, you know, decision making and dynamic moments. So I think holding planks or doing whatever to fix your core strength is a huge improvement in flying. And I'm, I'm, I'm glad that you can relate to it. So anybody who's listening, take notes people. There's a lot more to walk meets the eye, as we said. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now this is what I trained in the gym, like outside of Accra, I in the gym, I trained those kind of things. I went bouldering to train my forearms because in the gym it's

a bit boring to train your forearms but training the core and everything, which also basically train in bouldering sport for replying. But yeah, just in the gym the triceps I even trained also biceps just to balance out the whole body. But this I felt like this helped a lot because when I trained for like 6 months on the take of people were always like complaining about the arms like oh I have so much pain. I just kept going and this was really nice. So I get the more I get more hours. So people who have pain in the arms don't have as many trophies as you do, basically.

Well, to be honest, Theo, he doesn't really, yeah, train like the muscles. I think he's just like conditionally, like really fit. And he's doing a lot of hiking flies and he flies like his whole life already. So I think he just pulled, builded this up naturally. But for me, because I didn't fly so much, I was like, what kind of advantage? Because Theo is like for me, he's the best pilot in the world. Like he's always been the best pilot in the world since, well, basically since I've been flying and I know him. But yeah, I needed to get some advantage over him, you know? So I was like, OK, what can I do?

And just try to do those things to maybe get like a little advantage over him, because that's all I, I needed for. Yeah, to as a Dutch pilot, you know, so I really needed to find ways next to training because he trained so much, find ways to. Yeah, equalize. Basically, I would try and make your advantages and be. Honest. Yeah. Yeah. Nice, nice, nice. But Luke, ideally I should divulge into nutrition, but obviously that is subjective and depending upon how much people want to, you know, have that as a part of their investment and whatever energy we're putting in. But one thing that I do want to

come to is intoxication. Cross country is famous for beers. Every competition has beers on the landing bill. I think parade landing in general. Yeah, I mean it started as a recreational sport with a bunch of like, you know, I wouldn't say junkies, but like out of the ordinary people which the community was saying that ways to kill yourself or whatever kind of a thing, but breaking the norm, proving that there is enough ways to have fun. And then, of course, finding more reasons to laugh about it and share includes intoxication or celebrating it. Yeah. Macro in general, or let's say the younger crowd in general in

most countries is fairly open to experimental use of recreational drugs. For example, weed hash, you know, you see people holding a joint in landing fields a lot of times, you know, or one of those, I wouldn't call them junkies by any means, but what's it called? Paragliding bomb, you know, where they've given up on every other thing in their life and they're like, you know, now this is my life, which gives me purpose and it's my calling. So I'm going to go all in. And like these are the people who you won't say wearing the flashiest shoes or the trousers or those kind of branded items, but they will be async their

craft. You know they are really good pilots, but at the same time you see them holding a joint as well and enjoying the evening sun after the day's activities. So. For me, any intoxication to an athlete is a pull back on your physical abilities because body does not recover like that. Numbing the pains or kind of giving like you know, those shots in your body is only temporary and in the longer run like otherwise the Olympians would be doing it, you know? So weed and paragliding, what is your take on that? Because to me that is blatantly scary, but I don't know why people don't put it like that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course it's a big thing. And also when I started to fly, I saw it around me. But I would say also the last few years it's getting better and better because I feel like it's mostly with other sports as well. Let's say skateboarding, I think same thing basically. And the moment it got bigger and bigger and more serious and there were competitions and like the skateboarders became like real athletes, it just started to fade away. And I think it happened the same in Aqua paragliding because of course what you say, like it's better not to do it as that, but still people do it.

But I feel like over the last few years, especially when I really wanted to win, I cut everything. Like I was like super clean. I, I was eating super healthy, went to the gym, like did all the things based what I needed to do to win and well, it paid off of course. And I think nowadays most of the, the pro pilots, they are like really clean. They don't really do any recreation of things or beers or whatever. Of course, here and there a beer they do it. But most of the time if the pilots get really serious, they they try to really live like a pro and train as much as

possible, eat healthy, live healthy and yeah, try to achieve their dreams basically and get. I mean, the reason why I'm asking that is because like let's say a joint is going to give you a feel good factor, but it will come at the cost of slowing down your reflexes because that's what any intoxication does. You know, even a beer is like, you will have impaired vision, you will have slower reflexes. Definitely. So yeah, definitely. I'm not saying that you put your life online if you fly with a joint because your body is used to that joint, like coming into your life and making those decisions. But eventually, let's say there is a pilot who is flying clean

and there is a pilot who's flying after smoking a joint. What will the difference in performance look like? Yeah. Yeah, of course what you say is reaction time mostly. I have to be honest, no experience while flying under influence because when I was young I always told myself I never fly under influence. I don't want to do this because this is super dangerous. Like of course pilots take a beer like after a flight, sure, but for me while flying I always had to be be clear and sober. So how to fly under influence? To be honest, I have no idea how it is personally, but of course we just say reaction time will

be a big thing. And this is even if it's like half a second or one second, this is too much. And yeah, you can have a mid air collision or whatever, basically same stuff. What happens in traffic? Imagine people getting DUI kind of infringements for flying under influence. Dude that would be crazy.

Yeah, no, it's really like my my father told me when I was young, you don't crash like you. You don't like you do everything in your power not to do it. And so I took it really serious. Of course, if you saw my my videos, I crashed in 2022 due to a storm. But yeah, I with this just already, this idea and this vision really makes you save a pilot. You try to do a lot of things. Of course, I made a big mistake in 2022, but yeah, you just are already become like a way safer pilot. If you already have this thought and your father telling you,

promise me that you never crash. So we always try to do your best not to crash. And yeah, this is one way to to not crash and to be super clear in your mind. I really want to dive into the safety aspect, but just out of curiosity, I'm pretty sure anybody was watching and listening to this is Love the shaker man, Optimum Nutrition.

It's well, it does get a protein shot in there once in a while, right? So healthy living. No, actually, no, actually I'm quite. I did some protein powder when I was really hitting the gym a lot. Now it's a bit more chill, but I never really took like, yeah, protein powder so much or whatever. I just try to get there as much as possible out of my normal. You know, I'm going to bring some like some kind of a medical expert who's into power lighting on the show 1 day to because I'm very curious to ask this supplementation helps in decision making. And I'm not saying the pre workout is going to like, you

know, like, OK, it will give you the caffeine shot and all that rush that you get with it. But gamers, yeah, recently, like, especially like those ones who are like Microsoft Top 10 or Xbox, you know, the team and all of those guys who are like the top of the line gamers, they started having customized free workouts made for them. Man, that is so interesting. Oh wow, yeah, I remember that a lot of gamers took Jeep fuel, which is like some Jeep powder thing. I don't know exactly what it does. I think it of course, like caffeine, sugar and some other stuff that's like in all those things makes you think faster,

think more clearly. Never really tested it myself, to be honest. I but yeah, yeah. I don't know how much it really improved my, my training or whatever. Like in competition, I used to drink Red Bulls to really, like, turn myself on, but I could have never really measured if I really did better or not. It's really hard to say. I feel. I feel like I did, though, because, like, it really gives like a little punch just for the run. And I feel like it worked. And also maybe if it's placebo, it's the work, I guess. Yeah. I mean. It's all in the head anyways, right? Like you're secreting hormones

which are there in the body. Yeah, Anyways then. Yeah, exactly. So I feel like it works, but I never really measured if it really changed anything like so. I mean dude, you have your trophy speaking for you so I don't think you'd need it to measure. Like actions speak louder than words. Exactly. It's. All in the head, I love it. I love it. All right, since we're talking about all in the head, you know, one thing that I really took away from your video that you posted was that let's let's talk about visualization. Man, I, I, I love this thing about like, I love dreaming. I think it's a very powerful force that that has the, you

know, capacity to take you places and you're only held back by your imagination. Like whatever you can say the Wright brothers or whosoever were the inventors, like they dreamed. And eventually now we have an aerofoil, which all of us are having fun with. So what does visualization look like when you're chasing glory and a niche like ours? And I know this is subjective, but what was? Yours. Yeah, Yeah. For me, I feel like visualization is really underrated. I mentioned it already like in the past, also in other podcasts and videos and stuff like this, but I feel like it's still really underrated because what I said when I was in winter here

in Holland, I had to find ways to become a better pilot without flying basically. So I did a lot of research, a lot of videos, and when I was training, let's say for Infinite, I was basically standing in the middle of my room visualizing me in this rhythmic sort, pooling on the right moments all the way up to Infinity. And did this thousands times, like 5 thousands of times. I was in bed visualizing myself flying and doing tricks and maneuvers for years basically. And I really feel like that this worked because the somehow the brain cannot differentiate real life and your like your visualization. So it works basically. Of course, you have to be, you

have to try, you have to, you try, have to try to be as realistic as possible in your brain, because if you if you don't do those things, then you can maybe like fuck up in real life in the end. But if you really look a lot of videos and try to understand everything about the maneuver, the glider, the trick, the the way it feels, basically everything to make it as realistic as possible. I really feel like you can train your your head to make it work basically. So the moment you go into the sky, you fly to the box. You already have like three runs

done basically in a way. So yeah, visualizing every trick makes you for sure better by the time 100% about it. Like this helped me a lot. If you allow me, Luke, I would like to pull you back post 2022. But like, you know, because the visualization and getting you back on the horse and chasing it with as much strength and zeal is very important as well. Somehow I feel that humans visualize a lot better when they know that that is the only way out. You know? I mean, when you're good, when life is going fine, you're like, yeah, I will visualize like it's not the highest of your priority.

But when you're sitting with the cast on or something and you're like, moments are restricted and you literally know that this is my only way for to make my body heal faster and get back in the air. So but first of all, before we go there, just give give our viewers a little bit of intro of what happened. And then how did the post recovery mental training look like? And then we'll move on to the next topic. Yeah, well, already like the mental training, like of course, would you say post accident I I did a lot, but I think it kind of re sparked what I had when I was younger because what I said,

I always had this manifestation, this vision, this visualization about everything I want to do next to the awkward training and the trick cell itself, I was visualizing myself in the competitions, winning and basically all the moments that I had to go through to get there. And after the accident, of course it this feeling got better and increased a lot because I crashed. I kind of punished myself for it. I felt like I'm not religious or anything, but somehow I had this feeling that I got punished for, for, yeah, being stupid and that I had to get back stronger. And this was like a sign like this is your punishment now you

have to get out and to really do it. So when I once I got out, I like just talking about the mental things. I went back into this mental state of how I what I have to do to win. Basically the tricks, I kind of already had them. Of course, there are always more tricks to train and I already had my planned. I had everything worked out. But mentally I was thinking everything true. Like every step, like from the beginning, I came out of the hospital all the way until winning. And yeah, it's really hard to, to put this in words, but it was a lot of yeah, time in the gym just training my core and

everything to train, get my body back basically physically and putting myself in this place mentally where I would not get too stressed because the pressure was insane. You just come out of the hospital out of an accident and then you want to win the world tour. This is quite tough mentally. So I had to really calm myself down in ways and try to visualize myself or tell myself that it's all fine, it's just all training. It's like, if you don't get it this year, you get it next year or whatever. But in my head was like, no, no, I have to get it this year, but just chill.

Like, yeah, I don't know, I get it, put it in words. But I really try to, I really try to put myself in a, in a solid way not to mess up and try to think everything through through beforehand so that I wouldn't miss a single thing, basically. No surprise. I think once again we are coming back to the like drawing the same circle that it all comes down to how bad you want it every single time and. Like. It like there's something super interesting that reminds me of this guy called Doctor Joe Dispenza. Like he is somebody like he's a super famous podcast host and

motivation speaker, you know, written tons of books, improved millions of lives. That kind of a guy. He talks about manifestation and visualization in a way because he went through a road accident where he was hit by a truck. I don't know what his story was, but ended up shattering his, you know, insides. The backbone was broken on endless places. The doc said that we're going to have to put a metal rod in you just so that you can stay upright. Otherwise, there was no way that he could even sit upright or whatever. I don't know how long has recovery been revolved but it was just a few weeks and all. He said that he denied the

treatment and he just freaking spoke to his inner voice or whatever it is and manifest or visualized and the guy started walking again in a few weeks. Man, Can you believe it? This is real life like this is 2026. The guy is walking around like anybody who's who's curious about this just Google up Doctor Joe Dispenza. I think it it is like ZA at the end but the the power of manifesting and visualization like blows my mind. How much? Yeah, I believe so because when I crashed also and broke my back, a lot of people around me with the same experience reached out to me and I reached out to

them and we started talking about all those things. And when I heard the story of people like, Oh yeah, after like weeks or whatever, I could walk again or whatever this and this. And I was really like, oh, it takes quite a long time. But for me somehow like they put the rods in and the day after the the surgery they already put me up again to sit, which was really tough. I would say like the, the all the life not drained out of my body because I was laying down for like 2 weeks already, but I started walking already like 2 days afterwards basically or maybe the next day they started

put me up and they said just walk. And of course with some help I started walking. And shortly after when I went back to Holland because I had the surgery in Barcelona, I was walking like 2-3, four hours every single day. I just went outside, walked, walked, walked. And what? Longer and longer and longer. And yeah, as you all know, like next season, I was back and I was feeling fine. Of course, I was quite stiff and I had a little pain here and there, but I could just come back and train again. And also the year after when the the still was removed from my

body because I really wanted to get it removed, I left the hospital the same day. Basically I just walked. Out. No way. It's. Just quite pretty serious. Wow. Yeah, I had like the surgery at 8:00 in the morning, I think. And I woke up at like 12, maybe one or two PM, I don't remember exactly, but just midday. And at 7 in the evening, I just walked out. My my dad picked me up. And because they were the, the hospital's like, I maybe have to stay one more night. Like I don't feel like it. And I was already walking around in the room, you know, talking to the other patients.

And then they were like, OK, yeah, you can do seven, 7:00 in the evening. And I just walked out. Of course, I was really stiff. I felt it. But basically the bones were the cracks were healed already after a year. Of course, just the skin and the muscles had to heal. And of course, there were like gaps in my my bones. Those had to heal. But it was technically they said, like, you can walk, it's fine. Just of course, be really careful. But yeah, I just stood up and walked out of the hospital. There's still even a video I made to my friends holding the bag with all my titanium out of

my back, walking home. Quite funny. And then I just, yeah, did like exercise slowly. Of course, I was quite serious. I didn't went back straight into the gym. I lifted their most heavy weights. I did it slowly, recovered, walked a lot again and then slowly started to get back into the gym. Like light, light weights. And yeah, then I got better and better. You know, it reminds me of a saying I told to myself because my first instructor said this to me, that every time you feel like pushing the limits in the sport, just remember that the cost can be pretty damn steep if it goes South.

And I was just, I was just kind of running that thing in my head because obviously like initially when there's like the first 5-10 flights and you're still learning how the wind feels in your face or like how the initial G force when you pull like half a break or something, it's like, Oh my God, the, the rush and everything. And I told myself this, I was like, buddy, this sport is amazing. You know, there's there's no doubt that as a human, it will make you see the point of view of the planet that only blessed few get a chance to. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. The thing is, if you don't give

it the respect it deserves, it will make you learn how to walk again. Yeah, definitely. It's what it did to me, basically just being like, how do you say, I don't know the word exactly in English, but when you're pushing yourself too much and you, you pass the limit basically. And we knew the storm was coming and I was like, one more run, one more run. I wasn't the only one in the sky. More people were caught up in the in the storm. But basically nature just punishes you if you're not. Is that the video that we like? I think yeah, probably like few years ago, which we saw a bunch of paragliders being blown back

and people running towards them. Yeah, yeah, I was this video. Yeah, that looks scary. Yeah, I look mad. Yeah, yeah, yeah. People were. It did something because four people crashed. I was the unlucky one that broke something. The rest was fine, luckily. But I heard from my friends the weeks after there was this weird like feeling this weird vibe in Organia. So, yeah, I think a lot of people got like shaken up basically and woken up like we, we have to be serious about the weather here now again, because we fly for in organia for years and we, we know the place well, this day was a bit different and I think a lot of people realize

this, this moment and people got more careful. I I want to go on a like a mystical tangent here about how organia or the energies there were like behave.

Yeah, usually in the day when the weather is fine. It's amazing. I really like flying with your friends all day long, training like 8 hours a day until the sun goes down top, landing on the mountain, chilling. What does, what does life look like in organic life Quickly? I've been very curious because there's only a very selected few people, whoever gets to go there and camp and, you know, chase everything. So for everybody, what is it? Let's say I would take two scenarios when I just got there and like let's say the last two or three years when I just got there, you wake up what time you, it can be like 12/1.

It doesn't matter. Like life is 10K there. And yeah, you eat a breakfast there, son. It's nice. It's a good fight. This was when I was on the camping. You're around surrounded by people. You're always surrounded by people, even if you're in apartments, like you're always like, you always live, like privately, but you're always together somehow. It's really, really nice. And then let's say on an ideal day at 1:00 PM, the wind starts to blow. But usually it's on average it's between 1:00 and 5:00. The wind will start to blow. You feel the wind is coming South. When the wind suckers turning, you take the car, you go to the take off.

You wait a bit. And yeah, you take the glider, you take off and you fly the all day basically. And you train, you look at other people train, sometimes you meet up in the sky, you talk a bit, have fun, maybe fly a bit of synchro or like fuck around a bit, I don't know, something funny like this. Then you top land on the takeoff, you eat a bit, you chill a bit, you hang out, you take your stuff again, you fly again until the sun goes down and what like we call it golden hour. At golden hour we usually top lands on top of the mountain at

the antennas. We chill a bit with friends as well. Then we take off all together again and then just in front of the antennas there we do runs. We film each other with amazing light. That's where we got the best videos always when we post them. And then the moment the sun goes down, it just gets too dark basically to fly. We fly down, do a last run, lent on the take off, go home, eat dinner, go to bed and repeat. And since I started to become a pro, I wake up at like 7. Then I do one or two things. I do a hike and fly quickly for

one hour or I go to the gym for one and a half hour. Then I come back, eat breakfast, work on the laptop, do sponsorships, emails, projects, whatever like business stuff. And also just sometimes chill a bit with friends, hang out. And then same thing of the last few years, the weather was a bit different. So we went to the takeoff at like 3 more or less or four or five, depends on the day, of course, on the weather. And then same thing again. But then more serious, less chilling with other friends, more training, train, train, train. And then also me analyzing Theo the Blake a lot, because he was

my competitor. He was analyzing me a lot. Sometimes I try to do new tricks. When he just started to run, I started to do my run, so he couldn't watch me when I was learning new tricks. So I tried to think strategically like this. And of course, he did the same for me. So it was kind of like a cat and mouse game in a way, but some there's also meeting up in the sky, talking a bit because we're with friends as well, which is amazing that you're you're endless your your. Friend. And yeah, then yeah, yeah. Yeah. Basically. But yeah, we just trained the whole day like this. And at one point we also flew

syncro together. So we trained a bit of synchro. This was nice. And then same thing a lot like landing on the take off, eating, chilling, letting on the antenna school in our. Field so like, let's say if somebody wants to go there does not have a lot of resources, does not have a lot of contacts, is it like just, you know, go there, find a place and find your tribe kind of a thing like people will it's easy or you need to kind of make something called and hey, are you there at the same? Time really, No, no, usually like the seat, like most people are there in like June, July, August basically.

But the pros will be there earlier. The moment actually the weather gets good, we just go there. You don't really have to call anybody or whatever. Like pilots will be there any time of the year. Well, in summer, let's say season, you can just go there, go to the camping or go with your fan and sleep wherever you want. Basically. If you want an apartment, then you need some contacts. But I think for your first few years, if you have like a van or whatever, or if you really want to stay in an apartment, you just reach out to one of the pilots. That will give you some context to have a place.

And then, yeah, you just go there and basically just check the weather. But you can just check around because you will have the mountain in front of you. You will in the morning, you will see people fly already with the big gliders. And then, you know, like weather is starting. You just go to the takeoff. You park on a parking place and the whole community will be there. If you have any questions, you just go to some pilot and you just ask them whatever you want to know. Like we're all there. We're all there to help. So yeah, you just basically the hardest thing is just go there. Yeah, yeah, I think that sounds

quite nice. I mean if you get there rest everything else falls into place pretty much because the tribe takes care of the community. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like anything there you want to know, you just ask any pilot basically. Like you will meet us in the in the little village, in the supermarket, on the take. What's the what? What does life cost per day approximately? Like how many euros maybe?

Poof, good question. Like if let's say in one of the cheaper apartments there, it's like 600 per month, but usually we take it with two people. So this is 300 and yeah, then you just need food and gasoline basically. So but the right to the takeoff is 15 minutes, so you don't need much gasoline. And then you just need to pay food. It's I would say well, it depends of course a bit on the country, how much the food is there. But compared to Holland, it's a bit cheaper. Compared to France, it's a bit cheaper. I think Norway is quite expensive as well, so it will be cheaper than Norway but.

Yeah, I really. Want to know because I just buy food for like €8000 and I eat for. Like that I see you keep on mentioning cars, so is it really possible to go there without a car? Like can you use public transport to get there and let life figure itself out? Yeah, this is also possible. What a lot of pilots do is take a plane to Barcelona and then you can take a bus or a taxi to Organia, basically. Yeah. You get out of out in Organia and there, if you have your place, your apartment, you can you just stay at your apartment. And then to get to the takeoff,

what usually new people do is they walk a bit and they there's that basically in the village you take or you take the road all the way to the point where there's just one way up to the takeoff and then people wait there and hitchhike because many people, when the weather gets good, many people go. And there are always people able to thank you. So yeah, usually from from the village to the take off hitchhiking, it's. Got it, got it. Luke. You know, before we close for the day, I quickly want to talk about the role of mentorship in our sport because I think. Yeah. Coaching is such an underrated skill as as as I said in the

beginning, conventional sports, you have pH DS coaches doing, you know, university degrees and learning the things like flight mechanics or whatever would be be cool in para lighting. But you know, there are sports mechanics and those kind of things. So for us in our sport, it's like that guy looks cool and he flies well and he's still super passionate. So let me go ask him the questions. But obviously you are only exposed to that little side of the person. You don't know his like, you know, plus and -5 years. What did life look like or how it was? So I, I think and especially like when, as we mentioned, the

cost, the reward is freaking amazing. I'm not going to lie. You know the person is going to teach you how to have the most amazing time in your life. That is so cool. Yeah, if you put it that's kind of true, yeah. But at the same time, the cost that might come, which is always kind of hanging, the risk factor is that holy shit, you could pay the highest price ever with your life as well, if you trust, if you put your trust and energies in the wrong place. So trusting people when it comes to finding trustworthy or like reasonable advice, what is what is your take on that? How have you navigated that?

Because I think a lot of times, especially newbies or pilots who are eager are happy to be vulnerable in front of anyone. And then there are people who have their own baggage of different sorts, which might kind of, you know, give advice in a different context. So being responsible and asking for advice, what is the way in this? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's, it's really hard to say as well. I think the best examples are just people that you look up to and who did it in the best way possible. If you look at someone who threw, let's say, ideally you want to look up to the pilot who

has get the best results, no accidents and no rescues basically. But this is also kind of like debatable because it's also good to have a few rescues. Maybe it's also good to have someone teach you who had an accident because they have the experience basically how to not do it. But basically just in general, look up to a person who you think did it correctly in your eyes because it's always a bit subjective who does it right. I have my own thoughts and my own ways, but I wouldn't say I'm perfect. But of course, for me, this is how I think it's it's good. And how you can get the

furthest. If you're young and you look, yeah, and you have questions, go and ask the pilots where you look up to where you think. Like he can give me the correct advice. For me, I always think in a way because my dad really thought me like all, all my thoughts are basically because of my dad. And he always told me like don't crash really like do everything in your power to not crash. So take everything step by step. And what I see nowadays with all the younger and well, also autopilots who are just starting acro, they go way too quick through the process. Like they do tricks way out of their reach.

And I see them like falling lines, falling lighters and they get away just like they just get away with not crashing or whatever, you know? And I feel like people really have to take it more seriously that they'd go step by step because on the long run, the step by step way is anyway quicker. Like in the beginning it feels slower and it may be a bit boring, but on the long run, you'll be like way safer with the least amount of rescues. Of course rescues happen. This is like a thing. This is why we have them. That's why we have to. This is just a thing, of course, but you want to minimalize the

risk. And nowadays I see people train infinite when I just started parrotlining, you know, and of course this is nice and infinite is not crazy enough. Not a difficult maneuver. Yeah, infinite does not even like really difficult maneuver compared to what we do nowadays. But it's really dangerous. Like you pass above a glider like 1000 sky, you know, it's really it's like 1 mistake and you fall in the lines or in the glider and then you create scenarios that you don't want to create. So that's why I love the rhythmic stuff. It's a really safe and good way to train. But it's really good to have like like a kind of like a trick

guide where you have all the tricks step by step. And this would be really nice to put it out there, which actually a friend of mine already built, I cannot show you guys yet. He's will release it himself. But also me now because I stopped competing. I want to do something about this. I want to help people, the newer generation, and also not just younger pilots, but pilots of any age who just want to learn acro. I want to make a place where if you have any questions about a paragliding acro guide, yeah, you go to a certain place where you can get your questions answered, basically.

So I'm working on something. I cannot tell too much, but yeah, I want to make sure that the new generation of Acro pilots will be just safer, basically, because Acro still has this, this. Yeah. It's still kind of like a stereotype where we are the crazy pirates and super dangerous, while in the end we are in a safe box with no cliffs next to us where we can crash into, where we perform maneuvers in a safe environment basically. So I feel like a lot of things changed in Acro. I think we're really serious right now. We take it super serious. We try to do it as safe as

possible and also the best way possible. So yeah, I think for the future it could be nice to have something like this. And if you have any doubts or questions, just ask any pilots like most of us reply anyway. It's a sports sport and worst case scenario, come to our go. Yeah, you meet us first. Love it, man. Yeah, it's like one place which answers all your questions and all you have to do is just ask. How hard can it be? Exactly, and also like I also like there's also this thing about a generous of course, like it's still new. It's like a guy dominated sport, especially akro.

I really would love to see more girls. So if you're a girl you just started akro, just come like there's enough information on the Internet or people that you can ask things to help you. Basically, I really want to see more girls coming into the darker world. This would be really cool. Yeah, I know. I think it, it helps kind of having a balance. And obviously I, I think somehow for guys, it's a lot more easier to be a lone wolf and say that fuck it, I'll figure it out even if I don't have anybody to turn to. But for for for women pilots out there, it's like, you know, of

course, there's a bit of a safety thing as well that if I'm walking alone by myself, I don't know how much is it. It is in Europe. But usually, you know, having some company also means having some good safety. So I think finding A plus one in a tribe doesn't mean that it has to be romantic, but just finding a + 1 where you can put your trust is kind of helps you grow. But if if. Yeah, of course. But this goes, this goes both ways actually. Like even if you have like a body, it doesn't matter who you are, it's always better because you can learn from each other and people like the other can

watch the other. And this really helps anyway. And you kind of push each other to also train quicker. Like in 2018, I was flying in Organa, that's where I met my Algimenez. We flew out to the box together and we had basically the best time. This was amazing. Like we just kind of pushed each other in the Safeway and trained together and this was the best thing. So if you can find a body, doesn't matter who you are, this is the best in any way. Just reach out to people, ask questions, doesn't matter who you are, where you come from. I feel like there's. Always. I think that is very important.

What you mentioned in the in the end is like, if you can't find a body, like fine, you know, if you're lucky enough to have like a + 1 amazing. But if not, the easiest way is to try and make an effort for it, which is by reaching out and saying that, Hey, can you be my virtual plus one? If you can't be my physical plus one? So, but that is the whole idea of this paralyzing Atlas podcast as well, that there are a lot of people who would love to, you know, write to people like you and the other guests that we have over here. And we are trying to bridge the

gap and broadcast this knowledge to everybody else with tunes. And so thank you people. You guys mean the world to me and to everybody else. And take me as an example, I'm from a flat country. Like no one was flying really. Like of course we had some aquifers, but no one was do had the issue that I had. And I just put myself out there and it worked. So if you just put yourself out there and I ask a lot of questions like back in the day to all the pros, this was yeah, really easy to do. And most of them the replied and they helped me a lot.

So reach out and don't be scared. Like wherever you are, go for it. It's an amazing life, really. Sold, my man OK, where do I buy the next Jetro 1? Yeah, I, I should have asked you this before because, you know, this like this such sounds like such a perfect note to end on and we're running out of time. But look, one thing that I've told myself is that there are, there is a certain flight envelope that every pilot has and then there is a certain flight envelope that every glider has. The the thing that you mentioned that a lot of pilots are going out there and doing Infinity

straight out of the, you know, more or less early days. It's like, is it the pilot doing it or is the glider doing it? Because the glider can do that fairly easily. You know, for example, for example, a racetrack driver wants to clock 300 miles, 300 kilometers an hour on straight line speed. You can do that in an IndyCar or some other car which requires you to change the do the gear shift properly and, you know, hit the gas accordingly. And then if you're lucky, you get to hit the 300 mark. Or you can go in an F1 car where no matter how much you fuck up,

it'll still go 300. So. That's true, but you might hear yourself. There we go. Thank you, thank you for completing the sentence. The point is for me, E&B gliders are game changers in our in our sport. You know, these, these, this category keeps us safe, yet it has the capacity to push the limits as hard as we want and of course scare us. To me, even a high E&B like Paul Tuckharts amazes me. And it's just acro videos and stuff like that. The dude is doing crazy things on a Rush man. And like, fine, the glider will, you know, get more stress on them or whatever those things.

But how far or how long can a guy stick to an E&B? Because to me, the longer you stick to an E&B, be it acro or be it cross country or be it any other form, the faster you are going to have fun in ANC or freestyle or acro 1. So let's talk a little bit about EMB before we close. Yeah, definitely. Yeah. No, no, this is true. Nowadays also the Aquapilots realize that you can do a lot of the beginner maneuvers on the EMB. And yeah, like Theo, the Blake also showed this the last few years, how well you can do on an EMB doing Misty, Misty Haley, Haley SAT SAT Haley dynamic full

stalled. And combining all those maneuvers and already doing everything on this and trying to master them brings you so much more safety once you step into a Aqua glider. Because Aqua glider is really a different thing. Like you really just put your hand down and poof, it stalls. But already knowing how to perform those maneuvers and having the feeling how those maneuvers feel makes it just so much easier to hop on Aqua Glider. Francois de Goldsky once told me this was specifically about downsizing, but it's also jumping from an EMB. Just to let people know, Francois Robowski is also a really qualified pilot. He's he, you know, pushes XC does wall bed.

One of the legends. Wasn't reply to my emails. I don't know, I've been wanting to get him on the show for.

No, no. But he's an amazing guy and he once told me once you downsize and you fly better, it's the right time to downsize. If you not fly as good as you did on the bigger glider, don't downsize. And this is super true. I try to stay as long on the on my current glider as possible. And the moment I step down, I just feel better. Like everything just became easier and this is the right time to downsize. And nowadays I see people downsize so quick. It's super incredible. Like I'm really looking like, wow, you're you, you will never do anything. And then they fuck off big time, you know, and then I'm looking

like, yeah, man. And even if they don't fuck up, the progression would take so much longer. And also halfway into my progression, I would say like a few years in, I told myself I like on the I was doing twisted joke or twisted Corox, all those things. And then I was like, OK, I will go back fully to the basics. Start with wing overs, left, right, sought right, sought left. And what I went up by tricks all the way to the point where I was flying at the moment to be sure that I have all the basics down. And I feel like a lot of people

nowadays don't master the basics and they plateau. And this is I see this happening a lot like they have big plans and big ambitions and they take an arcroglide and they train and they get good super quick and then boom they plateau. And I feel like this is like a like because they don't master the basics. If you really work on the basics. And that's why going step by step is better. On the long run, you'll become a way better and safer pilot. OK, I'm going to come to the intuition part of downsizing or upgrading and stuff like that, but I really want to talk about the importance of basics.

I started learning in India in beer and you know, like that's the Himalayas, big mountains. You cannot fuck around and find out. You have to be sure about like the blank, basically. Yeah.

And then within my first year of flying, I moved to Norway and life got 10 more expensive. So I was like, holy shit. And progress in like steamed. It was like, holy shit. I can't find money to go to an SIV course. I can't find because like the license here was going to cost me €5000 the car license like dude, if I'm going to spend 5000 a car license, how do I, you know, burn that money in SAV course or something? So anyway, space, I made a plan that I will just go absolute berserk on wing overs because that is something that you can do anywhere and you don't have

to push the limits all the time. You can do small like you can do swing overs, you can do tiny ones or whatever. Yeah, exactly. One thing that helped me so much is feeling the brake pressure because every single flight that I had doesn't matter, it was soaring, doesn't matter it was top to bottom, doesn't matter it was whatever cross country this side of the world gave me. I finished it with wing overs up to a few 100 meters above the ground before landing. Eventually what happened is that I found myself in a position where like, OK, now I feel I'm ready for A2 liner from ENB,

high ENB to A2 liner ENC. And the only credit that I give is that when I finally flew A2 liner and I could kind of sense it and did not shit my pounds was because I have just been doing wing overs every single flight, which comes down to the basics. That horning the basics is so damn important that it, the reward it gives you is a lasting one. It's not just the thrill, it's not just the kind of, you know, adrenaline, but it's like keeping you safe in the longer run, more or less. Yeah. Yeah. That's all I wanted to brag about. Think over. Yeah, no.

Nice. No, definitely, definitely no. Yeah, what I said, step by step is the way to go. Don't rush things. If you doubt or you get stuck, go down a bit, go back to the basics, start again, work your way up. And this is just a way to really for your own safety and just for your progression if you want to become better. And I think everybody wants to be. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's, that's an inherent desire of human, you know, like you just want to do things more than what you did last month. Well, OK, let's talk about progression from E&B to freestyle or to acro. Freestyle is more or less like a

gateway, I would say, but people are happy skipping the gateway and going directly to acro and then because I mean, fine, you know, it's an expensive, you can't keep on buying things and selling them and doing going through the logistics and the administration side of it. But one thing that answered my questions was that when I was going on A2 liner and pushing full bar, there were times when I was shitting my pants so well. I mean I have no no no hard feelings in accepting it. I was shitting my pants and the sooner I. Became. Myself, look at you. Are you ashamed of of yourself now?

You wanted the flashiest wing in the world and now you can't even apply it to the to the full capacity. So anyway, trace being brutal with myself helped a lot and I was like, let me go down to 2 1/2 liner. See, I kid you not, Luke, I could go through any amount of turbulence face. I mean, you know, I'm not going to say that I'm invincible or something. Touchwood life was very kind to me, but the the anxiety just vanished. It was it was nothing but full bar all the time. So what I'm wondering is how does how does progression look from E&B to acro or to 16 meter

square acro? Let's let's just put a number to it. Yeah, yeah, it's, it just turns faster, basically just like simply said, like from our EMB to a real Aqua glider, there's a big change because Aqua gliders are really made to do Aqua maneuvers. So the EMB will be slow and long break range and yeah, will turn like smoothly and you have a lot of margin for error and Aqua gliders. You what I said before, you just put your hand down, pop and it stalls and wants to turn and shoot. It's really basically everything you want. It has you have full control of the glider basically, which can be safe in a way because it does

exactly what you want. But if you don't know what you do, then it can be quite dangerous. But that's why to start at the big Aqua glider, usually average it's 20 square meter, depending a bit on the weight of course, maybe a 22, but it depends. Usually it's on average it's like 20 and the moment you go to a 20, that's where you really do all the maneuvers that you did before and you can add some maneuvers. You can also learn a Mac twist. You can do more connections, you can do reverses. It will be easier to perform them and you can already try a few rhythmic pools. Like you don't have to go all

the way to infinite. That's why rhythmic sub is amazing because you can just work your way up until you feel uncomfortable. Just go ahead and sub and you go out of the sub really nice. You don't have to go up every time straight away. You know, you can just do a few pools, see how it goes. Go down again. Yeah, work on those maneuvers basically. And then you can go to like an 18 and I feel like an 18 square meter and I'm using myself now as like as with my weight on the 18. That's where you really start to learn like infinite. You do rhythmic, you go higher.

It's slow enough that you can see when to pull, but it's also big enough that it's like, yeah, keep you safe basically. And all the other maneuvers. And after that, it depends really how your progression goes. But the rest, I think 60 square meter is like this nice middle ground off. You can do basically every maneuver, but also it will turn slow enough that you can be relaxed and freestyle a bit basically and everything down. Downsides it from that point is just personal preference or competitions like competition mindset. Basically, you want to turn faster, You want to fly cleaner, You want it Yeah. You want to turn quicker and

connect faster. It's all all those things. But yeah, in general it will just be a speed thing. Everything will speed up. And This is why downsizing too quick is dangerous, because if you pull a Mac twist on the 14 square meter, it turns like rapidly fast, while if you do it on an 18, it's really controllable. And yeah, it will save you some mistakes. And is there a measurement metric that like we have in cross country that 50 hours every year means you're good to fly an E and BA 100 hours every year, it means you're good to fly A-22 liner like that kind of a thing like, you know, how many

Mac twists or how many hours or what, what kind of performance matrix do you guys have? We don't have anything. It's off feeling basically, and if people downsize too quick, we basically tell you that you're stupid. That's our measurement. We love the honesty, man. No and yeah, yeah, really. Like if you want to downsize also just ask people around, like asking like, have you seen me fly? Do you think it's time for me to downsize? Do you think I'm ready? It's kind of like a, like a, yeah, like a communication thing because the experienced pilots can see if you're ready basically to. Downsize. Got it. Well, I think with that we have

pretty much hit the nail on the head for anybody curious about how to make it count and acro or otherwise. Yeah, perfect. Yeah. If you're not sure about anything in Acro, just ask around. We're all happy to help. And when I say, I'm trying to to build something where you can have all your answers, all your questions. When is when is that project coming out? Just just for the perspective. Not it's hard to say I'm working on it right now because recently I put like an Instagram story on a poll like asking people what they want me to see do this year because I have more time left basically now.

And a lot of people were telling stuff like this, coaching courses, informations, locations, like basically they were all questions I had when I was younger. And what I said, it's really hard to sometimes find those answers. You have to really research, find the right post by accident or other pilots to find those answers. And now I want to create like a place where you can just have everything answered. And I try to finish it as soon as possible, or at least a part of it, like it will always be progressing and getting better. But yeah, I hope as soon as possible. What a way to give back on that. That's all I can say.

That's perfect. Amazing. Look, it's been a pleasure. Can't wait to have you back with new stories whenever you have them. So let's let's stay excited. Yeah, of course it was a pleasure. Have a good one, see ya.