WestCoast Wingsuits "Flock Lodi"

By Ed Pawlowski

WestCoast Wingsuits, "Flock Lodi", paints the sky with awesome wingsuit pilots wearing purple and red!

The "out of towners" showed up at the Parachute Center Friday morning with their A-Game and ready to fly! To start off the event they joined a few local pilots with some nice 10-ways, while awesome clouds filled the sky for all to fly around. Unlike how Florida's humid cloud cover fogs up lenses and makes the video and stills go into a blur when entering cloud elevation, the cool crisp Northern California air refreshed the pilots and made some awesome video!

Most of the group completed 5 jumps on Friday. Normally, at all WestCoast Wingsuits events, the last jump of the day on Friday is a demo jump into Ed Pawlowski's Wine and Wings Ranch. But due to a prior engagement some locals only did 4 jumps, so they could support a local skydiver Will DaSilva, at his premier boxing match. Will's fight was well worth watching, getting the crowd on fire up with a 53 sec TKO!!!

Saturday started off with clear skies and eager pilots ready to fly. With the Ed Pawlowski leading the flock in his TIV Vampire3, and the Team Ill Vision contingent ready to fly, the sky soon filled with 20 very talented pilots in a fast flying formation through the sky.
Do to recent shoulder surgery, Team Ill Vision's Kris Sosso, was not able to fly with us this year but showed her support at the event. We also had some other talented female pilots with us too. Brook Shinsky, Cate Henegan, Lori Butz and Katie Hansen, rocked the sky with the flocks! The dirt dives were relatively easy, with only a few cats to herd, and the formations went as planned. Jade Christopher Tatom rocked the Team Ill Vision Stealth2 on the flocks and provided some awesome video for the debriefs and still pics that will make your jaw drop.

After jumping on Saturday, the flock and about a dozen other skydivers gathered at Lodi Beer Company, where great food and drink was consumed by all, with only a little concern from the restaurant staff....lol
Sunday's weather showed us that the wind was still The Boss on a couple of jumps, but the flock continued to fly some awesome formations. Tight precise flocking lead to some awesome vertical stacking throughout the day. The day also lead to Team Ill Vision breaking out its entire arsenal of Phoenix Fly wingsuits including:
Acro
Shadow (custom order)
Phantom2
Ghost2
Stealth2
Vampire3
This soon lead to almost the entire 20-way formation rockin' the TIV purple and red!
Team Ill Vision members at the event included, Avery Badenhop, Ed Pawlowski, Jimmy Hopper, David "Dingo" Royer, Damien Dykman, Ricardo Valbuena, and Jhonathan "Medusa" Florez.

Wingsuit Pilots who joined the flock included:
Cate Heneghan
Ben Mitchell
Katie Hansen
Brook Shinsky
Brian Drake
Don Simmons
Lori Butz
Charley Kurlinkus
Nic Russell
Sean Horton
Randy McCoy
Chase Bradshaw
Zack Morlock
Glen Fafard
Ira Meiberger
Kip Chambers
Andy
Melissa Pemberton
Jade Edaj

Thank you to all the new pilots that attended the event, as well as all the ones that have flown with us before! WestCoast Wingsuits and Team Ill Vision look forward to flying with you again sometime soon!

Long Flights
ED