Catching up with Voodoo 4-way team

Congratulations to Voodoo, UK National Champions, and previous National Champions of South Africa! They are very worthy winners, having worked very hard as a team, continually pushing their own boundaries for over a decade.

How come you changed from being a South African team to being British?

Vana: We’ve entered the UK Nationals for many years as a guest team, and have finished second the last two times, obviously behind Satori. We thought that we would like to come back this time as a British team. All three of us [from previous Voodoo line-up] are living in the UK now and we decider to switch. We didn’t compete at the last World Championships and wanted to come and give the English system a try. It was a goal to come and see how well we could do against very stiff competition.

Who has gone from your line-up?

Dave: We lost Colin, who was our last link to South Africa. He moved out of SA to take up a post in China for a few years. The other three of us live in the UK and we thought that that was probably the right timing for us to make the full switch to the English system. You can’t just click your fingers and change country. You have to sit out of World Meets for a few years. We were hesitant to do it but we decided that this was a good year to make the switch, so we decided to sit out of the World Championships this year, which means that we haven’t represented South Africa for more than two years, which in turn means that next year we will be eligible to compete for the UK. We have been living here for 6 or 7 years now, and we wanted to become part of the thriving skydiving community here.

Why did you want to enter as British Nationals?

Vana: That was part of our goal really. In SA it’s quite a small pool of skydivers, so it became after a while not really challenging to win there any more. The UK has a really good talent level so it was going to be a tough competition to do well at. Initially when Colin left us last year, we started jumping with Gary Smith, our coach, which was so good for experience and skills. We entered a lot of competitions as guest teams. [Even though Gary is South African by birth he competes for the Netherlands as he lives there, and has previously competed for USA]. Then this year we saw an opportunity, that if we could find a British National to join us we could compete for GB, and Liz [Matthews] has been perfect. It couldn’t have worked out better. We did reasonable amount of tunnel and a 50-jump camp in Spain. We just had so much fun and she fitted in so well, personality-wise, the flying has been great and we’ve really done well together. We’ve scored our highest ever average and we couldn’t be happier.

Was it a long search to find someone to replace Colin?

Dave: It fell into place pretty quickly. When Colin left us a year and a half ago then Gary started jumping with us, and we had a goal to reach a 19 average, then we thought it might help the next stage.

Vana: We thought that we might be more attractive! That it would help someone to want to join us – to take the chance.

Dave: We looked around and did some research on the skydivers in this country and looked at who the inside centres were, and straight away thought of Liz. We figured, if we can get her it will be great. She accepted, so that was fantastic. We were very happy to do the Nationals with her. We’ll see what happens next, in the future, we don’t have any plans as a team.

Vana: Apart from going to Chicago tomorrow for the US Nationals! We’re going to compete in the US Nationals, with our coach Gary, as a guest team again, but this time a British guest team.

What do you think of the British Nationals?

Vana: It’s so exciting to be part of the British Nationals. It’s just amazing.. There are so many teams here, and you watch the videos, and see so many really good jumpers.

Dave: It’s an incredible community in Britain. We really appreciate it, coming from a place with not so many skydivers.. where there are only 5 or 10 teams in the Nationals. Coming here you suddenly have over 70 teams, and an amazing standard. Some of the rounds we did there were 4 or 5 teams all scoring the same at the top. That is really competitive.
People can go to a very high level here really quickly, and the whole level of UK skydiving. We saw that wave a few years back and we thought we want to be part of that.

Why do you think are there so many teams at UK Nationals?

Vana: I was speaking to Liz about this earlier. You have 4 wind tunnels here, which makes a huge amount of difference. There are a lot of very active coaches. Everyone’s got access to good training and good coaching. when you are part of something like this, when you come into it as a rookie, you think, I want to be part of this, it’s really exciting!

Dave: You have a lot of quality coaches who are actively putting teams together. You have good drop zones and you have a relatively strong economy. People can actually afford to skydive here, which doesn’t happen in every country. You have a lot of ingredients to make this happen. You have good skydivers at every level here, you have all the benchmarks. You have teams that score a 20 average. Teams at 19s 18s, 17s, and so on all the way down the scale. So everyone can see the next step. It just creates this great environment for people to improve.

How important is Skydive Hibaldstow’s contribution to our skydiving community?

Vana: It’s very important; the facilities and the aircraft here. The UK isn’t known for great weather but the fact is, when it does clear or there’s a gap, you get straight up in the sky and make the most of it. No messing around, it moves fast.

Dave: It’s a very slick operation. We’ve been to quite a few world Meets over the years and we’ve seen some that aren’t as well organised as this. It’s very smooth. They are coordinating multiple aircraft and there are all these different areas that have to be coordinated; the boarding points, landing points, the loading points.. there is a lot going on… to coordinate all that and keep it slick is impressive. You have to give [Hibaldstow] kudos for that, a huge round of applause. We’ve come to about 6 of these events now and we’ve never seen a bad one. It’s always very smooth. Great job!

As a long running team with the same line-up, do you have any advice on keeping a team together?

Vana: Dave and I have been jumping together for ten years. There is a formula for a team, which is that getting along is more important than the skydiving… then, because you get along then the skydiving works

Dave: Choose people that have the personalities you get along with. It has to be people that you would want to go on holiday with, if you weren’t skydiving. They don’t have to be close mates, though they will become mates over time. You also have to have similar goals, finances etc. If you do that then you will still have a strong basis for a team, so that when someone does leave, you always have a core team identity that someone else can step into, then you look for someone similar who fits that mould. The key to keep it together is, always be willing to take the next step. When someone steps out, find the next person who fits that mould but keep progressing. Last year we didn’t have a fourth so we kept moving forward with Gary our coach, just until we could find a fourth.

Vana: We have been through a lot together. Once you have been through some hardships together then you have a history together and it strengthens the bond. In South Africa it’s hard to skydive, and it’s very expensive to come to Europe to train, you have to make a lot of sacrifices to make it happen. Then you got to meets together, and some go well, some don’t go so well, and it’s like the relationship bonds and then you can carry on from there.

Dave: One other thing I would say is, get quality coaching. We’ve been fortunate in that we’ve always had really good coaches; Gary Smith, Solly Williams, Steve Hamilton, quite a few. You learn a lot from those coaches, not just about skydiving but about team dynamics. How do you cope with the grumpiness after a 10-day training camp, cope with arguments, when you want to tear each other’s throats out. How to deal with that, recognise the signs, move past that, look at the positives, etc. A good coach will help you deal with those things so you can manage them and stay together, whereas otherwise they might make a new team fall apart.

What are the best things about Gary as a coach?

Dave: He’s got a similar accent, we understand him! 😉 Gary has a very similar approach to us. He just fits. We can be serious but we also like to have a laugh; he really gets that and joins in, he gets the humour and gives it back. He knows when to have a laugh and when to tell us to calm down and refocus. He’s very personable. He has a huge amount of experience. Everyone knows Gary and likes him, he just talks to everyone, he is a great guy and is a mentor to many people. Good luck trying to book him! He’s very busy.

Vana: He gives 100%. He really cares. Even during this meet when he’s in the US, we’ve been getting lots of messages from him. He’s waking up in the middle of the night to check how we’re getting on, whether we’re jumping, what’s going on. The last message from him obviously said huge congratulations, but it also said “I’m so sad that I can’t be with you to share this and celebrate.” He really cares about us and the team, and I get the feeling he’s like that with all the teams he coaches.

What’s it going to be like jumping with Gary again?

Vana: It’s going to be good. We’re looking forward to it – but it is going to be a bit strange. Obviously this was a very favourable draw. We were hoping to do an 18.5 maybe a 19 average with Liz, and then increase that with Gary. But we made our best ever average of 19.5. But we’re now under a bit of pressure with the US Nationals, maybe we could get a hard draw and then we might score less with Gary than with Liz!