Why back-fly comes first

The first position to learn well in freefly is back-fly: on level, holding a heading, across a range of fall rates. Every vertical position you learn later recovers to it.

The recovery position

Back-fly is the vertical recovery position: back to earth, feet together, knees toward your chest, arms out to the sides and slightly back.

If you become unstable in a sit or lose your line in head-down, recover to back-fly, in the recovery position. From there you are stable, on a known heading and falling at a speed you can control. Settle, then get back into the position and re-approach.

Make the recovery a reflex, because working it out in the air takes the seconds it was meant to save. Rehearse it on the ground with your eyes open and then closed, and use it straight away whenever you become unstable.

Without a trained recovery, the same instability can end in a cork. You drop to belly speed in a second or two, and anyone above you can hit you. More on corking.

A wide range of speeds

A neutral back-fly is where you start, and Freefly 100 asks for more. Back-fly has to catch a recovery from both head-up and head-down, so its speed range needs to be wider than that of any single working position.

On the assessment jump your coach moves from belly speed through fast knees to sit speed, and you follow on your back, staying on level the whole way. Hold level through that whole range and you have shown you can recover to back-fly at any of those speeds.

Build this range before you move on. A gap here shows up later as a cork, usually with other people close by.

The same range stays useful later. De-arching to fly fast on your back is the same input that drives out-face carving and layouts in head-up. That is why coaching in the Australian Skydiver Magazine set the progression as belly, then back-fly, then sit, then head-down: the back-fly you build first stays in use for the rest of your flying.

Head-up before head-down

The same thinking sets the order of the vertical positions. Head-up comes first because its recoveries, out to your back or down into the sit, are more forgiving and better understood than a head-down recovery at 270–400+ km/h.

You build the recovery habit where the speeds are lower, then take it with you to head-down. More on the recovery position.

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Advisory, educational content. Techniques and speeds are guides that vary with body type, gear and conditions. Learn recovery skills under a qualified coach, and comply with your federation and drop zone.