The son of a previously unrevealed badass, sports like surfing had attracted Mike Brewer from a young age, but as he found himself running track for a military academy he couldn't help but feel that something was missing. As usually happens, random chance and circumstance found him taking the leap on his first static line jump. Then his second that same day. That was pretty much all it took. Realizing that his previous love for photography could aim him toward the top of the pyramid as a... tand...
May 26, 2024•57 min•Ep. 327
Born in the Dominican Republic and raised in Canada, Carlo Manuel did all the same things the other kids did. From skate boards to music, he did his best to fit in with the crowd; but when the thought of life in the military appeared on his radar, he knew it was the role of paratrooper that had real appeal. So much so that Carlo went out and made his first jump at a civilian dropzone, just to make sure he and a grip on what was to come. That's all it took. Although it would be many years before ...
May 19, 2024•1 hr 27 min•Ep. 326
"Cause who the hell am l" is what most people say when they've got an opinion they either aren't ready or don't think they're qualified to share, and although you'll hear Candice say those exact words, they aren't ones that keep her from sharing. A self proclaimed 'empty Nester' who found herself asking what might come next, it turned out skydiving was. Back in the day there was no way she could have ever imagined doing even one jump let alone going on to get licensed, but now, having raised chi...
May 12, 2024•1 hr 19 min•Ep. 325
Friends for decades, Paul Dorward and Ollie Neuberger had a lot in common from the very beginning. A love for skydiving, and a career in law enforcement. As each discovered along the way their love not only for teaching within the sport, but welcoming new people to play, they found themselves regularly traveling abroad with plane loads of fellow police Britts to exotic places like Lake Elsinore, California. Paul was blasting full steam ahead on the canopy side of the sport, while Ollie set his s...
May 05, 2024•1 hr 15 min•Ep. 324
Back in the can to fire off a few questions of his own, A legend in the airsports world who has not only carved out his own unique path, but helped countless others find their own, Ray Kubiak shows not only why he's an incredibly valued member of The Lunatic Fringe, but one who's taken up an entirely new challenge which he'll be making good on in less than three months!
Apr 28, 2024•1 hr 21 min•Ep. 323
Like a lot of us, Andy "Bad Andy" VanHandel went out to make his first jump with his then girlfriend. How did that first jump go? Truth is, he couldn't tell you. It was complete overload... Yet something in that first experience drew him back. By jump number 3, he knew he'd found his sport. Working toward his coach rating, then static-line instructor, and eventually to a very busy weekend warrior TI, Andy had found not just a passion, but a community to share it with. Still deep in the tandem ga...
Apr 21, 2024•1 hr•Ep. 322
Although Dawson and Olivier started their journey in skydiving at the same time, it was the tunnel that first sunk its hooks deep in both of them. Growing up in Canada, all the usual sports were on tap for each of them, from snowboarding to rock climbing, but it was the tunnel that showed them something exciting and new. As with most, finding both the time and money to maintain turned out to be the biggest challenge, and although Covid threw a proper wrench into the machine for everyone, both Ol...
Apr 14, 2024•57 min•Ep. 321
Anyone in skydiving for any length of time hears amazing stories, both in the air and on the ground. For those outside the sport, some of them are truly hard to wrap your head around... and Rhino Jon? Well, he has more of those stories than almost anyone. From wealthy beginnings Jon decided to go a different way. His path led him toward the military, then special forces, then covert style operations, drug smuggling, art theft, and of course skydiving. With a 12,000 acre "garden" in Kenya to tend...
Apr 07, 2024•43 min•Ep. 319
The first time Lee Crudgington thought about jumping out of an airplane he was just in search of a plan for the future. He wasn't prepared for the military recruiter telling him paratrooper training was the way to go. Being fit and young, his training went well, all except for being deployed first to his paratrooper regiment in Iraq without having gone through jump school; yet once he did finally earn his wings, it was the fast track for Lee. Becoming a member of the heralded Red Devils from the...
Mar 31, 2024•1 hr 28 min•Ep. 317
Another kick ass reboot with Marat Leiras! Originally aired Aug 2020 At 17 he knew. Well, he knew after he talked his mother into signing the release anyway. Marat Leiras showed his dedication to the sport of skydiving almost right away with a 400 kilometer drive one way to the dropzone just to get through AFF. With some serious skill, some wonderful luck and a whole lot of great timing, Marat managed to travel the world, train and jump with some of the best the sport had to offer and even marry...
Mar 28, 2024•1 hr 8 min•Ep. 320
From a pretty standard 'that one time I had some money and free time' start to skydiving, to it becoming an almost singular pursuit, Jimmy McCarthy discover in himself not only a desire to pursue his dream of flight, and his passion for teaching, but also an almost core desire to be his own boss. Now a successful load organizer, tunnel coach, and partner with his wife in a budding real estate empire, he's bouncing around from country to country, teaching people to fly and setting aside enough ti...
Mar 24, 2024•1 hr 2 min•Ep. 316
Another kick ass mid week reboot with Junior! Originally released Jan 2021. Back in the can with the Fuckin' co-host Junior Ludvic, he's got some good tips and advice on taking care of your gear while it's down for the winter months, keeping or getting current, dealing with injuries and what the future holds, this time around on The Lunatic Fringe.
Mar 21, 2024•51 min•Ep. 318
Like anything, being raised within a sport or activity can either draw you in or push you away, and skydiving is no exception; and although skydiving didn't push Anna Moxnes away from the idea of jumping, it didn't exactly call to her. At least not like music did. At a very young age, Anna found herself on the road as a backup singer in a working band, and it wouldn't be until a random opportunity to make a tandem skydive for charity came about that the idea of jumping surfaced. Even then, it wo...
Mar 17, 2024•1 hr 10 min•Ep. 311
Another kick ass mid week reboot with Timmi Thomsen! Growing up seeing canopies in the air pretty much his entire life, the idea of going to make a skydive when he turned eighteen seemed like a pretty easy decision. Like more than a few jumpers, it didn't take very long until Timmi spotted the direction he wanted to take his journey in the sport. Seeing what at the time he thought was a fatality in action, but was in reality just another swoop did the trick. After a fortuitous job offer to go pa...
Mar 14, 2024•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 315
Growing up in a kitchen helped toughen up Tom Gunes. Working his way from a sink full of dishes to a chef's knife, there's no doubt in his mind that the fiery environment a chef has to operate in helped prepare him for the stresses of skydiving, and he took to our sport from jump number one. With his beginnings at one of the most prestigious drop zones in the world, he's been able to soak up inspiration from icons in the sport, but long before he'd ever seen a parachute in person, he'd seen skys...
Mar 10, 2024•49 min•Ep. 310
Another kick ass mid week reboot with Jeff Weatherall! As a young Kiwi, starting out with sport was a pretty natural thing, and Jeff Weatherall excelled. Surfing seemed to be a natural fit for him, and competition became the standard at a young age; but as is known to happen when you push for the top, Jeff found himself burned out on the waves, and instead put all of his focus into a sport he'd never considered before, wakeboarding. On his way to becoming an international champion behind a boat,...
Mar 07, 2024•1 hr 19 min•Ep. 314
He never could have imagine when at the ripe old age of seventeen and enlisting in the Army that he'd eventually be nudged into pursuing skydiving by open water and a big fish, but that's exactly what happened. Greg Windmiller knew pretty quickly that skydiving was for him. With what he admittedly calls a 'blessed' career, Greg found himself not just jumping with some of the best in the business, but leading the pack. With a passion cultivated between military and civilian operations, he found h...
Mar 03, 2024•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 309
Another kick ass mid week reboot with The Darmon Brothers! Third generation skydivers, brothers Marcos and Franco were literally born for aviation. Through luck, both good and bad, their grandfather and father built the family airfield and operation literally from the ground up, and these two brothers took to it like ducks to water, although not as quickly as one might think. With Business and Medicine the original goals, it was conscious decision to change course and follow in their fathers foo...
Feb 29, 2024•1 hr 4 min•Ep. 313
An absolute trailblazer in the world of freefall photography and the man who can almost single-handedly be credited with blueprint for modern tandem video production, Mike Mcgowan joins us once again to talk not only about his incredible career in our sport, but about a subject that holds just as much importance to him. Addiction. Having faced his own demons in the form of alcohol and drug addiction, Mike speaks frankly about his now forty years of sobriety and what it took to get him from a pat...
Feb 25, 2024•57 min•Ep. 308
Another kick ass mid week reboot with Will Lajeunesse! Starting out at Skydive Crosskeys in the early 2000's was a fucking trip! Just ask Mr. Will Lajeunesse... From the dropzone fix-it-all man so he could jump his ass off, to a fully sponsored athlete, Will had the chance to see skydiving from every angle, both good and bad. From crazy highs to deep lows, he's had the opportunity to taste a bit of it all. Having become infamous for some seriously sketchy shit, to becoming zen in the alps, Will ...
Feb 22, 2024•1 hr 29 min•Ep. 312
Drawn to skydiving when higher education failed to engage him and it's social scene held no interest, Nicolas Armstrong couldn't help but feel when he went out to make his first jump on a weekend that also happened to be during the biggest boogie of the year that it simply must be his destiny. With more than 20 years in the sport, working as everything from a camera flyer to tandem instructor to AFF and competitor, he has more than his fair share of stories to tell. On top of that, having to nav...
Feb 18, 2024•1 hr 19 min•Ep. 306
Another kick ass mid week reboot with Shannon and Louise! Living mirrored lives on different sides of the planet, Louise Kristensen and Shannon Seyb had a passion and drive for most all the same things. From Horseback riding and yoga, to tunnel flying and a love of the sky and our community, forming a team to spread the love and a positive vibes was the only natural thing to do. Biding their time until they can train for dynamic two way tunnel comps and get back in the air, Louise and Shannon ta...
Feb 13, 2024•1 hr 3 min•Ep. 307
EPISODE #300! Fourteen years old isn't terribly early to be exposed to the wonderful world of skydiving if you're a second or even third generation jumper, but for someone with no connection to it... James Heck was that kid. Through random circumstance, James found himself packing parachutes almost right away, and even though he'd be required to wait what must have seemed like a lifetime to manage that first jump, he knew it was exactly what he wanted to do. Now a proud camera flying, TI instruc...
Feb 11, 2024•51 min•Ep. 304
Back in the can after way too long, the one and only David Junior Ludvik catches back up with us to talk about his beginnings in the sport, the wild and wonderful ride that was a decade in Dubai, life after the sandbox and a more military take on the sport, and just some all around fun catching up with The Lunatic Fringe.
Feb 04, 2024•58 min•Ep. 302
Another kick ass mid week reboot with the one and only Mark Norman! In this episode I get the chance to sit down with one of skydivings true ambassadors. Having come up in the sport during times of great change and innovation, Mark recalls what it was like to be there "when". Through struggles with burnout and addiction, he's persevered to cultivate a love for skydiving, its community and all the lessons he's learned, and freely shares them with me.
Feb 01, 2024•1 hr 29 min•Ep. 305
Leaving Southern California for the North Shore of Hawaii Sounded like the perfect opportunity for a then 18 year old Robin Jandle, and it was. So when the opportunity to go make a skydive over one of the most beautiful places on Earth came up, she was... absolutely not into it. So, as good friends are known to do, they took her anyway and peer pressured her on to the plane. One grudging tandem turned into a second, then AFF in one of the most challenging places in the world to learn, and before...
Jan 28, 2024•51 min•Ep. 300
Another kick ass mid week reboot with Ellis Danho Bourbonnais! Ellis Danho Bourbonnais is the quintessence of a renaissance man to say the least, but most certainly not in the way most people would think. From surfing in the Gulf and then Hawaii, to MMA, skydiving, BASE jumping and climbing, Ellis is more at home pushing his personal limits than most people are on a sofa. Attacking new passions whole heartedly is where he's at his best, and he takes this time to give us a few of the reasons why....
Jan 24, 2024•1 hr 4 min•Ep. 303
in 2012 going out to make a tandem skydive in Poland was pretty much like everywhere else. You book it, you jump. But when Marta Molinska made her first skydive, she didn't even make it to the ground before she was asking how she could make it as a pro. Her instructor not only got her to the ground safely and aimed her in the right direction to begin her journey, but remains her biggest supporter to this day. Now, not just the AFF instructor she set out to be on that very first jump, but managin...
Jan 21, 2024•53 min•Ep. 299
Another kick ass mid week reboot with JYRO! Back in the can to talk all things nylon are Julien Peelman, Chris Stewart and first timer Chris Snell who are quite literally the ABC's of canopy development, design and production for New Zealand Aerosports. From concept to the production of Proto types to test jumping, we sit down to chat about exactly what it takes to put together the industries leading wings that help keep the lunatic fringe in the sky.
Jan 18, 2024•1 hr 16 min•Ep. 301
“Imagine a free fall from an altitude exceeding 26 miles, breaking the sound barrier unaided, and ascending to the highest crewed balloon flight—this is Hera Rising. Their historic dive aims to leave its mark on history and in hearts, smashing records and lifting spirits.” Meet Eliana Rodriguez, Swati Varshney and Diana Valerin, the Hera Rising teammates who, along with everyone at Rising United have aimed their sights higher than ever before., determined to take the Lunatic Fringe to the highest...
Jan 14, 2024•1 hr•Ep. 295
