Local sky diver wins gold at national championship

Submitted by the United States Parachute Association

Grayslake resident Brian Martin won gold in two-way canopy formation sky diving at the U.S. Parachute Association National Parachuting Championships recently at Skydive Paraclete XP in Raeford, North Carolina.

In canopy formation sky diving, teams of two sky divers deploy their parachutes immediately after jumping from the plane and build formations as quickly as possible while holding onto each other's canopies. A videographer flies alongside to capture the action.

Martin, 32, is a software engineer for Discover Financial Services and has completed 4,000 sky-dives. He and his team, Slotswitch, train at Skydive Milwaukee in East Troy.

Founded in 1946, the United States Parachute Association is a nonprofit association dedicated to the promotion of safe sky diving nationwide, establishing strict safety standards, training policies and programs at more than 220 USPA-affiliated sky diving schools and centers throughout the United States.

Each year, USPA's 37,000-plus members and hundreds of thousands of first-time jump students make more than 3.2 million jumps in the U.S. USPA represents sky divers before all levels of government, the public and the aviation industry and sanctions national sky diving competitions and records.

For more information on making a first jump or to find a sky diving center near you, visit www.uspa.org or call (800) 371-8772.

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