This is the Leadership and Adventure blog written personally by Alastair Macartney.
I’ve got a lot going on this year and, as a result, I’m having to slow down the rate at which I’m blogging – apologies. This is temporary. I will continue to blog and I will get back to a regular schedule. In the mean time I’ll keep new content coming, just not as frequently, and please do check out the archives.
I’d still love to hear from you so please leave comments and I’ll make sure that I attend to them personally.
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 06:00 in Adventure | Comments Off on ProBASE World Cup Final
ProBASE World Cup Final The final competition of the ProBASE World Cup starts this week in Stechelberg, Switzerland where the best of the best are lining up to fly their wingsuits in a head-to-head race. The pilot that crosses the finish line first will be crowned champion. Piloting skills continue to advance and we’re anticipating some record breaking times at this event. In previous years, getting times between 21 – 23 seconds while flying the course were pretty good. This year, I suspect, getting a a time of 22.5...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 06:00 in Challenge, Leadership | 2 comments
Challenge Yourself And Remember 911 Tomorrow is the 12th anniversary of the events of 11 September 2001. A day when much of the modern world was shaken by a series of unexpected events. A day that changed the direction of many of us and directly or indirectly affected a huge percentage of the world’s population. Like many, I remember exactly where I was. I was on temporary duty at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, training with the US Army Parachute Team, the Golden Knights. I remember boarding the Twin Otter aircraft, taxiing...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 06:00 in Adventure, Challenge, Risk | 11 comments
Preventing Death – The August Attrition I lost a number of friends in August. Dead. Gone. Forever. I’d like to think these deaths could be preventable and I certainly don’t want to follow their fate. I’ve made a plan to survive. 5 wingsuit pilots died in a 7 day period in August 2013. I call it the August Attrition. It’s a phenomenal number. What’s worse is that they were all experienced BASE jumpers and competent wingsuit pilots. They were current and good at what they did. They weren’t the cowboy jumpers that...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 19:36 in Adventure, Challenge, Leadership, Risk | Comments Off on Inspiring or Inspired?
Inspiring or Inspired? I leapt from the 217 feet tall World War One Museum, landed in front of the media, presented the American flag to a Vietnam Veteran and then helped him raise it – you can see links to one of the news reports in my last post. It was inspiring stuff. But I was inspired too. We then got a call from the Mayor’s Office. He wanted to meet me. The 5 minutes I had scheduled in to see him quickly became 30 minutes. Mayor Sly James loved what I and my team, Jump4Heroes, did and wanted to meet me....
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 15:48 in Adventure, Challenge, Leadership | 2 comments
BASE Jump from World War One Liberty Memorial Museum Incredible. Yesterday, I leapt from the 217 feet high World War One Liberty Memorial Museum. It was an incredible experience. I got to be the first person to have ever made this leap and I did it 99 years after the start of the Great War. As part of it I was privileged to jump in with the American flag and present it to a Vietnam Veteran – US military and UK military working side-by-side, shoulder-to-shoulder. See the Fox News coverage. The coverage went viral. It was immense....
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 20:03 in Adventure, Challenge, Leadership, Risk, Teamwork | Comments Off on Achieving Success – Defy Impossible
Achieving Success – Defy Impossible Success can often be the result of lots of hard work. Over the last couple of months I, as part of the Jump4Heroes team, have been working extremely hard on a stunt that should come to fruition next week. On Saturday I travel to Kansas City to deliver a TEDx talk. While it will be based on the talk I gave at TEDx Houses of Parliament in May it will be more focussed, detailed and expanded as well as being totally aligned to their theme; Defy Impossible. The theme is awesome and aligns...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 20:15 in Teamwork | 1 comment
Life Lessons In Surviving The Honeymoon When Disaster Strikes I got married. It was an amazing day. But, very quickly, it all went terribly wrong. We got married, in our first wedding, in a slightly unconventional way, wearing costumes. I wore a huge afro while my bride wore a beautiful period dress – we were, sort of, dressed as hippies. Our small group of friends joined us with a variety of outfits. The theme was ‘Love Through The Ages’. We had a ball, popping champagne next to the canal near Oxford City...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 13:03 in Adventure, Leadership | 8 comments
Being True To Yourself – Why I Know I’ll Have 2 Weddings Before I’ve Had My First I get married tomorrow. It will be my first marriage. I’m going into this knowing that I will have a second marriage and I’m extremely happy with this. You might think this odd, but my circumstances are odd too. The Complications My fiancee and I both live in UK. That’s where I’m from but she’s a Californian girl, born and raised, and her family live there. My family have...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 06:00 in Adventure, Challenge, Comfort Zone, Teamwork | Comments Off on Closest Thing To Crazy
The Closest Thing To Crazy Picnics in the sky, a chart topping singer and a superbike double World Champion. That was our excitement recently. Katie Melua, the best selling musician and supporter of the military, and her double World Champion biker turned rock star husband James Toseland joined Jump4Heroes to go skydiving. But, it was skydiving with a twist. The plan was to promote Poppy Picnics, a summer initiative to raise awareness for The Royal British Legion. So, Katie, publicised as an adrenaline junkie, and her...
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Posted by Alastair Macartney on 06:00 in Adventure, Challenge | 4 comments
From Hero To Zero I won the ProBASE World Cup Istanbul Sapphire Showdown. My next competition was at Kjerag, Norway and I flailed. I went from winning to losing in just one jump. The competition at Kjerag was the first wingsuit competition of the ProBASE World Cup Tour this year. But, not only that, it had a new format. Instead of racing in a straight line we had a U-Turn race. Competitors would leap from the 3,000 feet high mountain through a set of start gates with an electronic timing system. They would fly at high speed next...
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