From Team Beale to Team USA, Tech. Sgt. Goodwin set to compete in international skydiving competition

  • Published
  • By Charles Borsos
  • 9th Reconnaissance Wing
HOHENEMS, Austria --  

When U.S. Air Force Tech. Sgt. Michael Goodwin arrived in Austria, he did something he usually doesn’t: he let the airplane land before getting out of it.

Goodwin, a 9th Physiological Support Squadron aircrew flight equipment (AFE) technician at Beale Air Force Base, spends much of his free time skydiving. Soon, he is set to compete for Team USA at the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale Skydiving World Cup and the International Speed Skydiving Association’s 6th World Cup of Speed Skydiving, held simultaneously in Hohenems, Austria.

For many, skydiving is a once in a lifetime experience. But for Goodwin, he regularly completes multiple jumps a day in preparation for this upcoming speed skydiving competition.

The difference between a good run and a bad run can be subtle, and practice allows for the gradual refinement of positioning to make the human body slip through the air as smoothly (and as quickly) as possible. Jumps are scored by taking the average of the three fastest seconds of free fall, recorded by a GPS system.

“You pick up little things. If I move my arm this way, then my body will turn. If I tilt my head this way, then my angle will change,” Goodwin said. “It’s about how you fly your body.”

“We’re not dealing with falling straight to earth, we’re dealing with something more,” he said. Goodwin is meticulous in his preparation. He tracks his stats and analyzes video of his jumps to adjust his technique and fall even faster. “We have to control our body to make ourselves as aerodynamic as possible and that’s really the balance of this discipline,” he said.

“The average skydiver will fall around 120 miles per hour, depending on their weight ratio, air resistance, and body position,” said Goodwin. “Speed skydivers, we can reach up to 300, 305 miles per hour. That’s the average we are hitting right now.”

Speed skydiving is a relatively young sport and competitors are still finding limits for how fast they can fall. Goodwin was first exposed to skydiving early in his Air Force career when he started as a rigger at RAF Mildenhall, England. “I went to Mendenhall and was working with premeditated parachutes all the time. Turns out the majority of the AFE shop that I worked at, all of them were skydivers,” he said.

Early in his skydiving career, Goodwin met the world-renown jumper, Tim Porter. Porter, no more than 120 pounds, would poke fun at the larger Goodwin. “He has to keep up with me, I fall a lot faster,” Goodwin said. When Porter began coaching Goodwin, Goodwin had about 30 jumps under his belt; Porter had over 25,000. Yet, when Porter suggested Goodwin look into speed skydiving, Goodwin initially throught he was still just joking about their size difference.

Eventually, Goodwin figured Porter was being serious.

“I realized that my entire time skydiving, every time I would jump with someone else, I would have to be restrictive on how I fly. I had to basically fall as slow as possible. And when you’re falling as slow as possible, you’re restricting your movements, so you can’t really move around as you would like to,” Goodwin said. “When I started speed skydiving, I realized that I have no restrictions.”

With speed skydiving, Goodwin found freedom and success. In 2024, he competed in his first competition, scoring sixth and earning a place on Team USA for the competition this August.

“We’re just representing something bigger than ourselves. It’s one of those reasons why I joined the Air Force,” said Goodwin. “I can not only represent the Air Force, but I can now represent the United States as well.”

For 9 PSD, Goodwin’s fellow Airmen are excitedly waiting to hear back about his jumps in Austria.

Staff Sgt. Ysaak Hemenway, PSD launch and recovery supervisor, said,” I think we are all pretty excited for someone from our shop to represent the USA. It’s like the Olympics for skydiving.”

Hemenway remarked that the same detail-oriented mindset which has allowed Goodwin to make steady improvements in the sky serves him well at PSD and in AFE. “When he’s working on a suit, he is very meticulous,” Hemenway said, discussing the careful way Goodwin checks and repairs the critical suit components which allow Beale’s U-2 Dragon Lady pilots to safely fly over 70,000 feet.

“He’s a good guy and he always goes above and beyond,” echoed Senior Airman Manuel Ortega, PSD technician.

“The squadron over here has been extremely vocal about their support. And not so much like ‘hey we hope you do a good job’. But showing interest in what I do, why I do it and how I got into it. That’s the type of support that really carries you on,” said Goodwin.

In speed skydiving, each competitor is trying to individually go as fast as possible. Yet, for Goodwin, competing is about more than self. “They don’t see the back of the shirt,” Goodwin said, “They see the front, and the front says U-S-A.”