Fighter Freaks Interview – Jim Martin
by NicOneill

- What is your name? Jim Martin
- How long have you been flying fighter kites? Intermittently for maybe 20 years (?)
- Why fighter kites? Why not? They are amazing little flying machines, a lot of fun to play with — if you enjoy kites, seems to me to be a good idea to at least try as many different sorts as possible. If you don’t fly them all, you miss some of the fun.
- What is the easiest, and hardest thing to learn about fighter kites? Often it seems hard to find them, and the line. Not super hard, but you have to dig a little. After that it is just a case of working on the “touch.” I never had anybody give me a lesson really, just read up on how they work and started playing.
- Favorite place to fly? A beach. Furthest you have traveled for a match? I don’t fly to compete, I fly because it is fun. Non-competitive, non-combative fighter kiting sounds like something of a contradiction, I guess, but ti works for me..6. Is it all hardcore competition, or is it friendly rivalry? Not applicable to me.
- What do you think is the biggest obstacle for people to get into fighter kites. See 4.
- Do you make your own? I’ve made a few. A couple sewn fabric, a couple out of orcon. I’ve done some miniatures for indoor use.
- What is the strangest thing you have ever been asked or told about your flying? The usual comment about “if you just put a tail on it, it’ll quit spinning arou like that and fly way up there.
- Why should someone try this? Try everything you can. You get one go-round.
