This is the full transcript for Episode #238 of the Wild Business Growth Podcast featuring Luke Aikins – Distinguished Skydiver, Red Bull Air Force. You can listen to the interview and learn more here. Please note: this transcript is not 100% accurate.
Luke Aikins 0:00
You calculate that risk and then you make the leap. I just think that’s a such a good lesson for people to learn and I literally am taking the leap every day.
Max Branstetter 0:22
Hi up there in the sky. Hello. Welcome back to the Wild Business Growth Podcast. This is your place to hear from a new entrepreneur every single Wednesday morning who’s turning Wild ideas into Wild growth. I’m your host, Max Branstetter, Founder and Podcast Producer at MaxPodcasting. And you can email me at to save time with your high-quality podcast. This is episode 238. And we have a 230-Crazy-8 one for you. Today’s guest is Luke Aikins. Luke is a skydiver who is boundary-pushing, record-breaking, limit-pushing. He has skydived over 20,000 times, including one time without a parachute where he landed in a net after skydiving from 25,000 feet, he has also consulted on the Red Bull Stratos jump from the stratosphere. He has been featured in the Iron Man film franchise, and he is a member of the Red Bull Air Force. This is one of the most fascinating and just crazy conversations I’ve ever had. And in this episode, we talk Luke’s skydiving roots, which kind of rhymes just count it, the behind the scenes of some of his most historic dives, and fascinating and laugh-creating,cCan’t think of a better adjective or adverb whatever that is for that questions from Wild Listeners. So thank you for submitting those. It is Ssweet Luke. Enjoyyyyyy the shoooooow!
Aaaaaalrightyyyyy we are here with the daredevil, the skywalker, the professional skydiver, there’s lots of names for for this particular guest, but I like to call him Luke. Luke, thank you. Thank you so much for joining. Just so super excited to talk to you today. How you doing today?
Luke Aikins 2:23
Thanks, man. I’m stoked to be here. Actually, I haven’t done one of these in in quite a while last year I’ve been kind of silent. So it’s really excited to talk with you guys and share whatever what we’re up to.
Max Branstetter 2:34
Oh, of course, well, that means a lot that you’re you’re breaking out of the cone of silence for this interview. So it’s super excited to dive into all sorts of things skydiving and in your professional career. But before that, like many of us, there was some point in your life. As a kid I would guess that you had never gone skydiving before. Can you take us back through your first time actually jumping out of a plane and what was going through your mind there?
Luke Aikins 3:02
Yeah, I mean, I was able to make my first skydive it a tandem jump when I was 12 years old. Back when the rules were a little more loosey goosey. We made a I got to make a tandem jump. My dad flew the plane and I took me up we did a a tandem skydive. It was pretty fun, but you’re kind of just along for the ride. It was really cool to experience. But the first time I actually got to jump by myself, I was 16 Climb out on the wing and you let go in a static line pulls a parachute open for you. And my first jump really is a lot of a blur until the parachute opens. I mean, there’s a lot going on, you’re out there clinging on your 3000 feet in the air and you step off the side of the plane and your parachute opens up and then it’s quiet. And I remember a lot of the parachute ride but really my my second skydive by myself was probably the most fun skydive I’ve ever done it was you were a little more aware your eyes opened up and you got to really realize that, hey, you just jumped on a plane, you also weren’t scared. You know, you’re pretty sure you’re gonna live and everything’s gonna be alright. But my second jump is the one I remember the most.
Max Branstetter 4:02
How would you characterize the difference between doing tandem jumps and like your first time actually jumping solo?
Luke Aikins 4:09
I think tandem jumping is an incredible way to bring someone who doesn’t know that this is something they want to do you know this one, I experience it right? You get strapped to a super experienced, licensed skydiver who’s got 1000s of jumps and they’ve been training to do this. And you’re basically along for a ride, you get to experience what the freefall feels like you’ve experienced a parachute ride, but you’re kind of along for the ride, you really, you know, unless you do some crazy things, like grab a hold of your instructor or something like that. Unless you do that everything’s gonna be just fine. And then we got the jump by yourself, whether it’s accelerated freefall or you step out there and yourself. It’s all dependent on you. You know, it’s that commitment before there’s almost somebody essentially pushing you out. They say, ready, set, go and you don’t have much of a vote in that right. But when you’re doing it by yourself, you have to be the one to let go of the plane and do the thing. And I would say that’s the biggest difference is the commitment. It is fully in your hands at the moment we jumped by yourself.
Max Branstetter 5:05
Oh man, I have chills her Heebie Jeebies however you want to call it I can already tell this interview is going to hopefully excite people but also give people some goosebumps.
Luke Aikins 5:14
People ask me that all the time and when you said the heebie jeebies or scared whatever it is, uh, I always say that scared and excited are right next to each other their friends you got like your I never say that I’m scared but I’d say I’m excited a lot, you know, and they they’re almost the same thing.
Max Branstetter 5:31
Definitely I think depends on the person they’re either best friends or mortal enemies but they’re certainly certainly living on the same block. I know your family had some sort of background in skydiving Can you put that into words like just how deep your your family skydiving roots go?
Luke Aikins 5:46
Yeah, I mean, the the Reader’s Digest version is my grandpa started a family business. I’m a third generation skydiver. My grandpa was a pilot in the war got shot down and as p 47, tried to open up the cockpit to jump out. Back over over Germany there ended up landing and allied territory had to belly it in because it couldn’t get the cockpit opened up. always wondered what it would have been like that day to jump out what would have been like, and came home and him and a buddy went to a skydiving club in the 60s. And in the 60s, the most experienced skydiver at a skydiving club was an ex military guy with you know, six or seven jumps. They went out he did it, he fell in love with it. And they ended up making their own club and him and his buddy kind of took it into that. And then my aunt and uncle took it over and turn that club where everyone’s sharing expenses, they actually made it into a business. And now I’m a third generation skydiver, with a 11 year old son who may be fourth, we’ll see.
Max Branstetter 6:45
And I know part of your morning routine is, you know, jumping out of a cockpit of a fighter pilot. So you got that down out to? That’s so cool your family goes back to So third generation skydiving. That’s a hell of a family tradition. What was it like for you growing up like with that? Just being surrounded by skydivers alike what sort of impact and inspiration to that shed off onto you?
Luke Aikins 7:12
It’s pretty interesting. So as a kid growing up, I have pictures of me four months old on a packing table where they used to pack the old round parachutes, you know, so I’ve literally been around it since I was born. You get exposed to a lot of things good and bad when you’re a little kid around a bunch of hippie skydivers back in the 70s. But you get to see a lot of life you get to experience what’s going on. And for me, it was just something we did it was a normal thing. You know, some people’s dads take them out and they go hunting or fishing or, you know, shooting hoops. I went to the drop zone and watched my dad’s skydive and hadn’t dropped my GI Joe parachute guy when he was coming down. And it was always been a part of my life. So for me, I wasn’t necessarily scared or nervous when I got to do it. I was excited to finally it wasn’t like if I was going to jump it was when I was going to jump. My mom was very nervous about it. My mom made about 40 skydives while she was pregnant with me. And then after I was born, she hasn’t made another jump. She made one tandem jump with me a couple years ago. So I literally been doing it since before I was born. I’m like,
Max Branstetter 8:15
wait 40 – 40 jumps while pregnant. So so she averaged once a week, or maybe it’s a little bit back towards the beginning.
Luke Aikins 8:23
Yeah, I think we think she got farther along obviously didn’t continue. But she made a lot of jumps when she was pregnant in the beginning with me. Maybe that’s what’s wrong with me. Who knows?
Max Branstetter 8:37
At some point, you decided to become a professional skydiver. What was that inflection point for you?
Luke Aikins 8:43
I honestly think it’s like you when I was a kid, you obviously dreamed that man. I wish I could do that for a living. But it wasn’t really possible when I was younger. So I ended a construction company with bulldozers and dump trucks and back hoes. I did that because I wanted to have a nice house isn’t on an airplane. And I scattered on the weekend. And then as things get progressing, the skydiving industry grew and grew. And I was able to slowly transition out of the dirt work construction business up here in Washington, which is cold winters and all that and I was able to turn it into whether it was training with military, some Hollywood stuffs, special projects for Red Bull demonstration skydives around the country. And I was able to just slowly make that transition into I look back the other day, and I realized I’ve been doing this professionally now for like 20 years just doing this. So pretty cool to be able to make a career doing what you love.
Max Branstetter 9:38
Yeah, definitely. And it’s pretty, you know, easy work. You just gotta rely on gravity, right? So you just close your eyes and it all happens. He’s like,
Luke Aikins 9:46
you know, you travel across the country. He does planning and preparation and you go do a jump and the whole jump lasts like three and a half minutes, right? So really, all the work goes into like three and a half minutes and then it’s over, and you’re off to the next one.
Max Branstetter 9:59
It’s kind of And this is obviously in a totally different scale. But that’s that’s always been my thought on skiing like skiing. It’s fun, like the act of going down the hill. But the the amount of, as Larry David said in Curb, like it’s a schlep like the amount of work it takes to like, get to the mountain and like go up the mountain and get all your gear on and everything and then you go down and it’s like, few minutes. Same sort of thing, but I think yours is probably gets the heart rate a little bit higher your hobby.
Luke Aikins 10:24
Yeah, I mean, a base jumping is the same thing. It’s so much work to get there. So I guess you got to enjoy the journey. You know, you climb up a mountain, you hike for two and a half hours, you get to the edge and it takes 30 seconds to get down. Right? I guess you got to enjoy the journey and the whole process of doing it.
Max Branstetter 10:39
So you are a member of the Red Bull Air Force, which is awesome. I think just like the coolest name ever, but obviously a really cool brand. I mean, I remember growing up and you know, my friends when when YouTube started becoming a popular thing I’d be like, dude, Red Bull has the coolest videos and like action athletes doing all sorts of things flying through the air. I had no idea at that time that you know, eventually you were one of those people. But how did Red Bull come into your life or you come into there’s
Luke Aikins 11:10
so again right place, right time kind of scenario. I’ve been skydiving competing a different level of you know, champ national and world championships. For a while. My cousin Andy got on with Red Bull as a Red Bull skydiver also. And Andy was on for about a year before I was and I was helping out once in a while they would do a jump they would have enough guys and they would have me come in, I would do a jump and you do a good job. Because by good job means you could land in one spot, you could actually communicate and talk to people you weren’t like, Yeah, dude, bro. Man, you know, you could have like a real conversation with people. You slowly kind of got brought in you don’t. It’s weird. You don’t choose to become a Red Bull athlete. In my opinion, Red Bull chooses to have you an athlete. And in our world, especially the aviation and skydiving world, there’s no better sponsor in the world than Red Bull. I mean, they helped me do stuff that seems like insane and impossible. And it’s all stuff I’d be out there trying to do on my own. But on a shoestring budget, you know, and then I can, I can take it to the next level when I have a company behind, you know, helping make that happen. But a lot with Red Bull To me, being a Red Bull skydiver, it’s not just about your skill in the air and being able to do that. There’s a lot of skydivers out there who have the ability to land in a perfect spot, or do the perfect move in the air. But it’s a lot about the whole package and being able to weigh decisions. And yes, it seems like we’re always pushing the envelope and we’re, we’re taking it to the edge. But at the end of the day, we have to make the decision whether to stand down or jump if the conditions aren’t right. And sometimes, you got to check your ego at the side which is really hard thing to do. So I think being a Red Bull athlete, it’s a balance you have to be like the full package being able to, from communicate, to have a good time to push your sport to the next level and also be credible in your sport Red Bull, if you’d look at all their athletes, everyone who’s a Red Bull athlete from whatever level they are if they were the Shaun White snowboarders, you noticed that Travis was strong as in their sport. They are what people want to do. Well, there are where people want to be. And I think that that’s key to becoming a Red Bull athlete.
Max Branstetter 13:14
And I love your impression of the Yeah, dude, bro. Man, buttery. That was you should just do this entire interview in that voice. But no rebels super cool and amazing athletes like yourself. I want to first talk about some something that was a Red Bull, stunt or event whatever you want to call it that this one actually you weren’t the one jumping or dropping but you were kind of like the Wizard of Oz man behind the curtain orchestrating it, and that is Red Bull Stratos. If I’m pronouncing that correctly. Felix Baumgartner. I remember when this happened, it was I mean, it took the world by storm and it was warranted. Literally he was I think, what 125,000 plus feet in the air and drop straight down. So you weren’t the one that was actually the quote unquote, athlete in this, but what was your role in making that a reality and making it safe?
Luke Aikins 14:10
Yeah, I mean, Red Bull Stratos is one of the parts I’m most proud of in my career, you know, for many reasons, what we accomplished jumping fields show for 128,000 feet, right, the edge of space. What’s really cool to me about that isn’t so much the height, the height is awesome, but people are going to go higher, people are going to climb a ladder, they’re going to jump from higher, it’s just going to happen. But Felix was the first human being to break the speed of sound without a vehicle around him. Right? Intentionally just gravity pulled his body to the speed of sound. And that was an unsure thing. Like we didn’t know exactly, we thought we were pretty sure what was gonna happen. But there were all of these theories about you know, the shockwave is going to tear him apart and this and that. And so, to me that that is the crowning achievement of Red Bull Stratos. And for me, personally, I learned on that project went for three and a half years. I designed the equipment to use to jump, I tested the equipment, I helped train Felix for the jump, I had about 250 jumps on all the equipment, you know, testing in things not working and trying to get it right. What I learned on that project about myself and my ability to engineer things and to lead a team and to have my own team and big responsibilities before that, I was a little more of a Yo, bro man, we just got I’ve been having a good time. And that project really opened it up, they put a bunch of responsibility on my shoulders. And it was very cool to learn that you could do a lot more than you expected. So my role and that was keeping Felix alive from his feet off the capsule to his feet on the ground.
Max Branstetter 15:38
Yeah, just 128,000 feet between that to worry about. So not too much. What was the biggest insight that you uncovered as part of that preparation, that you’re like, Oh, this is actually key to making this happen smoothly?
Luke Aikins 15:51
Well, there was this concern Colonel Kittinger, Joe Kittinger, who just passed away this last year, he was a big inspiration to me my whole career, you know, he was the guy in 1960, that jumped from 108,000 feet, and was the first man to jump from that high. And he owned that for 50 years until Felix came along, was able to break it, meaning Joe and hearing stories about everyone’s concerned about the spin that might happen. When you’re going supersonic, everybody thinks that your body is going to spin out of control, you need a drogue chute, because that’s what Colonel Kissinger had in 1960. What we ended up doing was we didn’t use a drug, but we had a drug. And one thing that I’m most proud of on that is that I designed a device that he wore on his wrist, that if he experienced a certain amount of Gs, which was three and a half G’s, for more than a continuous six seconds, meaning he was spinning so fast, that for six seconds, he couldn’t slow it down and couldn’t control it, it would automatically fire and deploy a drogue chute that would help stabilize kind of a stabilization, round, little small parachute. My job was testing that parachute designing the system that would make it deploy, if need be. And figuring out in that, you know, I didn’t know how fast you would want it, what you’d want to trigger that. I just knew if you were spinning out of control, you would want something and they said, Well, if you were unconscious, it needs to be automatic. And I started thinking about how you know how fast of a spin is too fast. Who knows if no one’s ever done that before. So I built in the back yard, a centrifuge, basically, I took a rear end of a car, I buried half of the axle in concrete, I hooked up to a tractor and it spun as put a little table on the top and I laid on it and it spun me around and we measured the G forces. And what I found out was that it wasn’t I thought like 10 G’s, when you can’t pull your hands in, that’s when you’d want something to help you. What I found is it was more duration, the amount of time, if you’re spinning on a on a ride at a amusement park, and you spin really fast for a couple seconds, it’s no big deal. But if you spin medium fast, for 678 seconds, you can no longer see the horizon, it starts to wobble. And if I can’t tell what the horizon is doing, I don’t know what my body needs to do to stop it. So coming up with those numbers was probably a very cool and it was eye opening. And their numbers are used today in other things based off of what we discovered.
Max Branstetter 18:06
So in addition to all your accomplishments, you’ve built the world’s most safely sound and biggest centrifuge.
Luke Aikins 18:15
When I sent the picture to the team of what I built in my backyard, and me spinning on it, and my cousin and he’s running the tractor and the toggle switch for the PTO stuck for a second, it spun me around so fast, my hat flew off, things went flying. They called me immediately. And I felt like I called him to the principal’s office saying what do you do, and you’re gonna hurt yourself, testing this stuff. But that’s the only way I know how to do it is to go out there and try stuff. So speaking
Max Branstetter 18:41
of going out and try stuff, let’s get to your 25,000 foot jump without a parachute, which I talk about with all my guests now just but I know that you got around 120 miles per hour freefall during that this stunner event called heaven sent and I think it’s probably what you’re most well known for now. First of all, thank you for for hitting the net and landing safely because I’m very excited for this interview. And, and it’s really, really inspiring just to see, you know, someone like you kind of push the limits of what you think is possible. So just appreciate all you did there. But where did this crazy idea for jumping out of the plane from that high without a parachute come from?
Luke Aikins 19:27
People ask me all the time, you know, how did you come up with that? And I actually didn’t come up with that. I worked with Red Bull Stratos. And one of the guys Chris Talley, one of the engineer type on the on the project. He reached out to me about a year or two after strata a couple years after Stratos. And he said, Hey, I got this idea. And I want you to sign an NDA and whenever I get a chance to sign a nondisclosure agreement, an NDA, I sign them right away, I happily sign them 99% of the time you don’t ever nothing. You don’t ever have anything to do with that project, but you get to hear about some really cool things going on in the world. So I signed them You know, and I sent it back to them and we had a conference call. And I was outside. My son was very little at the time. And he’s making noise now. So when outside of me my truck and I have this conference call, they said, Hey, Luke, you know, here’s what we’d like you to do. We want you to jump out of a plane without a parachute. And I said, you know, thanks. But no, thanks. A guy Gary Connery did that in Europe, he landed in some cardboard box with the wingsuit. Amazing, very, very cool, like 18,000 cardboard box on a hill. And I said, you know, it was really cool, but it’s not really for me. And he said, No, no, no going to no parachute. We’re going to land your land on a giant slide. Imagine a halfpipe, right, with a wall going up the side of a building, and you’re gonna come down that you’re gonna match it, you’re gonna slide out on the halfpipe and slide out the bottom. I laughed out loud a little bit for just a second. And I was like, whoa. And then I started thinking, I’m like, You know what, I guess that’s possible. But I don’t know how you could test it. I don’t know how you could, could, you can’t drop something. And I’ve been hitting the sweet spot every time and I couldn’t figure out how you could test that. And the feasibility of making a slide that big, it didn’t seem very practical to me. So I said, You know what, I’m not your guy, I got a wife and a son, and I want to be around for a long time. So I’d love to help you guys find somebody to do it. I’d love to help you find somebody and go away. But two weeks go by, I start thinking more and more. It’s just always thinking about it. And I thought to myself, if someone put a gun to my head, Luke, it said, you have to jump out a plane without a parachute? How would you do it? You know, I start thinking about what about a net, the guy in the circus that shoots out of that cannon and flops into the net? I’m like, I wonder if you could do that. So we started designing this little system. I call him up after I talked to my wife. And I say, I think we could do this. Here’s how we do it. You know, I need to get paid not to jump, you get paid before you jump. You need to get paid. Just to develop the system. Not just that you can’t have money on your mind when you’re trying to do something and push the envelope. And I get to pick my team. They said great, let’s do it. So Chris Talleys idea. We start moving and we we make it happen. So originally, I turned it down. Even someone like me sometimes thinks stuffs a little too out there.
Max Branstetter 22:03
That’s a good one that’s pretty out there. This net you mentioned was 100 by 100 square feet, which is a huge net. I mean, I’ve never seen a net that big. Even NBA hoops that are pretty tall. No, but from 25,000 feet up 1000 square foot net, if that if I did that math, right. It feels kind of like a needle in a haystack situation like that net feels tiny from from that far. And obviously you can, you know, navigate to an extent to make sure you’re you’re aiming right. But for someone who’s not quite familiar with like all the ins and outs of skydiving, what is the the way that you were able to for the most part guarantee that you’d be able to hit this net and land in this net safely?
Luke Aikins 22:44
First, and that was 100 feet by 100 feet. So it gives you 10,000 square feet. So it’s a it’s small from that high. I mean, it’s like I knew I knew I messed up that math somewhere along the way. It’s like a small warehouse thing. But what you do is like when you’re flying in your airplane, you can’t see your house, when you’re flying in a commercial airliner. And you’re going into let’s say wherever you live from coming in, I can’t see my house, but I can see the town I live in. Right from that high, I can see the freeways, and then as you get lower, you can start to pay Okay, that’s safe way. Okay, that’s my house right there. So it’s the same thing with this. When I exited, we opened the door about almost a mile short, as we’re flying towards it at 25,000 feet, we opened up the door, I looked down to make sure that I can at least see the area right you can see a whole bunch of cars parked and, and the setup and it was out in the middle of nowhere. So the only thing in these foothills, so it’s very easy to see that way. And honestly, when you step off, you could just see the general area, you know where you’re going. But you can’t see the lines on the road, right, but you can see a road and as you get closer, the lines start to appear. And that’s exactly how it worked with my jump. But in order to line up was the hardest thing. So imagine your cross swimming across the river. You have to angle your body and swim upstream a little bit in order to go straight across the river. Right. So the air currents are like rivers in the air right, the air is going different directions. So sometimes I had my body position angled where I was moving forward through the air at you know 30 miles an hour through the air but I wasn’t moving across the ground at all. It’d be like the river changing directions and speeds a couple times as you’re trying to swim across it. So you make those fine adjustments. I had a light system that we use on airplanes, a pappy light system with some lenses in them. Basically, if you stand on one side of the light, it’s red, you stand on the other side of light, it’s white. I use those to help guide me down there. And I honestly did a ton of practice jumps opening my parachute super low below 1000 feet over the top of the net until I felt confident. We my wife and I do we do it 75 times in a row opening over the center of the net below 1000 feet before we would try to do this and by the time we did it for real we did 82 times in a row. And I don’t think you can create a little piece of paper and throw in the garbage can next year at two times in a row. Um, so at that point, I figured we were at 100%. We weren’t 90% We were 100% success rate, by the time we were ready to go,
Max Branstetter 25:07
I would probably miss that garbage can 81 Out of those 82 times, was there anything different about that jump from? Like, obviously, from a safety standpoint, you don’t have the parachute. But like, was there any other protocols that you put in place just to help save your life and in any possible room, if anything went wrong?
Luke Aikins 25:26
Honestly, once you stepped out of that, stepped out of the aircraft that day, there were no safety, there was no backup there were You were 100% committed. And there’s a little bit of freedom in that, you know, if you have, let’s say, you have a little backup parachute or something, you’d have to decide to use that so much higher above the net, that you wouldn’t be committed to it right? If you have no options, but to do something, and there’s no backup plan, there’s no anything. Your focus is solely on doing that and accomplishing that goal. So in the moment from exiting the aircraft to landing in the net, there was nothing no backup, no nothing.
Max Branstetter 26:06
You have, I would say the most unique resume of any guest and while business growth podcasts history, what else in your career, besides, you know, helping out with Stratos, Heaven Sent? What else? When you look back Do you can you point to and you’re like, oh, man, that was really cool. I got to do that.
Luke Aikins 26:27
I think my first adventure in working in the in the movie industry, right? Iron Man three. If you watch Iron Man 3, we got sucked out of Air Force One, a bunch of us skydivers a sec, that were dressed as business suits and reporters and stuff. And I’m the last guy that Ironman rescues right before he hits the water and Ironman three. And that was really, really cool to get to see how movies are made right and be part of the movie magic and such a iconic Iron Man type of thing. Right? That was a really neat, neat moment, as far as for my sport goes. And for the things I’ve done, I would love for at the end of this career for it to be it’s not going to be known for one thing, it’s not going to be like, Hey, he’s the guy who did the no parachute jump. That is probably the most famous thing that I have done. And it’s by far the riskiest thing I’ve done and will ever
Max Branstetter 27:16
do. I mean, you know, people do that all the time, right?
Luke Aikins 27:20
I want to have a body of work that people look back and are just like any one of those things, you know, from running a TV productions for wingsuit race with a bunch of helicopters in the air and guys racing between pylons, the plane suave, doing, like, all the things and then a couple things I haven’t done yet that are on my bucket list to finish before I’m done with this.
Max Branstetter 27:40
Oh, is there anything that you can reveal from the bucket list? Or is that top secret information? No,
Luke Aikins 27:44
I’m not quite ready yet. We’re still working on on a couple of those. But then I’ll let you know when we’re ready.
Max Branstetter 27:52
I never get a chance to say this. So I’m just going to say it. If Luke can jump out of an airplane 20,000 times, you can sign up for the Podcasting to the Max newsletter one time. Think about it. I know, I know, the chain of incredibly corny newsletter segues continues. But if you want a short and sweet email from me every Thursday that includes entrepreneurship tips, podcasting tips, and the worst jokes on the planet, all you have to do is sign up at MaxPodcasting.com/Newsletter. That is the Podcasting to the Max newsletter. Now, the moment you’ve all been waiting for, let’s get to your Wild Listener questions for Luke. The Wild Listeners have put together a list of rapid-fire questions for you. That is, basically I posted this on social media and posed the question. Hey, interviewing someone really, really cool for the podcast who has skydived over 21,000 times which which what is the latest number? Is that the most accurate number?
Luke Aikins 28:59
It’s a little more than that probably at this point, but I like to say a lower number. That way no one could give you a hard time.
Max Branstetter 29:05
Gotcha. Okay, that’s for sure. There’s
Luke Aikins 29:07
haters out there. Oh. I’ll pick a number I’ve been jumping since I was 16 and 49 now so I can easily say that I have 20,000 skydives.
Max Branstetter 29:17
Perfect. Alright, so I’m interviewing someone who has skydive twice and here now just go I asked what would you ask them? It was a really interesting mix of questions. Some serious some more kind of disbelief of like, okay, yeah, there’s nobody out there that skydive that much so, so I’m gonna rattle them off here. Totally up to you how philosophical or tongue in cheek you want to get with your answers.
Luke Aikins 29:39
I like them all.
Max Branstetter 29:40
The first one is from Brendan O’Marra, who asks, How many bugs have you swallowed in your lifetime?
Luke Aikins 29:48
Believe it or not have not got a bug in your parachute ever before. motorcycles have a no bugs. They’re up. We’re up too high for bugs, but that’s pretty funny.
Max Branstetter 29:56
It makes you think how high bugs go up. But yeah, think of it so They just asked that question actually, you’re gonna keep your mouth closed on the next dives, then I’m sure. This one’s from Sue Pohle. What was the closest you ever came during a dive to something bad happening? And how did you get yourself mentally to go back out there after a scare like that?
Luke Aikins 30:18
That’s a great question. When shortly after the no parachute jump. I did that jump and had so much focus and so much training on doing that. That was do you think that would be the scariest moment of your skydiving career? A couple of people told me a stuntman told me and then a Navy SEAL Admiral also sent me letters saying, you know, like, Hey, there’s this giant letdown after you work so hard on a project and you know, you’re it’s written or some books written by some Olympic gold medalist and spent their whole life and they win their gold medal, and then they’re like, now what? And the stuntman to rugby told me, he goes, Hey, you know what, you got to be extra careful now, because you did some that required all of this focus. And now you’re gonna go out and do normal skydiving, which requires all of your focus, but you’re gonna feel very, and I kind of poo pooed it and I kind of went on. We were in Tijuana doing a jump for Red Bull at night into a stadium. I jumped out was raining, we were low. I jumped out I pulled my parachute. My pilot chute got tangled up around some live air to ground wire system because it was broadcasting to the stadium. I didn’t take it so serious. It was hooked up. I was trying to untangle it while I was falling. And at some point, it dawned on me in that moment as that parachute was tangled up around me that you have to pull your reserve parachute No, no matter what. And I had found that complacency being complacent is what put me in a position that a normal little jump should have been no big deal, landing in a stadium at night. And we do that hundreds of times. And I was distracted because I had just done something that I thought you know, if that didn’t kill me, nothing can and so I would say that was my most dangerous time in skydiving was after the no parachute jump.
Max Branstetter 31:56
And this one, I think is more in the realm of disbelief of like, Wait, okay, there’s nobody that’s actually skydive this much. Olivia Campanella asked, why? As in why would you jump out of a plane over 20,000 times? What drives you?
Luke Aikins 32:10
You know, I wish there was a philosophy, like this big answer that you know, made everybody feel good. I love it. I mean, there’s no I don’t have this big emotional feeling. And it’s not a spiritual moment. For me. It’s just the thing that makes me the happiest and I love it. That’s the only answer I have for that.
Max Branstetter 32:29
In a similar vein, Cam MacKugler asked if you are aware that planes actually have landing gear?
Luke Aikins 32:39
They do. I did not know that. No, that’s a really that’s really funny. For the long time. You know, I had jumped out of a helicopter but never landed in one. I’ve jumped out of this type of plane but never landed in one. So you know, that’s pretty interesting. And then over this last year, I did a jump where two planes dive in at the ground I took off in one. So I took off in one airplane, and I jumped out and I flew over and I got in the second airplane and I landed the second plane. So I’ve actually maybe the only person who’s taken off one airplane by himself and landed in another one by himself, which is so do know they have landing gear. I just try not to use them.
Max Branstetter 33:17
Probably some Mission: Impossible movie, Tom Cruise has done that too, with a little bit of help. But alright, two more quick ones. This one is just something I was super curious about. So this is from me. Thank you, Max, what is your pre-skydive ritual?
Luke Aikins 33:36
It really depends on what type of jump I’m doing. And it sounds funny, but I’m doing normal jump mat, a regular skydiving center, it’s YeeHaw and high fiving your buddies and stuff. If it’s one that requires some some focus, I find myself just before I jump going through the whole jump in my head, just thinking about, you know, exit what I’m doing, where my hands are going, what I’m doing. And I visualize that all the way through landing, touching down and walking back off of the field or the landing area. And that seems to complete that circle and then I’m ready to go do it. Go do my work. I was told it was some form of meditation. And I said no, because I don’t meditate. So
Max Branstetter 34:16
that’s amazing. That’s – I think Jimmy V. Jimmy Valvano was the one who made all his players visualize that they won the championship and practice cutting down the nets. When I
Luke Aikins 34:26
did the no passage of the sport psychiatrists Michael Gervais, and psychiatrist
Max Branstetter 34:32
psychologist I guess psychologist, I you could say whatever you want.
Luke Aikins 34:36
Yeah. And Mike is incredibly versatile all these Olympic athletes and NFL teams and all this stuff. And he helped me learn that to visualize not just touching the net. But what happens after and it took a long time to get to the point where I could everything all my focus was till I touch the net. And then eventually I got to the point where I was walking off and I was going home after words and I was unpacking it, you know, and that put everything at ease and made it like completed the thing full circle, so I can totally understand that.
Max Branstetter 35:10
And finally, this one, this guy who submitted this has a reputation and a nickname. So totally up to you if you want to answer it or not. So, Danny Schneider – who goes by The Big D: Given that you’ve spent so much time in the air, are you a member of the Mile High Club? Yes. There we go. All right, perfect. I’m gonna edit this podcast down to just 10 seconds. And that was it. Perfect. Awesome. Well, Luke, this has been an absolute blast and just find you and your story. And all you do so inspiring and fascinating and, and motivating. And I’m sure there’s endless people out there that that look up to you as well. So thanks so much for coming on. Where is the best place for somebody to connect with you online if they want to check out some some of your videos or just connect with you in any way?
Luke Aikins 35:58
Really, it’s @LukeAikins on Instagram is probably the best, easiest way to do it these days. Now, everybody’s out there doing it once we post all the cool stuff we do.
Max Branstetter 36:07
Awesome. Perfect. And then last thing, final thoughts. The stage is yours. It could be a quote kind of words, to live by words to skydive, buy, whatever you want, send us over here.
Luke Aikins 36:16
You know, I’m out here I do all these crazy and wild things where you know, you’re jumping off planes without a parachute, you’re flying between planes, you’re wingsuiting down mountains, you’re doing all of that stuff. I choose to look at appeals to you this daredevil you know, you don’t care if you live or die. And that kind of bothers me a little bit when people say that because I look at what I’m doing is I’m out there living life to the fullest. We go into these things with our eyes wide open. I’m family, I have a son and a wife. And you don’t have to be this crazy, wild guy to be out here doing these things. And if you calculate things out and you mitigate risks down to what’s acceptable to you, everybody’s risk is different. Yours is different than mine. And we’re all out there. You know, trying to find our way and doing our thing. And for me, this is what makes me who I am and what I do and I just love sharing it with everybody. That’s kind of my passion is everybody gets to kind of see what’s possible. Whether you’re a kid you know, and you’re struggling in school or you’re a guy who decided whether we’re going to switch to a new job or not. You calculate that risk. And then you make the leap. I just think that’s a such a good lesson for people to learn and I literally am taking the leap every day
Max Branstetter 37:25
Wild is the word of the day yet again, Luke, thank you so much for sharing your story all the behind the scenes, all the ins and outs details. And thank you, Wild Listeners, for tuning in to another episode and and for submitting those awesome and Wild questions. If you want to hear more Wild stories like this one, make sure to follow the Wild Business Growth Podcast on your favorite podcast app and tell a friend about the podcast and then check out all the videos of Luke’s jumps and stunts and everything – you will lose hours on hours. Yeah, he’s the man. You can also find us on Goodpods, where there are very cool podcasts and podcast recommendations. Very cool. And for any help with podcast production, you can learn more at MaxPodcasting.com and sign up for the Podcasting to the Max newsletter. That is at MaxPodcasting.com/Newsletter. Until next dive, let your business Run Wild…Bring on the Bongos!!
