Some businessmen like to play golf. Others prefer a quiet fishing trip. And then there's Tomas, our mall guy, who's best off when the wind is in his sails or jumping out of a plane. He lives yachting, passes on his experience to others, and has been a guest on Snídani s Nova several times. Although it may not seem like it, all these experiences help him in his work - for example, when he knows that the wind is not always the right wind, it is important how you sets the sails.
Almost from birth, I spent my summers in the grounds of the Cheb Yacht Club, of which my dad was a member, and later me. With a bunch of Husák's children wading through the water of the Jesenice dam on small sailboats, I could hardly avoid sailing in such an environment. So it kind of came naturally, like learning to walk and talk. It's so long ago that I don't remember my first impressions. I could barely speak when I was on a sailboat for the first time. The real passion of my life became my very first sea sailing trip, which was in 1992 on the route Genoa - Elba - Sardinia - Corsica - Sanremo - Monaco - Saint-Tropez. There, I understood that I had to go to sea again and again.
Captain's exams :-/ You don't watch a lot of morning shows on commercial TV. I explained several times there that a "skipper" is someone completely different from a recreational sailing chief, but I understand the query, and we can borrow that imprecise term. I have sailed thousands of miles as a crew member under experienced skippers, and only when I felt I had something under my belt did I want to sail on my terms, in my own chosen places, with my responsibility for everything. It was a natural progression. My motivation came later when I embarked on my career as an RYA instructor, wanting to improve my skills and then pass them on to others. I have been an RYA instructor since 2010. The acronym stands for Royal Yachting Association, and it is a renowned British institution that educates water enthusiasts and teaches them humility and respect for the element. The RYA is an absolute phenomenon, founded in 1875 (then called The Yacht Racing Association), it lived its life until 1952 when Elizabeth II knocked on its door and said, "You are doing a great job. Would you like to be called the Royal Yachting Association?" Naturally, this is not refused, especially when the royal family offers the patronage of their monarchical crown to an association about once every 50 years.
It gives me freedom. I see moving at sea as the freest activity in the world, and I answer only to Neptune, otherwise, it's up to me and my crew. Besides, ever since I was a kid, I've always been fascinated by the way a sailboat sails silently and gracefully on the wind alone.
There have been a lot of experiences over the years. Whales in Greenland, a Mediterranean hurricane in Greece, the midnight sun in the Lofoten Islands, cruises with the kids in various parts of Europe, a collision with a reef in Sweden, lava splashing from Stromboli, encounters with submarines, phosphorescent plankton, and a sky full of stars on night cruises... I'm afraid there's no room for it, and it would bore the reader to death.
Any place that's sailable and not too hot, so in summer,r from the Baltic further north, like Sweden, Norway, Scotland, Brittany, and the Channel Islands are also famous. Outside of summer, I like to sail in Greece or off Sicily. The Åland Islands are very close to my heart. In general, I love sailing anywhere I have never sailed before and discovering new places for myself.
I was recommended by another guest and then they called me themselves. In the summer months, there is a need to fill the program schedule, and "anyone" can come there. That was my case. I was supposed to talk about "captain's licenses", I always wanted to thematically divide it into lakes/seas, sail/motor boats, issuing institutions and make it a bit more orderly for the audience, but the moderators' questions always made my concept a bit disjointed and it was just a shallow talk with no added value.
In the make-up room, it takes ten seconds to do my make-up. I just have to run a brush over my skin so I don't throw pigs around the studio, and I can be in front of the camera in no time. It's good training for presentation skills, and that's how I've always felt about it. After all, knowing that the whole nation can watch me makes me nervous, and when I know I can do it on camera, I find it easier to speak at presentations and conferences.
Yes, and not just from friends and colleagues, I have had a few of our clients contact me as well. Sometimes I'm surprised at how diverse the audience base is for this morning show.
My idea is to give my son a free jump for his 17th birthday. Knowing I was going to take him to the bridge airport, I thought I'd be a wuss not to try it. There was also a lot of curiosity involved. I didn't understand how it was possible for an absolute novice to get into a plane with a parachute on his back after four hours of training and jump alone from 4 km, and not in tandem with a pilot at his back.
Sure, that was recently, in the late summer of 2022. There were a lot of experiences on that first jump in very quick succession, I made a lot of mistakes. For example, I was enjoying the freefall so much that I stopped looking at the altimeter and underflew the altitude level I was supposed to open the chute by a few hundred meters, which I only realized when the instructor flying next to me tapped me on the shoulder. I opened the chute and enjoyed the silent flight and easy control of the chute. Then, just after opening the chute, my radio stopped working. I didn't realize this technical glitch until I was two feet off the ground, so I hit the landing back on the first try without the voice assistance of the instructor, and I credit my years of sailing experience for hitting the landing spot. I could feel the wind blowing me down, and I worked with it in the air. After a smooth landing, I was smiling and wanting to get back on the plane to improve.
All I think about is making a good jump and being in a stable position immediately in free fall. There is no time to worry because the plane is full of other jumpers who want to get out, and there is no way to block the door. They'd probably kick me out anyway.
There's a lot of adrenaline flowing, no doubt. There's not a lot of freedom. There's a defined place for the jump and the impact. True, you may not be able to land in that place, but that's a mistake, not freedom. Freefall is an experience that cannot be experienced elsewhere in such a long time, about one minute. But I'm still insecure about it, so I don't enjoy the free fall as much, and I'm much happier when I see the parachute fully open overhead and have that freedom, at least for a while, and even in 3D space. Suddenly, there's time to watch the scenery below, watch other skydivers, look for updrafts, think about the approach to landing,g and you feel like a dove.
Anyway, my jumper stage is going down the drain. The way I can't do it, I need lab conditions, especially light winds and minimal cloud cover. That has to meet the weekend, when the plane is available, and my free time. I had intended to jump my way to a fully independent jump, but now I need to have one experienced instructor beside me to watch me in case of free-fall problems. I just find it very hard to find the time. So I've resigned myself to the fact that I won't be able to learn this skill.
Sometimes it's intertwined, in some cases, they intersect with our clients' interests, and we share our experiences. I sometimes meet people at sea whom I subsequently see at professional conferences. My students include "captains" whom I meet on a business basis. This is also the result of some natural development.
Both require patience, diligence, consistent preparation, and above all, respect. All this is useful for everyday life, not just for business negotiations. Patience helps me a lot when arranging contracts, but I don't know if the company management will agree.
When you manage to arrange the execution of an order that makes the client happy when it is finished.
I'm curious, interested in many fields, aware of how little I know, and how many interesting things are out there. I still don't have an exact idea of what I want to be in life, and since I was a kid, it's always been something between a garbage man and an astronaut.
It's not off the top of my head, it's a saying from an extraordinary sailor, I identify with it, and I spread it around, "Everybody does what they enjoy." And then there's also a good line from a play for mental well-being (connoisseurs will know), "We sexologists have a principle. Don't be surprised at anything." And moving on, I've adopted it too, and I like it, "If you're telling the truth, it doesn't matter what you say."
We don't have much space for that either, because there are so many. At work, I've enjoyed building our MawisUtility mailroom from scratch and bringing new projects to life, or finding new uses for our existing services. For me, it's fundamentally the same as sailing into the unknown. Plans for leisure - there are a lot of them, and the ones I go after have a chance to work out.
Easy choice, because there's only one option. On a sailboat, I have both wind in my sails and wind in my hair in one experience. On the other hand, with a parachute on my back and a helmet on my head, even the slightest airflow won't move a hair.
Author: Tomáš Krejčí
