Local wingsuit athlete Chris Geiler is coming out of a post-three-World-Championship retirement to compete at the 2026 World Championships in the US in two weeks.
Geiler, who won the title in in 2016, 2020 and 2022, still has several world records under a belt that hangs quietly in New Brighton. ‘I retired after the 2022 Worlds, as my second son Ari was due and I wanted to focus on being more present for my boys. I stopped BASE jumping just before my first son Odin was born.
‘Also, without financial support from somewhere I find it very hard to keep competing. It costs me over $300 for every day I want to train in the sky, around six jumps per day. I would normally want to do a minimum of 200 training jumps per year to remain competitive.’
Geiler says that in the gym he’s doing a lot of fairly specific training that works on functional strength for his chest, shoulders, back and core. ‘It’s been a huge help to work with Social Remedy this year to train more in the gym to minimise the deficit of not being able to train much in the sky due to work and family life. Other gym members have probably seen me doing things in a slightly different way to normal or some multi-line exercises that help with the full body strength requirements of Wingsuiting.
‘After winning the World Championships in 2022 I retired from competition. This year I’ve decided to make a comeback and have qualified to compete at the 2026 World Championships in CF and Wingsuit held at Lake Elsinore, California.
‘I leave Australia on October 2 and the competition beginning on October 8. I’ll be in the States for two weeks and we’ll do nine jumps in that time and will have some extra time allocated for weather.’
Geiler had been competing in Wingsuit Performance for over ten years. Driven by hard work, sacrifice and passion, he welcomes the pressure of competition, embracing the feeling of knowing that everything counts on nailing the next jump. Back on home soil after a long stint in the US, he is looking forward to repping the green and gold at this year’s event.
‘The journey back has been quite different this time around. Since moving back to Australia, I’m now balancing training with a full-time role in sports development for Skydiving Australia, family life with two young kids, and the financial challenges of preparing for a World Championships while maintaining normal work and family commitments. And I had to qualify by competing at Australian Nationals.’
Why come out of retirement?
‘With Ari getting a bit older I wanted him to have the memory of me doing something cool. Odin has already been on podiums with me but this year has been the first time that Ari has seen me doing cool stuff. I was also Wingsuiting in the Pacific Airshow this year, that was the first time he got to see me like that.
Teammates and friends Jason Dodunski and Luke Rogers are the other two competitors representing Australia. ‘I coached both of them after retiring. We’re all good mates and the Australian team should definitely win the combined team event. Luke won Worlds after I retired and Jason is in prime condition at the moment, he won the last Australian Nationals.
‘Our aim is to secure all three podium spots.’
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