7th FAI Women's World Gliding Championship in Issoudun, France

The 7th FAI Women's World Gliding Championship celebrated three new champions: the French Anne Ducarouge in 15m class, the German Christine Grote in Club Class and the strong German pilot Sue Kussbach that was awarded the gold medal in the standard for the third consecutive year.
The German team won the Team Cup.

We had 52 participants from 15 Nations, including USA and Australia. The participants appreciated the considerable organisational efforts of the contest director Roger Eyrier, a well known instructor of the French gliding centre of Saint Auban, and his deputy, the IGC 1st Vice President Brian Spreckley that lives nearby and flies in Issoudun.

We had 10 contest days out of 13 available. The weather was generally good, although very windy.
There were three incidents, fortunately without any consequences for the pilots involved, but they led to the abandonment of the competition due to damage to gliders.

The Competition Director and the Deputy put a lot of efforts in the safety, but it didn’t prevent to have the above mentioned incidents. The pilots involved are very experienced and haven’t the reputation of being a dangerous or aggressive. There were just mistakes and we have always to take into account the high influence of the human factor in all the minor or major accident we have in competition.

(article by Marina Vigorito)