23/08/13 Day 1 Cheboksary, Russia

4.00 Parachuting was abandoned for the day (a huge thunder storm arrived) and it was necessary to prepare for the Opening Ceremony. 

Unfortunately I was premature in my announcement that results would be posted "live" as at other First Category Events attended over the past couple of years.  Due to unforseen problems and complications this will not now be possible.  However, I will post the results (unofficial - of course) as they are posted on the DZ and when they are finally signed off by the Chief Judge at the end of the Competition these will be available in PDF form on our usual results page.

Before the end of the day, the German team protested with regard to problems with the pad and their protest was upheld, so they will rejump Round 3 Accuracy Landing.

The Opening Ceremony  consisted of speeches, however I don't know of another First Category Event at which the Prime Minister of the country it is being held in, and senior Ministers of that state attend and speak - including, of course, Sergey Milnikov still enjoying the memory of his Tandem Jump.  Presentations were made to famous parachutists from the Chuvash Republic, including Maja Petrovna Kostina, Style World Champion 1974 and 5 Times on the Podium at a World Championships, . Graeme Windsor thanked our hosts, the organisers but mostly the competitors for making the effort to travel so far and attend these competitions.  The ceremony ended with the anthems of Russia, Chuvashia and the FAI.  We then had a short display of local dancing and singing, followed by flag jumps, a demonstration into the arena and a low level static line dispatch display.  Fortunately the rain held off throughout the whole ceremony.

3.30  Accuracy put on Standby due to the weather conditions - rain!  3 rounds of Male accuracy completed (results will be up shortly) and 1 round of style Female and Junior.

12.30  Provisional Style Results, Round 1 - Juniors and Female published on linked article below.

10.30 The Competition is well under way. The happiest man on the Drop Zone has to be Silva Gilson from Brazil. He took two days to arrive here - Brazil, UAE, Moscow, Kazan, bus - arriving at 12.30 last night. He came out to the airfield and registered as the 15 minute call went out for the wind drift indicator load. His call came soon after as he was on the first load for accuracy - his first jump in Russia at a World Meet and he scores 0.00 - a very happy man.

At the Team Captain's meeting last night the jump numbers were distributed and questions clarified.  The draw for the Style sets is:

Round 1  .... Sequence 2

Round 2 ....  Sequence 4

Round 3 ..... Sequence 3

Round 4 ......Sequence 1

This morning we start with Junior Style and Female Style.  The aim is to complete three rounds of Junior and two of Female by lunch time.  Meanwhile we start the Male Accuracy.  After lunch the men will do style and the Juniors and Females Accuracy.  At 16.30 the programme ends and we make a quick trip back to the Hotel to change for the Opening Ceremony here on the DZ at 17.30 followed by a welcome party and then back to the Hotel for dinner as usual.

The sun is shining, it is going to be a hot bright day.  Once we sort out the transfer system the results will be available on the IPC Results page - so follow the link.

1 Day to go, Cheboksary, Russia

Today started with cloud and rain but by 10.00 the skies had cleared, the sun came out, and all was set for the Tandem Jump of the Minister of Sport for the Chuvash Repuiblic, Sergey Milnikov and his tandem master, Jiri Blaska, the FAI Controller.  The Minister really enjoyed the experience and thanked everyone involved.  Given the support for this competition shown by his Ministry it is nice to be able to share our enthusiasm for the sport in such a real way.

Sergey Milnikov - Graeme Windsor - Jiri Blaska	Being interviewed by the press after

Today we continue with official practice jumps from the two Turbolets and two Antonovs.

Antonov = Style	Turbolet = accuracy

 By mid-day the rain was back and we have grey cloud cover.    After lunch the sun was out again and we continued with official practice jumps for the Accuracy and Style competitors.

Inside the Antonov	Style Runin

Closing Ceremony, Banjaluka, BiH

 The French Girls with their hard fought for medal.

Throughout the competition - Live Results available - follow this link

Videos available on YouTube - follow the link and the Playlists.

By the end of the closing ceremony everyone was humming the French National Anthem –' Les Marseillaise’. The French delegation was represented on every single podium, only being beaten by Belgium’s Hayabusa in the 4-Way Open in both events (European Championships and World Cup)  and by the UAE in the 4-way VFS (World Cup). The great atmosphere of the whole competition continued through the prize giving and the closing banquet, held on the DZ.

The organisers received a huge round of applause for the helpful and friendly way they had conducted the whole event, and in his closing speech the President of the Parachute Club of Banjaluka reminded everyone that next year they would be hosting the CF and Style & Acc WC – and who knows he may welcome everyone back in 2015!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/airsports_fai/9576049460/

The two competitors’ meetings held in the afternoon continued the general good feeling. In the Formation Skydiving meeting the competitors on the whole were happy with the conduct of the championships and the judging.

There was some discussion around the way “head up” and “head down” are specified in the regulations and the problems some had with interpreting or understanding them. There was also a suggestion following the situation at the end of the 4-Way Female event.

The USA felt that the tie-break round should be timed so that the team that is fastest to the last point (if a tie continues) should be declared the winners – rather than the count back system which is currently in the rules. That meant the competition was decided on one jump – however the same could be said of the proposal as the tie break round would be the deciding one. It does however seem a neater solution.

At the Artistic Events’ competitors meeting concerns were raised about the situation teams found themselves in following exit commands that had them landing well off the airfield and then being asked to jump through cloud when they could not see the ground. Some competitors felt they could not take the risk of not jumping for fear of their concerns would not be considered pertinent.

The British Freestyle team asked for a formal letter of apology over the error made in announcing them as placed 3^rd in the European Championships – before the adjustment had been made. They had announced this to their sponsors and now had to correct the situation. This will be forthcoming.

The competitors expressed being satisfied with the way the compulsory rounds had been judged believing the judges had listened to their suggestions and concerns before the competition started – and they believed the judging was an improvement on previous years.

All videos from the competitions, both Artistic Events and Formation Skydiving are on the IPC pages of YouTube – and over the coming days they will be sorted into the Playlist to make them easier to find. Unfortunately a few got corrupted between being judged and the transfer so unfortunately these are not available.

Ted Wagner (OmniSkore!HD) is already working on a faster and easier system of transfer to us so that all videos will be available on both the FAI/IPC site (and OmniSkore) as soon as the internet connection will allow after judging – for Prostejov (Czech Republic) 2014.

After the closing ceremony we were treated to an amazing gymnastic display by Daphney – Israel Freestylist. We hope to post the video very soon. This is one talented young lady with her sights set on becoming World Champion.

Blue Skies to all.

2013 18e Coupe d'Europe de Montgolfières & Ladies World Cup

The pictures of the competitions won by Laure de Coligny and Etienne Mercier are now available

18/08/2013 Banjaluka, BiH

Day 5     

Throughout the competition - Live Results available - follow this link

Videos available on YouTube - follow the link and the Playlists.

After the excitement of yesterday today is clear up day and prepare for the Competitors Meetings, scheduled for 15.00 hrs this afternoon in the Hotel Bosna in town.  The transport to the DZ for the closing ceremony will leave at 17.00 hrs.  Today Fay and I are working at loading all the remaining videos to YouTube and then titleing them and adding them to the Playlists - it will take some time!

Read more...

16/08/2013 Banjaluka BiH

Throughout the competition - Live Results available - follow this link

Videos available on YouTube - follow the link and the Playlists.

Day 3.  

Artistic Events first event has completed: 

Freefly:

In both the European Championships and World Cup

FRANCE  are the Gold Medal Winners - Total 60.00 Points

RUSSIA  are the Silver Medal Winners - Total 56.5 Points

NORWAY are the Bronze Medal Winners - Total 51.4 Points

Freestyle is finalised:

FRANCE have the first three places giving them Gold Silver and Bronze in the Artistice Event World Cup.

but for the European Championships the result is:

FRANCE Babylon -  Gold Medal Winners with 62.4 poits

FRANCE Solaris -    Silver Medal Winners with 60.3 points

RUSSIA 1 -                  Bronze Medal Winners with 45.3 points

Congratulations to all the medal winners and to all the competitors for a great competition.

Formation Skydiving

20.20  The Round 8 4-way Female continued the excitement - France scored 23 points - the USA 20 (two busts) so we are back to a tie for first place - bodes well for an exciting finish tomorrow.

18.30  The end of the day and a real surprise - the USA Golden Knights Female 4 scored 21 points on round 7 - the French 17 -  The USA is now in first position with a 3 point advantage.  An exciting end is in store.

17.00 hrs  Round 9 of 8-way completed with France consoildating their lead and dominance in this year's competition.   France has received 3 "busts" during the 9 rounds and Russia a total of 4 - the turning point is obviously France's 30 points in round 5 gave them a huge advantage. 

The 4-Way Female event at the end of Round 6 has France in the lead by 1 point having conceded a point to USA Golden Knights Female 4.  The fight for third place between the two UK teams widened with Bodyflight Isis now on 100 points and Kaizen on 96.

Round 7 of 4-way just completed with no change in the placings at the top.

The plan for today was to complete VFS, take the 8-way to the end of round 9, leaving one round for tomorrow and the 4-way (open and female) to the completion of round 8 - so 2 rounds for the morning. 

However, by 12.00 VFS was put on a weather hold - caused by the SUN - that has got to be a first!  The Drop Zone was visited today by the Commander of EUFOR, Major General Dieter Heidecker of Austria.  An ex-parachuter himself he was very interested in the competition and spent some time here this morning.

8.00 An early start for the 8-way and VFS teams this morning.  Beautiful day, no sign of the clouds of the past couple of days.  It will be interesting to see if France's 8-way  increases their lead over the rest of the field - curreently 28 points ahead of Russia with France's 2nd team 5 points behind the Russians.

UAE have established a 6 point advantage over France in VFS with Norway 3rd but not in the same league (yet).  Meanwhile this afternoon the hot competition between France and USA 4-way Female continues - the last round saw France pull ahead by 2 points with 5 rounds still to be jumped.  The two UK teams are in 3rd and 4th positions fighting their own battle.

Hayabusa (Belgium) are well established in first position in the 4-way Open (continuing this afternoon) with Russia 2nd and France in 3rd position - the real competition is taking place further down the table.

Artistic Events continue this afternoon also having already completed 5 rounds:  France is in 1st place, Russia 2nd and Norway 3rd.  The French boys have scored 9.0 points in each of their free routines.  France is dominating Freestyle with teams in all 3 placings.  We shall see what today brings.

FS Judges and the Jury arrive for work

8th FAI Junior World Gliding Championships in Leszno, Poland

Check out all the pictures of the event !

World glider and advanced glider aerobatic events in Oripää, Finland

Click here to see the pictures of the two competitions

2013 FAI World Championships for Free Flight Model Aircraft in Moncontour, France

See the competition in pictures !

2013 Poitou - Moncontour + PAM in St Jean de Sauves, France

The pictures of this World Cup event are on Flickr