2003, the Facts / Paragliding & Powered Paragliding

2003 was a very important year for Ojovolador, as our Web site was able to build its own place in the international community of paragliding and paramotoring to become a true specialized media, adapted to the times we live. Aside from finishing the year with an average of more than 550 visits a day, Ojovolador.com has managed to keep pilots worldwide informed about what it is going on in our sports. This together with helping stimulate each pilot’s pursue of personal goals and to increase the security of all of us in our flights, are our goals.
Here’s a small summary of the most important facts of the year already gone, that will stay in our memories as one of most intense of the last decade.

Bregenzerwald Cup, intermediates reappear: The traditional free flight event to open the year in Europe, the Stubai Cup, faced some problems so it handed the task to the zone of Bregenzerwald, also in Austria (that from now on will be alternated with Stubai to open every year of flight) where most of the manufacturers met to show their news for 2003. The massive return of intermediate class DHV 2 called the attention, after a long time relegated behind the 1-2s. Among the new gliders appeared we could see the Aeron (DHV2) and the Artax (1-2) from Nova; the Summit 2 (DHV 2), Kantega (1-2) and Targa (competition) from UP; the Gradient Aspen (2); the Twister (2) from Wings of Change; the Vulcan (2) from Ozone; the Gin Gangster (2/Acro); the Skywalk Cayenne (2); the Apco Keara (2); the Dune (2, not yet certified) and the Jumbe (1-2) from Aerodyne; the Intox (2) from Mac Para; Arcus 3 from Swing; the Freex Fxt (1-2 for mountaineering); the Pro-Design Jazz (1-2); XIX Inter 2 (1-2); Independence Dragon 2 (1-2); Airwave Wave (1); the Firebird F18 (Acro), or the tandem Bi-Beta 2 from Advance. In the traditional glide-contest the winner was the new competition glider from UP, the Targa, in the hands of PWC champion 2002 Alex Hofer –a preview of the great performance that this glider would show during the competition season.

Flying World is born: Ours it is a sport of minorities, but there’s always more than something going on. For this reason, in March of 2003 we created the news section “Flying World” to cover events, new products, records and any news that might be of interest for pilots worldwide. In the first edition we gave account of the first PWC event 2003 in Japan, we announced the X-Alps and the Aerotow event (to transform PG skills to HG), we informed about the prizes given at the Free Flight 2003, and about new products like the instrument vario-gps XC Trainer from Aircotec (announced in March and that appeared by the end of year), the Trainer glider from Firebird, some new harnesses, or the new website Volarencastejon.com, among others. You can access the complete archive from the READ! section.

Height record in Paramotor: On February 6th, Spanish pilot Ramon Morillas reached an altitude of 5333 m, over the highest mountain in Africa, the Kilimanjaro, and broke the world record of height in powered paraglider. Ramon, 3 times world champion and holder of the world distance record (644 km), was able to handle the hard conditions with his PAP Paramotor specially adapted for the feat.

13 Paramotors compared: In April, Ojovolador organized the 'First Comparison of Spanish Paramotors', an event where we could know the actual qualities and characteristics of 13 of the current models manufactured by the 4 Spanish brands: Airfer, Clemente, H-E and PAP. That’s how we found out that the most powerful (thrust) paramotor was the Clemente SIM 135 (Simonini engine), followed by the Pap 1400 CD (Corsair engine) and the Bi-Max from Airfer (Corsair). The most “silent” at 1 metre from the pilot was the Ziklon 115 from H-E, with 98,3 db at maximum thrust, followed by the Pap 1400 TD (100,1 db) and the Ziklon 99 (101,5 db). The lightest weight was found in the Clemente RAK 135 L (22 kg); second was the Pap 1100 TD (22,3 kg), and third the Pap 1400 TD with 23,6 kg. The expectation to see the real performance measurements of the motors attracted dozens of pilots from all over Spain, and also the most important dealers of flying equipment. Details in Flying World archive #2:
http://www.ojovolador.com/eng/read/flying_world/archivo_fw/fw_02.htm

Windy start of the PWC in Japan: The wind gave a hard time to the organizers and pilots at the first event of the PWC in Ibaraki. Finally, the sub-champion 2002 Scotty Marion (USA, Gin Boomerang III) was the winner. Some months later he tragically disappeared in the Alps and has not been found to date. In women, the unbeatable champion Petra Krausova (Czech Republic, MacPara Magus) continued in the first position and was able to keep it during the whole season 2003. She’s the queen of Paragliding.

ACRO established: The most radical mode of paragliding attracts more and more devotees, and the manufacturers work hard to satisfy this new segment of the market, with products specially design to undertake the most radical manoeuvres and help keep the pilot’s safety. Among these there are paragliders (Firebird F18, Gin Gangster, Sky Atis Acro and many more coming in 2004), harnesses, brake handles and even special instruments like the G-meter. The ‘Vertigo’ championship, one of the first Acro events, will become a world tour with events going on in different countries and it’ll be the first World Championship of Acro. Other feats that included aerobatics were the English Channel crossing performed by Mike Kung after jumping off a helicopter at more than 5000 m, or the jump from a balloon done by Miha Repovz and Primoz Lajevec on a tandem glider, in Slovenia.

Heat and records: The summer season 2003 brought some unusually high temperatures in Europe, which were welcome by many pilots to fly the flights of their lives. In France, seven PG pilots take off in Chamonix, reach 5200m in one thermal and decide to land on top of the highest peak of the Alps, the Mont Blanc (4800m). A real gift from Mother Nature! In Spain, cloudbase is found at more than 5000m at Piedrahita, and the national distance record (unofficial) is broke by Borja Rodriguez (UP Targa) with 206 km flown from Pedro Bernardo, on a training flight for the Spanish Championship. During the Nats, Venezuelan pilot Natalia Garcia breaks the female distance record of Spain with 110 km, but on the next day Beatriz Garcia takes it for herself with a flight of 125 km. Natalia wins for second consecutive year, and only one month later she dies in an accident during the British Open in France. Meanwhile, in the USA Josh Cohn sets a new distance to goal record with 284,8 km in his Windtech Nitro, flying over Texas state, the famous world-records area. His flight is only 6,5 km longer than the previous record achieved by Peter Simonics and Szilard Forgo some months earlier (both in Novas Aeron, 278.3 km).

The hardest competition: From the mind of the experienced competition pilot Steve Cox (CH) and a professional team of experts leaded by pilot and video producer Hannes Arch –supported by the multinational brand RedBull- the most ambicious and demanding paragliding race was born: the X-Alps. It was a competition with ingredients of bivuac flying; marathon and hiking that took 17 pilots to cross the Alps from Germany to Monaco, a total of almost 800 km using only the glider or their feet. Only 3 of the athletes could complete the race while thousands of persons from all over the world were watching their movements through Internet and a unique media coverage. Swiss Kaspar Henny won the world’s admiration after completing the route in a little more than 11 days, being in the first position from the very first day. Some hours later, French pilot David Dagault caught up with him in Monaco, after a remarkable recovery from the last position. Stephan Bocks (DE) was the third on the podium: After making it to the final glide he could only find the finish by the shouts and waves from the public and photographers, because he had lost his positioning system! No doubt it was the most exciting race we’ve ever seen, although it will surely not be the last.

Alex and Petra, World Champions: At the world championship in Portugal, Swiss pilot Alex Hofer took the first place, taking UP to the international podium with the Targa. In women, Czech pilot Petra Krausova (MacPara Magus) was the best, ending in an 18th place of the final results. The conditions did not help it be a good event but the security was paid a higher attention by the organizers. Second on the podium was Brazilian Frank Brown, and third Masataka Kawachi (Japan).

Ramon, king of Powered Paragliding: In the PPG World Championship in Great Britain, the Spanish Team took 2 of the 3 first positions and ended second by Nations, behind France. Ramon Morillas won his third world title, while his mate Dani Martinez was second. The competition is more difficult every year...

Distance Record in Tandem: On October 17th, Brazilian pilot Andre Fleury covered 299,47 km with his friend Claudia Ribeiro on a tandem paraglider over the Northeast of Brazil, setting a new world record. This, only 9 days after breaking the distance to goal record in tandem with 275 km. Both flights were done in a Kangaroo II (proto) from Sol. Read the story written by Claudinha here.

Gliders in a Sat manoeuvre: During all 2003 we’ve been collecting opinions from pilots worldwide about the behaviour of their gliders during a Sat manoeuvre. The idea is to build a reference database that could help other pilots before they try to perform aerobatics with a certain glider, keeping in mind that they are only opinions or experiences from pilots that we don’t always know or can verify. There are already more than 100 gliders reported. Read the reports here.

The best images: Thanks to the shots sent to us by pilots from the most diverse corners of the world we have built this Gallery where you will be able to ease your thirst for flying visions or remember your own flights during 2003. Check them out here

The ones who left: During this particularly good flying season there were also a high number of accidents that took some flying mates from us. Those sad moments are the opportunity to think about our sport and take the safety measures to the max, so we can all go back home after a flight. Every time we fly we are all alone up there, but we all have somebody waiting for us, down on the ground. To fly always in the appropriate conditions and with a proper gear for our skills level, is the basic rule so we can all get old flying…

Happy and safe flights in 2004!

*You can see our archives with details of these and other facts of 2003 in our READ section.

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