Season 2010

Well, it is not over yet, but I took all of my videos and cut the best parts out of them to a nice video, that shows a bit of my flying this year. Since I got a GoPro in my hands this year I was finally able to show the beauty of our sport to many people. Before it was only possible to talk about how nice it is when you come in to the high peaks behind Tolmin and you enjoy the wilderness of nature. Now I can show that too. People start to ask about it. Publishing everything also to Facebook just adds the number of people that can actually get a feeling about our sport
.
I payed for the GoPro around 350 €. With it, I got a great footage of flying this year, I won the Cross Country video contest and got a paragliding harness which Nena will now use, so looking in another way I already got my money back :)

Yes, the era of having a driver at any time is ending for me as Nena is taking lessons to start paragliding. Seems like days will be longer as we will have to retrieve the car from the mountain everyday but still I am looking forward to see her in the air. It is going to be really interesting :)

I remember how it felt when I flew with my father, although he was way more experienced than I was, I was always scared for him. Wonder how it felt for him as I was buzzing the valley at 16 years of age. Those where magic moments.

Hang gliding season in 2010 from Matjaz Klemencic on Vimeo.

Girls being jellyfishes...

Free flying GOOGLE

In Slovenia, we can be pleased to have a man who spends a lot of time programing our own OLC sistem which works better then many others. You can see it HERE

Aljosa now went one step further. The original idea was to have a database of all take offs in the world but the idea grew to even bigger a GOOGLE like webpage where you can now find take offs, best flights from there, pilots and so on.

So, now if you will travel somwhere, you will just need to put in the name of the city you are heading or just put the coordinates in and enjoy the data you will get.

You can find it here

http://www.xcglobe.com

Skeletons in the closet (Ager pitch measurments)

My friend sent me this pictures of pitch measurments at Europeans in Ager this year. I remember from Laragne, they where published on net, well here we have them in picuture. Any anomaly?
Well let me help you. As you can see all Aeros models with a tail are on 0° all others are in the range to -2°. Why? Rule is that gliders can be -2° from DHV measurments, but for Aeros tailed models this rule was set to 0.
The problem was that FAI did not have an official measurments for tailed models. The glider was tested but papers somehow stayed somewhere on the desk. 0 points for Aeros here.
Looking now, I see that all Aeros gliders with a tail where set to 4 and 6° minimum, which is now the official measurment in the papers. So eventually if papers would be on the right desk at the right time we could go 2° lower. Suprisingly Aeros gliders where flying on top with the others even with this handicap. So this point goes to Aeros.
I just hope that next year papers will be, where they should be at a time.

And for the record: I am not an Aeros dealer as some thought this year :)





Too see the pictures click on them and view in the bigest size.

Brainstorming the season and looking in to the future

My idea of moving to Australia this winter ended with a possibility of work at the same place as last year in Nova Gorica under the, I think most flyable winter site in Europe.

So here we go again. Squeezing every coin for a maybe new glider, looking for sponsorships, or I could say begging for them as in this time it is hard to find someone that could give you the oppoturnity to represent them worldwide.
Competition hang gliding is indeed a very expensive sport that cost you so much that you have to push your life, your relationship and yourself to the edge. Last two years I have not been thinking of any other costs than hang glider equipment and costs that come with competitions.

If you are not one of the rear people who are either wealthy enough or are sponsored by some manufacturer then your life is competition for the coins that you spend on equipment.

Looking at the new glider(The see trough one) of Zippy I ask myself, where is this sport going. Will we fly gliders that will need to change sail every 100 hours? Is hang gliding becoming the “sport for elite”?

We all look for the best performance of our gliders but at a cost that could reduce number of hang glider pilots at the competitions (Which is not that big already). Sure, a see trough machine looks great but I would not never buy it as I don`t have the money to change sail every year. Of course there is not just sail, there is frame upgrade every year also, so changing just the sail does not mean everything.

COSTS AT COMPETITIONS

We pay for the worlds and Euros around 400 € entry fee (Australia just the entry fee could be 800€). We get launch packet, a guy who knows where to look for the weather, a guy who knows how to download tracks and maybe a party in between. With 100 pilots this means a 40.000€ to spend. Of course I know you have other costs with our dear FAI stewards who always need the best accommodation with best food in town and there is more of course.
I miss one big thing. Transport. Each paragliding competition FAI 1 or FAI 2 or PWC has transportation in cost of entry fee.
Usually FAI 1 comps are payed by national team countries, so this is the easy step. FAI 2 competitions with 100 to 150 € are organised usually without launch packets, about transportation we can only dream about.

I know it is easier to put 100 jellyfishes to the vans and drive them around but I am sure that there is a solution for hang gliders also. Greifenburg was a very nice example of good organised transportation. For 50€ we got retrieve and take off ride.
In Bassano you can look in the morning at jellyfish pilots, coming in to the vans and going for the take off much further away, we, hang glider pilots we are so wealthy and we have so nice girls around that for us is no problem with transportation. AND WE PAY THE SAME PRICE.

So call me a crazy guy, that I spend all my time in thinking about where to earn money so I will be able to fly in summer at some competitions. One day I might have to cut this option as will need to earn money to feed some mouths, and hang gliding will become a sport of elite number of people that will be able to pay for a glider that will last for one season. Change will be spend for briefings and download guy at the landing.

Yes it is a passion or addiction that is really hard to resist.