Sunday saw a big task set at the Hang Gliding world Championships: 166 km through the big mountains north of Laragne, France. Cloudbase was low though, so pilots were squeezing through a ‘letterbox’ between cloudbase and mountain plateau of some 200m. Switzerland’s Christian Voiblet, who came second for the day, described it as a “great [...]

FlyAdventure and Fly Ecuador schools are organising the seventh edition of Acrolatino, billed as “The ultimate paragliding acro meeting in South America, uniting pilots from all over the world”. It will be held at the famous Yahuarcocha Lake, Ibarra, Ecuador, from 26 – 29 November 2009. SIV and acro courses will also be run by [...]

Aircotec are now supplying a budget version of their popular XC Trainer: The XC Trainer Easy features a 20 chanel GPS, high sensitivity vario, speed sensor, 18 hours’ flight storage capacity, user friendly software and large buttons and display, in a 150 g durable and resistant case. Its lithium ion battery lasts for 40 hours. [...]

Fly De Aar lodge will be hosting the XC Africa from 14 – 21 November 2009, at De Aar, South Africa. see www.flydeaar.co.za for more info

The 2009 West Coast Paragliding Championships took place at Woodrat, Oregon from 31 May – 5 June. There were only four tasks, due to bad weather.  Matt “Farmer” Beechinor and Josh Cohn took 1st and 2nd place on their Niviuk Icepeak 3′s, with matt Dadam (Gin Boomerang 6) in third. Peter Warren won the Serial [...]

Round 1 of the US Paragliding Nationals took place in Dunlap, California, from 27 April to 2 May. Great weather allowed five tasks of 45 to 80 km length, involving a combination of mountain and flatland flying.  Brad Gunnuscio (Niviuk) came first, followed by Eric Reed and Rob Sporrer, all on Niviuk Icepeak 3s. John [...]

Gradient have developed a special tool for ambitious XC tandem pilots and record-seekers: the BiGoldenXC. The sporty brother of the new BiGolden2, the wing differs slightly from the serial Tandem. A slightly bigger span of the profile improves performance, speed and sinkrate. The drag is reduced by the use of special competition tandem lines, and [...]

The first Festival of Spain dedicated to paragliding and flying, the International Air Festival of El Yelmo (FIA), will open its doors on July 2 to 5 to hundreds of pilots from all over the country and abroad, to celebrate its tenth anniversary with a program packed with activities and shows – all free for [...]

FreestyleAir, the Swiss Acrobatic Paragliding Championships, is to be held at Lake Lucerne, Beckenried, Switzerland, from 28 – 30 August 2009. New judging criteria will make for interesting watching, and the sloping festival grounds and lake promenade, and the Klewenalp mountain launch, will offer spectators the best possible view. Musical entertainment will be in the [...]

Thomas de Dorlodot and Ramon Morillas prepare for the 2009 red Bull X-Alps race by flying the route by paramotor

Following a successful event in 2008, Nova team pilot Steve Nash will be hosting another Ibex ‘Hike and Fly’ weekend on 19 & 20 September 2009. The event will be based around the mountains of Snowdonia in North Wales. The intention is to demonstrate the versatility of this glider by hiking up then flying off [...]

Manfred Ruhmer stormed back yesterday at the Hang Gliding World Championships in Laragne, to win the day by a massive margin. He was a full nine minutes ahead of second place Christian Ciech (IT) and a massive 36 minutes ahead of third place Attila Bertok (HU). It was a decisive comeback for the Austrian pilot [...]

On 12 June, Jenny Persson of the Cirrus paragliding club flew a new Swedish declared goal record. Flying from the Tärna towing field she declared goal at 54 km in Kolsva, but continued on to 72.3 km, breaking the Swedish women’s open distance record. This was achieved on her LTF 1-2 UP Kantega XC. Her [...]

Jeff O Brien (US) stormed the first task of the Hang Gliding World Championships yesterday, setting a blistering pace around the 162 km course. He took three hours 27 minutes, beating Italy’s Alex Ploner by almost eight minutes. Austria’s Thomas Weissenberger was third. There was disappointment for some, including Spanish champion and protégé ‘El Nino’ [...]

For the second year running, Steve Nash has won the X-Scotia hike & fly adventure race aboard his Nova Ibex. The event took place over the weekend of 30 – 31 May. Starting at Lochearnhead, the competitors had to round three turnpoints on the mountain summits of Meall nan Tarmachan (1043m), Ben More (1174m) and [...]

The Highest Performance Paraglider in the world – that’s what Ozone claim to have created with their HPP. The company say, “It’s a bold claim, but we seem to have built a wing that has the highest glide ratio of any usable wing in the history of paragliding”. Together with fluid dynamics expert, Luc Armant, [...]

The 17th World Hang Gliding Championships, Laragne, France, start on 20 June with the first task being flown on Sunday 21 June. Two weeks of high level competition follow. Hot favourite to win will be Manfred Ruhmer, back competing again after several years away. In the teams, Britain, France and Austria will be battling it [...]

There is a new software upgrade (version 3.25) available for Aircotec’s XC-Trainer.  Changes are as follows: Readout of G‐forces via the TN‐Complete software (only 3DG) Waypoint bearing now in Track Up mode “Distance via marks” summation Sink alarm now disengageable Acoustic climbing signal off before the new flight has been initiated, onset value +0,3m/s Glide ratio (L/D) indicator also without waypoints entered The softare can be downloaded from www.aircotec.com

The World Air Games, Turin, closed on Sunday 14 June. The medals for the free flight disciplines were as follows: Paragliding acro (individual) 1 Horacio Llorens (ES); 2 Antoine Montant (FR); 3 Pal Takats (HU) Paragliding acro (synchro) 1 SAT brothers (Raul and Felix Rodriguez, ES); 2 JustAcro team (Gabor Kezi & Pal Takats, HU); [...]

Icaro have a new water-resistant and breathable softshell jacket, available in three different colours (brown, black and turquoise). It features two zipped pockets, side reflector strips and a stitched Icaro logo on both front and back. They also have a new flying suit in their clothing range, and a quick-pack sack to protect your glider [...]