Photo: Mark Haycraft
The Bleyne Cross Country Classik took place at the famous site in southern France from 10-12 May 2015. The aim was to bring together cross-country and competition hang glider pilots for a three-day cross-country extravaganza.
Twenty pilots took part, including “most of the French Class 1 and 5 teams”, which was declared a rip-roaring success, with pilots getting lots of airtime and some great cross-country flights in, including some big triangles.
Antoine Boisselier flew a total of around 700km over the three days, including a 197.5km FAI triangle on 11 May, whose track is below:
Antoine Boisselier’s 197.5km FAI triangle flight from Col de Bleyne during the Bleyne XC Classik. Click to go to the CFD page.
A week later, on 18 May, he went on to fly a huge 349.85km flight into Switzerland from the same site.
Mark Haycraft almost closed a 300km FAI triangle, unfortunately landing 20km short, and Guillaume Chatain, the only paraglider pilot to have taken part in the event, flew a paraglider to Bourg St Maurice.
Organiser and local hang glider pilot Erick Angles of Atout Vents said:
Let’s just say that it was amazing to see this happy bunch have it for three days and just piling up kilometres flight after flight and see the grin on their faces. It was also truly inspiring for local pilots to witness what these guys brought into the game and the originality and creativity regarding the routes they took to get where they wanted to go!
To mention just a few, in 3 days, Antoine alone flew about 700km in 21h of flight. The last flyable day, 6 of them landed in St Hilaire’s official LZ in Lumbin and two landed in Albertville while Mark tried to close a circuit and had to land in St Andre at nightfall about 20km short from a 300 FAI !
The same day, Guillaume Chatain (Antoine’s good friend), the only PG pilot who came to play with the hang gliders, lands in Bourg St Maurice, not far from the Italian border just before sunset. The prospect of a very long retrieve if he landed in Italy made him ‘burn’ 2000 metres in 360s just to land before nightfall.
Altogether, this was a very friendly challenge proving that performance doesn’t necessarily come with competition !
Photo: Mark Haycraft
Pilots appreciated the stress-free format with no start times, no turnpoints and no speed points, which all added to the fun factor.
Photo: Mark Haycraft
A summary of the flights done over the course of the event is here:
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