I’m back home now but wish I was still racing. I miss that place! When we started task 5, I didn’t think anyone was going anywhere due to the low cloud base and tiny amounts of lift. I also figured there would be many pilots with nothing to loose who would take off in a blazing race and show the rest of the non-committed pilots where it was happening. I followed fairly close behind the lead pilots but then wished I had left with the lead. As we went on course, the lift was getting better. There certainly were spots of risk but overall it was heaven compared to the launch area. The pilots in the lead were racing full speed. I thought it was great and wish the other days would have been more like that. I was playing it safe and staying high between areas of lift because there were still pilots landing out on course beneath us and I didn’t want to ruin a good day. The plan worked well and I didn’t need to pull off any low saves. It ended up being one of the best days because of the work that went in to staying aloft and timing the areas where one would push the speed bar. Many pilots made goal on that task and the anticipation of curiosity over the final scores was incredible. Upon finding out that I was to be the first American to make the podium in the history of this event, I couldn’t help but think……It’s not just me. It’s all of the supporters too! They helped make this possible. I think we need a bigger podium!
Tom :>)

As I leave Manilla this morning I”m a bit sad. So much time and energy was spent to get here and make it all happen and now its over.

I’m feeling the effects of what we call “after competition blues”…..all the excitement is over and we are left with our memories…we say good bye to old friends…new friends…the place….never knowing for sure if we’ll see anyone of them again.

So I’m taking this time to reflect and appreciate all that took place that got me to this point and I”m grateful for all the support, friends and family that gave us the energy to keep going.

Thank You!!!

The party raged on last night long after I could. The organizers burned all the extra cash they had from not having to run as many tasks on an open bar. Damn good style. It’s the morning after, and I got a little time before heading out for the wrap-up blog. It was a tough and humbling meet for me as I couldn’t seem to find the rhythum of this place, and always seemed to be so perfectly wrong on each major decision it was like I was on the other side of the world..grin. It was strange new territory but you gotta ride the wave where it takes you, and only take yourself so seriously. It was a good reality check, and in the end the conclusions were simple ones. 1. Flying paragliders is a very, very special thing to be able to do, there is magic and boldness in it. 2. There is no such thing as a bad flight only bad competition results, and these are mutually exclusive. 3. The only thing you ever fail at comps is your own ambition, so what, just don’t fail at having fun. 4. The only thing better than flying, is flying with your friends. 5. We are all friends first and competitors second, never ever forget that. 6. The global flying community is a special one, and international meets like this one are the spark from which many more comps, trips and friendships begin. I probably invited half of the pilots here to come visit me in SLC, I just hope they don’t all show up at once.
Thank all of you for your contributions, positive thoughts and encouraging commentary. You made the hard days easier, and stood on the podium in the end. All of you made this trip possible and we will never forget that.

Bill

The results are in. Tom takes third and Josh takes 8th at the worlds! These guys put us on the map at this meet and it was an honor to come here and fly with them.

Bill

By some miracle the day dawns clear and it’s looking like we are going to fly. I was wondering how the hell we could go from driving rain to a clear dawn and then I remember. It was Will Gadd’s 40th birthday last night and we sacrificed him and his liver to the weather gods. It was ugly but effective, and Gadd’s moans at the clear morning could heard thoughout the trailer park. I only wished his birthday was earlier in the meet. We headed up the hill for a noon briefing and noticed cloudbase barely over the top of the hill, the horror, the horror. There was a lot of speculation as to what kind of task was doable in these conditions, they called yet another 60k downwind task to yet another goal I would never see. Best to get on with it. If the gaggles were bad before, nothing prepared me for today. It was magnitude 9.5 clusterfuck on a scale from 1-11 (yes, 11). Fortunately, there were no collisions but not for a lack of trying. No one was able to get to base and stay there, so we all churned in the same 1000 vertical feet and the same 1k radius as the starts clicked by. Finally, people just started on course at ridge height and gave up on getting any higher. I decided the most effective way to avoid the chaos was to sinkout and have to drive back up for another go (I had to piss anyway). Sure enough it works. Things cleared out and I relaunch 10 minutes after the last start of 2:00. It’s still a struggle and I finally get to cloudbase and on course. Thank god. Its all going well and I’m staying at base, flying by myself, and generally enjoying the flight. I get to a blue hole about 25k out on course and head in hoping to get lucky. No luck for me this meet and I have a good landing by the main road. A ride appears instantly and I’m back to Manila in no time. Nice people here, really nice. The big news is Tom and Josh made goal. Tom started the day in 5th, Christian Maurer was in 3rd place and went down early, as did Tomas Brauner in 4th place. The number one and two (Goldsmith and Caron) were much slower than Tom today. We are sure he will be on the podium but where? We had over 60 in goal today so the point spread could be just big enough. Tom may take the title. We will know tonight.

Bill

With 5 start gates to choose from, task 4 was underway but we were a bit uncertain as to which one would be best to take. Some took the first and second but It looked like the majority chose the 3rd gate as did I. With thermal markers out on course, it still wasn’t easy. Lift was light and the top of the lift was low but we managed to get going in good speed…..well, not real racing stuff, but better than task 3. About half way down the course it started to shade out from over development in other places. I found myself wishing I had started earlier and figured It best to go into survival mode at that point. Even under shaded ground we found enough lift to get through some mountains to find lift on the other side. Many pilots landed there in the fields where it was shaded. I witnessed one landing on the side of a rock in the middle of the trees on one mountain. A few followed me through those hills rather low, but we all managed to climb out near fields on the outer edge. Part of the gaggle I was with had cut through a different route and caught a good thermal farther on course. They made it to cloud base rather quickly and the rest of us who were still in the game headed over there to get in on the action. About 10 of us thermalled up in the remnant lift and we didn’t quite get as high as we wanted, but it was just enough to get us going again. One big problem now faced us…….we were over 20km from goal and it was all shaded. Kari informed us that she was getting close to goal but wasn’t sure if she would make it. Again I went into the best possible flying mode since it was a 14 to 1 glide to goal and 22km to go. I think I was about 11km out when Kari said she barely made it into goal. (Kari had taken the first start gate). I felt confident about the situation as I was pushing half bar. The shortest distance may be a straight line, but flying a straight line put most of the pilots I just thermalled with on the ground a few km short of goal. With an educated guess, I chose to fly off course a bit and not to my surprise, I found boaty lift that was just enough to get me into goal with about 30 feet to spare. That is the closest I have ever been to the ground coming in to goal! I have to admit, I was cursing goal lines just before crossing. I like cylinders but lines are better for spectators. It felt good to be in goal and I’m still kicking myself for making one bad decision in task 3, but that is part of the game. We woke to sun on our last day and we are now waiting to see what today will bring. Australian pilot Brian Webb has said many times, “you don’t hold a comp when the grass is green”. With the record amounts of rain during this comp, that just can’t be avoided!
Tom.

After a couple of additional days of shit weather, it finally looks like a flyable day. We head up the hill and set-up on the east launch with a few wind techs already in the air making it look alright. When I say “alright” I mean there were gliders in the air not going backwards or running from storm cells. It seems our definition of what a good day is has been modified a fair bit by the bad weather. A 60k task is called with 5 possible starts and no turnpoints, just a start and a goal. The usual massive gaggle forms as few want to take the earlier starts and there are 2 mid-airs resulting is 3 reserve deployments within 45 minutes after the launch had opened, traffic’s a bitch. I was still on the ground in no hurry to churn with the big groups. I finally get out there and have a relaxing climb until the gaggle decides that the thermal I had looked pretty good, and soon it’s a mess. It only lasts for a few minutes and we all went on glide to the edge of the start cylinder for the 4th start. It was about as good of start as I could of had, but I got dropped like a bad habit on the first glide anyway, making me wonder as to why I bothered timing the start at all. I take the first climb I come to and screw around before finding the core that goes through the inversion. There is a small cell overdeveloping just east of the course line starting to shade out the next section. I was hoping to get through there before it happened but it was going to be close. A few of us got to cloudbase at the end of the ridge and went on glide into a big valley full of shade with patches of sun that were quickly disapearing as we got closer. We were late, and we were gonna pay. The group split, some staying in light lift in the middle of the valley, others making a desparate run for the sun shade line on the far end. I stayed with the closer group as we were climbing a little and the sun was starting to break though again. It turned out to be a mistake as the thermal never really turned on but the drift ended up pinning us against a large forested area that had no landing options. We reached the point where it was going to be a desparate low glide over the forest, or just scraping back to the valley we were trying to get out of. I was spinning my head around guessing at the glide, and calculating the odds and the intelligence of both options. Our group split again, and as much as I wanted to get off the last page of the comp results, I pushed back into the valley of shade and landed. I had heard later of some interesting landings in the forest as some made it across and some didn’t. Around 25 in goal with Tom and Kari making it in and Josh about a km short. Kari made the best choice of taking an earlier start and beating the shade. It starting raining last night, and I was alerted to this fact immediately by the leak over my bed. At the moment, I’m waiting for it to stop pissing down rain so I can go for a run. Today is certainly out for a task and tomorrow doesn’t look good either.

Bill

It feels like ground hog day over here…

We sat on the hill all day yesterday in hopes to fly.

Every day we hope to fly but the weather gods are playing with us.

They seem to have other ideas and think it’s a fun little game to see how long we can take this abuse.

Perhaps they want to see who is the World Champion of Attitude…who can have the most fun while being teased with the idea of flying everyday but not actually flying…who can put it all into perspective and at the end still have a good attitude and who had the most fun!!!

Hmm…GAME ON!!!

Kari

I blew it yesterday, but at least got a few photos (myself and by permission from Charles):

http://www.pbase.com/josh_cohn/paragliding_world_championships_2007

http://www.pbase.com/josh_cohn/chaz_photos

I can slow down…I love light lift…I love huge gaggles…I can make well thought out decisions before leaving the sinking ship!!!

If anyone can make goal I can…I love flying in these light conditions which remind me of how much fun I had in Brazil and Portugal during past world championships (not!) where I struggled with the same thing.

These are the thoughts filling my head for this morning’s affirmation session!!!

Yesterday we flew…and I once again hit the deck early. Bill had the same fate and we had a lot of time to think about things. I realized that for me I just haven’t changed gears here. For the last 7 years of flying here I’ve never experienced this type of flying…its always been racing conditions and that’s why I love this place. Up until the start of the competition I flew almost every single day racing around the sky going where ever I wanted and staying up as long as I wanted.

AND THEN….the comp began….rain rain rain…wind…rain…wind…sheiza!!!! Conditions changed and I was in denial. I thought a day of light stuff and then back to its old self. But the ground is still saturated and lift is extremely weak…painfully weak!!!

I have gone into auto pilot here, letting my instincts take over. It has cost me on each of the days so far.

So today I have a new plan of attack…I’ll let you know if it works!!!

Love and Lift
Kari

After some close calculations on the scores, I realized there was still a few more places I could drop to by the end of the meet. I’d better get to work and make some changes fast. I resolved that today was going to be different…… The weather improved a bit after the blowout yesterday, and the day actually looked halfway decent. It’s still really wet and it looked like it could OD in certain areas but heh, we were going to get to go flying. The task was to Tamworth, about 55k. Most pilots were on the west launch today and a few more on the east, both looked to be working equally good. The winds dropped to nothing, it was too hot, and I was wondering how long it was before I would be able to get into the air. A wise man once said - “when you’re at cloudbase, hell is below you”, and I was low and wanting out. The launch priority was based on the most recent results ranking and I was “suckin hind-tit” big time in this meet so it could be a while. Just my luck, the launch marshals asked for volunteers to do forward launches as no one wants to forward launch a comp wing. Since I had a Omega 7 (2-3) that I knew forward launched just fine and I got to step right in. After a little sideways running down the carpeted launch I escape the heat and get into the air. The first climb to cloudbase was dreamy, lingering the edge of the clouds and staying away from the crowds. As is typical just before the start, all the clouds dry up leaving us grovelling. A massive clusterfuck of epic proportions forms right at the start. Gliders who got the start were going one way, gliders going back to get the start were going the other, and there was a bunch still thermaling in the middle. I pick the nearest pilot and fly straight at him in a game of chicken to get the start. I don’t know if he drives on the right or the wrong side of the road but we do manage to miss each other and start the task. We all get pointed in one direction towards the first TP in Manila and sink in to the humid inverted valley. It’s not looking good. The first group splits in two with the first taking a deep line into the first low hills, and the second turning in the first crappy lift they come to. I join the second “crappy lift” group, and since today was going to be different, and today I was going to stay in the death gaggle and wait for others to show me the way. Today was a day for change. After an hour or so of change consisting of; collision avoidance, gaining 800 ft, losing it, and gaining it again, repeat. I decide I can’t change, and I can’t fly like this because its just not flying to me. This is a rush hour commute with heavy traffic slowed to a crawl, and we are all fighting for the same piece of shitty road. Bullshit. I finally had enough and with a sigh of relief, I point it toward to open road and go on glide, the solo creep, the thermal hunt, the unknown, peace. After some hard searching the ground comes up all to quickly. I’m packing up on the golf course too disgusted to be pissed. Kari lands about a half a click away from me, Josh and Tom got around 40ks along the course. We heard 12 pilots in goal.

Bill

It was by far the most patient testing task today. Being out on course was great but thermalling up with lift-seeking competitors was a serious test of patients. Lift was light and pilots were flying too close for comfort. There were a lot of wings touching other wings and harnesses today. I heard a lot of yelling too. This encouraged me to continue on to avoid any problems. It is also my style to do that and Josh does the same. Josh and I headed out creating a new lead gaggle at one point. It was working great until we encountered an area of green fields void of any possible lift. We shoud have gone into the hills, but we didn’t. All of us in that lead gaggle dirted at that point. It was sad to watch those who stayed behind to pimp off the leaders, only to continue on to goal, but that is part of race strategy too. Can’t blame them for doing it. Next time I may do it too. It was still a good day and one that makes for good challenging conditions. I certainly would not call it a race day though. It had nothing to do with speed. I enjoyed the conditions we had here during the xcopen and wish it was the same. Maybe it will change but with the record rain, I think we are in for more of the same.
Tom.

To fly or not to fly…

Just when we think we’ll fly we are denied once again. This time it wasn’t the rain it was the wind. Blown out of the north. Oh well… off to a swimming hole called the “blue hole” not sure why they call it that . The rivers here are thick muddy brown in texture with floaty bits…I cant believe I got in!! Things are getting desperate around here…. so what do we do last night?? Go to the rodaaaayooo Yeehaw!!!

It was nice to fly the other day even though it was super marginal conditions. The ground was absolutely saturated and the air was stagnate up on launch. The pilots were doing what we call the “Borah shuffle” which translates to running around to each launch hoping to find wind coming up the hill or any kind of sign that “its on”….I stayed put on the west launch which proved to be a good choice as it eventually started blowing up the hill right about the time pilots were starting to get up…I went straight up to cloud base and joined the gang..we were all late for the last start gate but who cares we were in the air!!! It was a slow going race, patients was the name of the game, I missed the move at the end…

Bill and I seemed to connect thru out the flight which was fun, I felt I flew well up until the end and then I gave up …opps..I needed to be even more patient…these euro pilots are soo good at the..hangin in zero’s or downs until something of the slightest bit goes up and all their 50 friends turn mass confusion into a light thermal that takes them up and they get to goal….I watched with amazement from the ground!!! OUCH!!!

Team USA is doing great even with the other half of the team not performing up to par YET!!! I’m really proud of Tom and Josh they have flown consistently on the two days so far…Bill and I will have our turn to contribute to the team if we ever get to fly again!!!

Today????

Kari

The morning was clear, the winds light and the ground complete soaked after 5 days of rain. It was going to be some interesting flying. The task called was 60k with 3 possible start times 30 minutes apart. The winds were blowing up or down each of the launches at one time or another, and pilots were placing their bets as to which one to que on. I started on the west launch, gave up and went to the north launch. No one was getting up and few if any were launching. I hucked off the north as soon as I got there because I was sick of this shit and the first start time had already passed. I went down like a brick and got a ride back up, comforted that I would not need to try the north again. The south launch had some action with a small, tight gaggle churning right in front of launch, combined with more and more pilots launching into it, fun. The rest of the pilots were running all over the place like their heads were on fire and their asses was catchin’ trying to figure out which launch to set up on, me included. I decided to go back to the west launch and wait as it was less crowded. The second start time had passed, and no one was more than 300 ft over the top of Bora. It finally starts to turn on a little with the last start at 3:15pm, and by some miracle we actually climb to base and start the task. The first turnpoint is some god forsaken hole we were warned was really sinky, but now the sinky hole has a couple of feet of standing water in it to make even more sinky if that was possible. 150 gliders crawl of the end of the ridge to the first TP and into certain sinkout doom, or so I thought. If I’ve learned anything while competing on paragliders is to never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups. We all fly into the wet hole and actually get the turnpoint and climb out. We make it back to launch and get to cloudbase in the best thermal of the day. We then head to another seemingly impossible TP en mass. Kari and I are flying together, Josh and Tom are ahead having gotten to base on the last cloud on the ridge heading to the next TP, their position and timing was perfect. They make the turnpoint with enough altitude to get back into the low hills leading to the final turnpoint. They both make goal in the top 5. We are a little to late and too slow to make it in. Kari gets a little further than me and we both land short of the final TP but it was way further that I thought we would get anyway. All in all not a bad day with around 30 in goal.

Bill

I got up this morning for my usual run and did some quick and depressing calculations. As of this morning I’ve run more miles than I have flown since I got here, and I’ve drank more alcohol than I would in months. Never did I think a flying trip to OZ would involve so much rain, or involve checking into rehab when I get back. There is a team leader meeting happen at the moment and its pouring rain, another day down. Warning- this next section is about scoring and no sane person should attempt to read, understand it, or care even a little. Consider yourself warned. Ok here we go - The scoring games have begun with the first and only task, which GAP 2000 scored around 860. GAP 2000 is what was chosen as the official scoring software for the meet even though it was argued by many that 2002 was more logical and should be used. At the first task briefing it was announced that the departure and arrival points would be turned off for the task to make it a more fair elasped time race. After the task was scored using GAP 2000 with these parameters, the Brits filed a complaint to have the day rescored to 1000 points because it met all of the set validity requirements (GAP 2002 would have done this). The organizers have now rescored the day using code from GAP 2002 and added to GAP 2000 to make it score to 1000. I think this is BS regardless of whether it benefits us or not. Josh, Kari, myself and the Canadian team have filed a complaint about changing the scoring software after the fact. I’m sure it will go nowhere.

Bill

Rain Rain Rain…

Good Morning, the farmers are happy and the pilots are left wet. This is now the 5th day of the competition and as you know we’ve only flown 1 day so far. I still have high hopes for next week if all goes well.

The one day we flew Team USA did really good with Tom and Josh making goal respectively 9th and 13th place!!! Bill and I well…we…aaaa…dirted early!!! OUCH!!!

Our team leader Heather Mull has been doing a fantastic job trying to keep us all together team wise, spirits and logistics. It is a blessing to have her on our side working for us at the team leader meetings as there are many things that needed attention in the organization dept!!!

Last night we had yet another epic thunder and lightning show (3rd night in a row!) followed by a huge downpour. Conrad (our team assistant  ), Nicole and I went storm chasing …we wanted a front row seat to watch the storm, west of town. We left the party at the caravan park for all the birthday people and ventured out to get the elusive lightning shot….most people only came up with black photos….

I’ll attach a photo taken last year during a storm watching session out at Godfrey’s place….check out the strike on the ground!!!

Today has a wet look to it again….it could go either way so we have to play the game and act like we’re flying today even though it looks marginal.

The way I look at it is this…we get a few bad days in the beginning….then the weather turns epic again and we fly our booties off all the way till the end and we forget that we ever had any rain!! It’s a much better way then if it was turned around and we had great weather to start with and then it turns bad for the last 5 days. So this is mother nature teaching us all something I’m just not sure what yet….I’ll let you know when I figure it out!!!

Oh I got it…to always pack an umbrella when you go to a PG competition and be faster on the shutter button!!! 

Kari

The rain continues with another ripping storm hitting the campground last night and punishing all the poor bastards camping in tents as we laughed at their misfortune. Trailer parks are cruel places. It was raining harder than a cow pissing on a flat rock and the winds were scattering tents and tree branches everywhere. A leaky trailer is pretty luxurious in comparison with tent camping, if you can believe it. This morning, I went out for a 10k run and just beat the first thunderstorm back to the campground at 8:30am. Needless to say the day did not look good for flying. After a few meeting they canceled the day without making us go up the hill. Between the US and Canadian teams, the entire stock of Jonny Walker Red has been wiped out in Manila, and a car had to be sent to the next town for resupply. I hope new supplies hold till the end of the meet. My liver needs a rest day

Bill

Task one gave us tricky conditions but at least we got to fly. Since it was an individual time and not a race start, many pilots stayed behind at launch for far too long (nearly half the pack). The view of these pilots waiting for who knows what, was comical to say the least. In an uncommitted fashion resembling a swarm of bees, they stuck together until it was too late to fly the whole course. Some pilots left early and dirted out but those who left in a reasonable time made goal by staying alive in the light conditions. A rain storm is brewing now. I doubt we will fly today. More later. Tom.

The day didn’t look very promising as we drove up and waited on launch, with lots of clouds and shade and an inauspicious wind direction. An elapsed time task was called with and out to the East and then part way back with goal in Manilla. The conditions improved and then dried out and got worse. The day was hard on those who charged out front, like Bill and Kari, and the 50 or so pilots who waited until the start window closed, like most of the Swiss. Tom and I were lucky to be in the in-between time that worked alright and made goal in decent time. We are waiting for the actual results now…

Well, it finally began today with a low cloudbase, lots of shade, and weak lift. Day one of the Worlds, and it was on, so to speak anyway. The task call was a 46k individual start race because of the weak conditions. We all got into the air and to clouldbase and proceeded to churn around for an hour or so as no one really wanted to leave and get pimped off of by everyone else. I was chomping to get out of there and after a few guys left, Gadd and I teamed up and went for the first crossing. We knew this was not the best tactic but I just don’t have the patience to wait the other guys out, nor to I like this style of racing. I’m just going to go when I think I should go based on conditions and I felt we were late anyway as the day was getting more stabile. We had been watching the clould shadows leading toward the first turnpoint and they looked good. Unfortunately no one followed, and on our own with the weak lift we dirted after a few climbs. Not the best decision and not the best way to start the meet, but we went down like men so I’m good with it. Time to start drinking heavily.

Bill