IGC President's Report to the FAI General Conference 2007

The International Gliding Commission held its annual meeting in Lausanne at the end of February 2007. Key points from this meeting were:

• A presentation from our colleagues at the Santiago Gliding Club in Chile. For those of you who had the privilege to visit this club at the General Conference last year you will appreciate the lessons that we could all learn from their initiatives and enthusiasm in protecting and developing the club and airfield.
• We spent some time discussing the future strategies for our sport and looking at how we, as the governing sports body, can assist at club level to improve the image of gliding and the attractiveness of the sport.
• We discussed, at length, the FAI ATMOS project after a presentation by Mr. Alvaro de Orleans Borbon.
• We surveyed our Delegates about the value of the Plenary meeting and the summarised results were:
  • We discuss the right subjects and spend the right amount of time on technical matters.
  • We try to fit too much into the available time, but the overall length of the meeting (2 days) is reasonable.
  • One meeting a year is sufficient.
  • The Olympic Museum is an excellent venue but Lausanne, as a location, has limited support.
  • Our meeting structure and our communication with our Delegates is good.
• The Plenum was pleased to confer the following awards:
  • The Lilienthal Medal to Mr Alan Patching, Australia.
  • Pirat Gehriger Diplomas to Professor Loek Boermans, The Netherlands, and, jointly, to Mr Brian Spreckley and Mr Keith Nicholson of the UK.
  • The Pelagia Majewski Medal to Mrs Ghislaine Facon, France.
• Significant decisions taken by the IGC Plenum included:
  • A resolution to endorse the work of the OSTIV in sailplane safety.
  • A major overhaul of the Sporting Code section 3 for 2008.
  • A resolution to hold World Gliding Championships outside of Europe on a regular basis.
  • Abandoning restrictions on the number of records that can be claimed on a single flight.
  • The adoption of a new Sporting Code Annex D to formally manage the IGC ranking list.
  • The formation of a committee to study the emerging range of light-weight and lower performance gliders and how they will fit into our championship structure and world records.

2007 World Gliding Championships

The 4th FAI Women’s World Gliding Championships, 2007, were held at Romorantin, France. The World Champions are:

• 15M Class Kathrin Senne GER,
• Standard Class Sarah Kelman GBR,
• Club Class Gill Spreckley GBR.

The 5th FAI Junior World Gliding Championships, 2007, were held at Rieti, Italy. The World Champions are:

• Standard Class Patrick Gai GER,
• Club Class Killian Walbrou FRA,
• Team 1st Germany.

The 14th FAI European Gliding Championships, 2007, were held at Issoudun, France for the Open, 18M and 15M Classes. The Champions were:

• Open Class Peter Harvey GBR,
• 15M Class Janusz Centka POL,
• 18M Class Ronald Termaat NED.

The 14th FAI European Gliding Championships, 2007, were held at Pociunai, Lithuania for Standard, Club, World and 20M multi-seat Classes. The Champions were:

• Standard Class Frederic Hoyeau FRA,
• Club Class Sebastian Kawa POL,
• World Class Krzysztof Herczynski POL,
• 20M Multi-seat Class Yytautas Rasimavicius and Gintautas Butnoris LIT.

IGC-OLC World League Results

The IGC-OLC World league for 2007 has recorded entries from 374 Clubs and gliding organisations and hundreds of pilots flying in 19 rounds of competition.

The top 10 Clubs were:

1. Warner Springs Gliding (USA),
2. Albuquerque Soaring (USA),
3. Black Forest Soaring (USA),
4. Tucson Soaring Club (USA),
5. Soaring Society of Boulder (USA),
6. Porin Ilmailukerho (Finland),
7. FLG Blaubeuren (Germany),
8. SFZ Königsdorf (Germany),
9. LSV Schwarzwald (Germany),
10. Hole in the Wall (USA).

The IGC-OLC World League has created a tremendous on-line competition opportunity for both individual pilots and for their clubs.

The IGC congratulates the winners of the Championships and the IGC-OLC World League.

IGC Grand Prix Race

This event is now branded as the “FAI World GP Glider Championship”. A total of eight events using the Grand Prix race format were held in 2006. Participants from 11 nations competed in this series and all 11 nations are represented in the Final. Six of the finalists are from Germany, three from South Africa and two each from France and the UK.

A total of 143 pilots competed in these eight events with many flying more than once to achieve qualification for the Final. Some 700 Grand Prix races were achieved with no incidents or accidents. The qualifying finalists include four World Champions, three past World Champions and three past European Champions. The Final will be held in Omarama, New Zealand in December 2007.

This style of glider racing has proven to be popular and effective and has created a significant amount of media and public attention, which was always our aim with creating the Grand Prix race format.

In 2008 it is our intention to run a full GP round – qualifying events followed by a Final. This will enable us to then run another qualifying series in 2009 followed by a Final in 2010. This will ensure that we do not have a major media attractive Final event running in the same year as the World Air Games.

FAI World Air Games

The IGC salutes the initiative of the FAI in creating the new World Air Games product and congratulates the FAI Executive Board on the bid process developed and the subsequent award of the 2009 World Air Games to Turin. We look forward to participating using our Grand Prix race format. The glider pilots that will be invited to represent our sport will be the current World Champions in each class and category. If all accept there will be twelve glider pilots present, including potentially three women and two juniors.

Championships Awarded

The 2nd FAI World GP Championships Final, 2007, was awarded to New Zealand.

Strong bids were provided from several countries for the new calendar of World Gliding Championships in 2010. The bids awarded were:

• FAI Open/18M/15M World Gliding Championships to Szeged, Hungary,
• FAI Standard/ Club/ World Gliding Championships to Prievidza, Slovak Republic.

Worthy of note is that there will also be a new “Continental” Gliding Championships – in South America - being hosted by Argentina in January 2008. This enhancement of our sporting calendar is welcomed and we look forward to further developments with Continental Gliding Championships.

Championship Management Initiatives

A number if initiatives have been put in place to improve the overall quality of our World Championships. These include:

• Chief Stewards being appointed, at the time of the bid selection, to work with the organisers to prepare for the event.
• Visits to the championship site in the year prior to the event.
• A qualification process for individuals to fulfil the roles of Jury President and Chef Steward.
• Training seminars for Jurors and Stewards.

Media Developments for Gliding

We continue to develop the media opportunities demonstrated in 2006. The 2nd FAI World GP Gliding Championship Final in December 2007 will have full internet and video coverage and will be viewable live on the internet.

The development of media relationships continues to be a bumpy road and our experience to date, in the IGC, suggests that we need to have better centralised management of this process. Unfortunately this creates a significant workload on the Bureau and willing volunteers and so it proving to be difficult to achieve. It also cuts right across the relationships that our championship organisers have created with media outlets in the past. This desire to ensure we maximise our media impact while allowing flexibility for organisers requires significant work over the next year.

Challenges in Europe

A significant amount of effort is being made, especially by the European Gliding Union (EGU) to mitigate the threats of Mode S transponders.

The EGU, in close collaboration with Europe Air Sport, is still in discussion with the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) about the future harmonisation of the regulation of light aviation in Europe. Last year a working group called MDM 032 was tasked with making proposals for a better concept for “regulation of aircraft other than complex, motor-powered aircraft, used in non commercial activities”. This group, in which gliding is represented by Roland Stuck (FRA) and David Roberts (UK), is now finalizing several proposals:

• Simplification for the certification process of all aircraft with a MTOM below 1 tonne,
• Relaxation of the Part M regulation on maintenance for all light aircraft,
• The creation of an easy accessible recreational pilot licence with different medical standards which should allow more people to afford to take up aviation safely,
• Light operation rules.

EASA will soon submit these proposals to the stakeholders. If they are accepted a better regulatory environment should be created in Europe for gliding and airsports in general in about two years.

Finally, it is my honour to acknowledge the excellent support and assistance provided by Secretary General Max Bishop and the staff at the FAI Office and to thank them sincerely for their efforts on behalf of the IGC.

Bob Henderson
President
International Gliding Commission