President's Letter to Delegates and Committee Chairmen 2008-5

FAI General Conference and IGC Bureau Meeting

Dear Delegates

A very successful FAI General Conference was hosted by our Italian friends at Saint-Vincent in the Aosta Valley at the beginning of October. The FAI Office will distribute
news from the Conference in due course.

The Conference included an Air Sports Commission Presidents’ meeting with the FAI Executive Board. A significant part of the agenda of that meeting was devoted to the World Air Games 2009 with the Organisers from Turin reporting to the meeting.

I am delighted to inform you that Brian Spreckley has been asked to act as an FAI representative to work alongside Pierluigi Duranti to assist with the direction of the
sports management of the World Air Games. Brian was acting as the IGC Liaison Officer for the Games and this role will now be taken over by Roland Stuck.

Eric Mozer was confirmed as a member of the FAI Statutes Working Group.

Elections for the FAI President and Executive Board were also held this year. Pierre Portmann was returned as the FAI President and I have been honoured by being elected to the FAI Executive Board.

Following the FAI Conference, the IGC Bureau met at the Fliegerschule Wasserkuppe as guests of the DAeC. The location and hospitality of our German colleagues was
fabulous and our thanks go to Hanno Obermeyer and Fred Gai for organising the meeting.

A very productive two days of work will be distilled into meeting minutes and circulated to everyone in the next two weeks.

There are, however, three points arising from our meeting that I want to share with you immediately:

1. Eric Mozer reported that no bids were received by the September 30 deadline for the 2012 World Gliding Championships in the Standard/Club/World Class. The
   Bureau discussed this and agreed to extend the deadline until November 30, 2008. Please contact Eric at emozer@deltamold.com if your NAC is interested in more
   information on the bidding procedure.

2. We are in negotiation with potential hosts for the 2009 FAI World Sailplane GP Final and expect to make a formal announcement early next month.
3. My election to the Executive Board has meant that we, at the IGC Bureau, have had to reorganise ourselves somewhat. This includes ensuring that we have an
   IGC Bureau member present at the FAI General Conference and at Air Sport Commission Presidents’ meetings. In the first instance this will be our 1st Vice-President. It also has meant ensuring that the various projects that are being run by Bureau members are evenly distributed to share the workload.

Bob Henderson
President, IGC
12th October 2008