President's Letter to Delegates and Committee Chairmen 2005-5

June 8th, 2005

Dear Friends

FAI Meetings

I recently returned from Lausanne from a series of FAI meetings. The City also hosted the FAI members to a formal function as part of the Centenary Celebrations of the FAI.

A meeting between the FAI Executive Board and the Vice-Presidents (Air Sport Commission Presidents and the NAC representatives) spent a considerable amount of time discussing how to develop the World Air Games for the future. The proposal is that a series of Regional Air Games (RAG) will be held over the next two or three years, leading up to a larger World Air Games.

The RAG will be designed to be held at a single venue with only a limited number of Air Sports present. For us this fits exactly with the new Sailplane Grand Prix event that we have designed – as short, sharp competition with opportunity for other Air Sports to also hold events on the same airfield.

We are looking forward to being able to work with the FAI Executive Board and other Air Sports to develop the RAG.

A subsequent meeting of the Air Sports Commission Presidents endorsed support for the RAG concept. A number of other issues were discussed at this meeting, including:

• Updating the FAI Organiser Agreement
• How the Environment Commission can support event organisers
• The protection of our intellectual property
• The use of GNSS technology for all Air Sports for verification, and
• An FAI “Seminar for Event Directors” to be held in late October.

Sailplane Grand Prix

The 1st World Sailplane Grand Prix, being held in Saint Auban (France) from the 2nd to the 11th of September 2005, is on track for being a showcase event with a full field of 20 entries. We are very grateful to the FFVV and the people at Saint Auban for their support of this event.

Bids are already being received for the 2006 Sailplane Grand Prix qualifying contests and for the 2007 2nd World Sailplane Grand Prix.
Remember, bids for the 2006 Sailplane Grand Prix qualifying contests close on 31st August 2005 and for the 2007 2nd World Sailplane Grand Prix on 31st October 2005.

IGC Officials

The Bureau recently conducted an audit of all those currently nominated as Officials (Jury and Stewards) for IGC sanctioned gliding championships. This audit revealed that there were a number of people who had not actually been involved as either Jury members or Stewards in the recent past. As a result the respective NACs have been contacted to confirm that the persons they have nominated are still available for duty as IGC Officials.

The Bureau will be conducting these audits frequently in future as part of the quality control of our Championships to ensure that we have the best possible people overseeing our events.

Anyone can be nominated to take on these roles, but they must be experienced in competitions at an international level and be very knowledgeable of the Annex A Rules. All nominations must come through NACs, or Gliding Organisations, so that the Bureau knows that the person nominated has the support of their national body.

Plenary 2006

Sir John Allison, President of Europe Air Sports (EAS), has agreed to be our keynote speaker at the Plenary meeting in 2006. By March next year we may well have seen a significant amount of legislation introduced by EASA, which will impact directly on the 90,000 glider pilots in Europe. By building a close relationship with EAS we anticipate being able to support the EGU in protecting the sport of gliding in Europe. I would like to again note that I believe that all Gliding Presidents should attend our plenary session in Lausanne in 2006 as I believe that this meeting will be a critical turning point in the development of our sport.

The Bureau will be considering a number of options to try and ensure that all NACs that have Delegates nominated to the IGC actually attend this meeting.

Enjoy your soaring safely

Bob Henderson
President, IGC
June 8th, 2005