President's Letter to Delegates and Committee Chairmen 2009-3

1st July 2009

World Air Games, GP Final and Bureau Meetings

Dear Friends,

Last month a very successful World Air Games 2009 was completed in Turin, Italy. The event was a success in terms of engaging the participants from each air sport, creating a sense of unity amongst the airsports and providing testing competitions for all.

Congratulations to the glider pilots who participated in very challenging and stable conditions. Sebastian Kawa (Poland) flew consistently to deservedly gain the title of World Air Games Champion.

Not everything worked as well as hoped. The public coverage of the next World Air games is something that we will need to focus on carefully to ensure that we gain the “maximum bang for our buck”. Significantly, the gliding community showed the potential way forward with live streaming and tracking of the GP race with commentary provided.

All credit to our Italian hosts for creating this spectacle despite the significant difficulties created by the World recession. The FAI Executive Board has discussed the way forward for the World Air Games and an announcement should be made very shortly.

A huge “thank you” also to a number of people within the IGC and gliding community who helped to make this event a success for us – Brian Spreckley, Leonardo Brigliadori, Roland Stuck and Shaun Lapworth (the voice of Turin) – to name but a few.

The organisation of the Grand Prix Final for the 2008-2009 round is now well underway with Alex Jansen and Rene Vidal being the face of the organisation in Santiago, Chile.

I am pleased to announce that, with the addition of all available Reserve pilots, we expect there will be 16 pilots, representing seven nations, flying in the Final. Three more pilots have yet to confirm funding to enable them to also compete. If all make it there will be nine nations represented in Santiago.

A great outcome for what was, in February, a very difficult situation.

My thanks go to the team in Santiago for their enthusiasm and dedication towards achieving this event.

Next month your Bureau will be meeting in Lausanne. In addition to our normal business we will be considering a number of specific issues including:

• The potential development of a “safety rating” scheme for gliders participating in IGC sanctioned championships (and we have invited the glider manufacturers to participate in this discussion)
• The future development of the GP product including the delivery of live tracking and commentary
• The development of alternative ways to communicate about gliding using the website and also other tools such as text messaging, skype, and YouTube
• The development of more OLC-based competitions for pilots.

Best regards
Bob Henderson
President, IGC
1st July 2009