2009 World Paramotor Championships

Before starting on the World Microlight Championships at Jihlava I must report on the World Paramotor Championships held at Nové Mesto nad Metují in the Czech Republic from 30th July to 9th August where I was a member of the FAI International Jury. This was a longer competition that usual with the opening ceremony held on the Thursday and the closing ceremony on the Sunday 11 days later. This meant that the thunderstorm and strong winds which arose mid-way through the event did not prevent more that a dozen good tasks being flown.

It was undoubtedly one of the most successful paramotor championships ever and certainly the largest World Paramotor Championship with over 100 entries from 18 nations. The Czech hosts did a great job in providing the facilities and the whole organising team, led by Richard Meredith-Hardy (Competition Director), worked tirelessly to make this an exceptional event.

From the British perspective it was a very successful competition with Michel Carnet taking the Gold Medal in the solo paramotor class and the British Team winning the Silver in that category. As an air sports event a spirit of sportsmanship prevailed and the combined bar and dining room became a place where people from the competing teams sat together and talked enthusiastically about the this fast developing sport.

Richard Meredith-Hardy, who introduced GPS loggers into paramotoring at Long Marston in 2003, this year produced an innovative almost paper-free system with all tasks, scores and even complaints dealt with online over the camp-wide WiFi system. This made briefings shorter and ensured that everyone, team leaders, competitors and organising staff had the same information at the same time. This approach has set the standard for future competitions.

Another innovation was the use of large inflatable pylons in the slalom tasks. These added a great visual element and will certainly be used in future.
The final Saturday was a leisure day which enabled the orgainising staff to finalise the results. The closing party, which started with a late afternoon pig-roast, lasted until the sun came up and the closing ceremony was exuberant and good-natured with most medallists and some of the officials liberally sprayed with champagne.

I drove away, towing the microlight trailer on the three hour journey to Jihlava feeling pretty good about the way the week had gone and looking forward to the change from Jury Member to Team Leader.