1st FAI World Cup of Wingsuit Performance Flying

This year the stars aligned to bring the right people to the right place at the right time. The result was official FAI recognition of Wingsuit Competition for Performance and Acrobatics disciplines. Then without any loss of momentum, the announcement of the 1st FAI World Cup of Wingsuit Performance Flying to be held in the UK this year. This competition is now just a few weeks away. If this is the first you’ve heard of it and want to get in on the action then you need to act fast and continue reading.

IPC Plenary in Bulgaria 2015

Wingsuit competitions have been around for many years. In January this year, the IPC were presented the highly developed competition formats for both Performance and Acrobatics for consideration. The IPC delegates voted in favour of adopting both sets of rules and also unanimously accepting the bid for the UK to host the first Wingsuit World Cup. We now have an IPC Wingsuit Committee, can declare World Champions and set new World Records!

The Event

On the 25th May 2015 the Wingsuit World Cup will commence at the World’s longest continually operated airfield. This is located just a few miles from the historic site of Stonehenge on the outskirts of the small Wiltshire village, Netheravon, UK. It will be hosted by the Army Parachute Association, a not-for-profit skydiving club who have successfully run this competition with the same format for the last three years. Athletes from all over the World are currently making travel arrangements for their opportunity to represent their country on the world stage.

As a recently recognised World Cup event the opportunities to set new world records are to be amongst the main attractions. Top of the billing however is a chance to be immortalised as the first FAI World Cup Champion of Wingsuit Performance Flying.

The goal of this competition is to find the flyer with the best all-round performance flying capability using Time, Distance and Speed tasks. A fixed competition window of 3300ft (1000m) is used, measured using a Flysight GPS logger and evaluated using the Paralog software which provides real-time results on-line.

In 2014 there were 20 competitions and over 300 participants worldwide. New to 2014 was a World Series incorporating four events held in the UK, Hungary, Germany and the USA. The World Series 2014 winner was declared following the USA competition in Lake Elsinore last October and is the organiser of this inaugural World Cup.

The outline programme for the 2015 World Cup is as follows:

How to get involved

Competitors should read the official Bulletin by following the links below and then contact their country’s national governing body to apply to enter. The deadline for preliminary registrations is 25th March but there is still some time as final registration is not due until 25th April 2015.

All other enquiries about participating or exhibiting at the event should be made directly to the organiser whose contact details are also listed below.

Thank you

This article isn’t long enough to credit all the people who have made this happen. You know who you are, you’ve made history, now let’s fly!

Links

FAI Website: http://www.fai.org/ipc-news/39178-wingsuit-performance-flying

Organiser Webpage: www.netheravon.com/wswc2015 (Registration, Bulletin and Rules)

Competition Rules: http://www.fai.org/fai-documents (Sporting Code Section 5)

Organiser contact details: Jackie Harper can be reach via email at: [email protected]