2012 USPA Nationals of Canopy Piloting

[crazydiver 0]

June 13-17? I was surprised to see nationals so early. Is this correct?

Cheers,
Travis

[ianmdrennan 2]

Yes. It's quite early this year.

Performance Designs Factory Team

[crazydiver 0]

This is certainly good new for those from FL and CA. Bummer for those from the rest of the country who will just be coming off a 6 month hiatus from winter and who've had little time to train.

Cheers,
Travis

[wildcard451 0]

Quite a few travel to the FLCPA throughout the 1st 5 months of the year. Also Cali has a organized league as well.

Hell Nationals is right after the last meet of the FLCPA season.

Plenty of time to train and compete, if you want to.

This year was my first nationals, and with the exception of the Hawaii and CO guys, there were very few new faces from the FL league.

VA winters are no frozen north, but I sure as shit don't enjoy jumping here from Nov-Feb.

[crazydiver 0]

Quote

Quite a few travel to the FLCPA throughout the 1st 5 months of the year. Also Cali has a organized league as well.

Hell Nationals is right after the last meet of the FLCPA season.

Plenty of time to train and compete, if you want to.

This year was my first nationals, and with the exception of the Hawaii and CO guys, there were very few new faces from the FL league.

VA winters are no frozen north, but I sure as shit don't enjoy jumping here from Nov-Feb.

Plus now, if the new FLCPA rules are adopted by UPSA for nationals this year and the FAI sets them as the precedent for world stuff, all of the folks from wintery regions will HAVE to travel to get any training in over a pond. Bummer.

Cheers,
Travis

[wildcard451 0]

Quote

Quote

Quite a few travel to the FLCPA throughout the 1st 5 months of the year. Also Cali has a organized league as well.

Hell Nationals is right after the last meet of the FLCPA season.

Plenty of time to train and compete, if you want to.

This year was my first nationals, and with the exception of the Hawaii and CO guys, there were very few new faces from the FL league.

VA winters are no frozen north, but I sure as shit don't enjoy jumping here from Nov-Feb.

Plus now, if the new FLCPA rules are adopted by UPSA for nationals this year and the FAI sets them as the precedent for world stuff, all of the folks from wintery regions will HAVE to travel to get any training in over a pond. Bummer.

I still don't know who is supporting these new proposed rules. I have heard nothing but opposition to them. Probably over my pay grade.

[superstu 0]

Not over your pay grade, they just didnt ask anyone from the canopy piloting community except for possibly a select few. Then they didnt think it through and just implimented what they thought sounded good.

Personally I dont have a problem with the rules from the stand point of actually running them. What i have a problem with is how these changes were made. It seems like they asked maybe one or two canopy pilots how they would change speed and distance to make it fit in a smaller area but didnt think about the other consequences, such as safety, judging requirments (more judges needed along with cameras), course materials (ie only timing systems and no possible use of cameras now), the lack of good training facilities (dz's with ponds), and so on.

Our discipline needs a better system to make rule changes. Other disciplines have forums where people can put ideas out there. Nick Batch also mentioned to me that the people making the decisions should be qualified such as having attended a minimum of 3 world meets. That way those people making the decisions are somewhat in the know on how rule changes effect the sport over the long run.

Slip Stream Air Sports
Do not go softly, do not go quietly, never back down

[frost 1]

Agreed. With an understanding that you can't have everyone who competes involved in a governing process - that would be destined for a failure.

A committee needs to be in place and should be comprised of several qualified individuals such as Athletes, Judges, Sporting Code experts, etc. I agree that representation from qualified competitors is a must! Competitors who not only have attended several world meets, but have placed reasonably high there, like in the top five or ten. In order to be on this committee these top pilots should also be qualified as international level CP judges and General Sporting Code experts.

All other competitors can and should participate in the process of rule forming by of submitting suggestions to an appointed/elected committee. I dont think it's unreasonable to have full visibility into how these rules are made/changed. That should be provided or made available by the governing organization, in this case - FAI/IPC.