Scout National Parascending Accuracy Championships 2001

 The 14^th Wimbledon fielded a full team this year and managed to win 5 out of 7 trophies. The following placing’s were achieved.

 Scout Round Comp. 2^nd Richard Burberry, 3^rd Sanil Modasia.

Venture Round Comp 1^st Ben Haworth

Leader Round Comp 1^st Simon Sykes

Round Team Comp 1st 14^th Wimbledon

Venture Wing Comp 1^st Ben Haworth

Leader Wing Comp 3^rd Simon Sykes 5^th Mark Hall

Wing Team Comp 1^st 14^th Wimbledon

 This event again ran parallel with Shy High 2001 Camp. This camp is for scouts to come and try out parascending, and a number of different activities such as go-carting, climbing wall, land yachts, kiting etc. and for the scouts to watch the scout accuracy championships.

 The championships were held the weekend of 6-8 July at RAF N. Luffenham, with most competitors arriving Friday to a warm welcome from Sky High co-ordinator Ann Underwood; who directed them to a spare bit of cut grass area to camp.

 At 8am Saturday there was a briefing for everyone by Ann, laying down some rules and how the camp and activities would run.  This was followed up with a meeting of the competitors with Simon Sykes, Comp organiser.

 It was agreed that as the conditions favoured round canopy flying for the younger scout competitors that 3 rounds of rounds would be completed before the wing event started.

 A drifter was put up and from this, the position of the target was decided. After setting up the target with Chief Judge Nikki Spence, the competition started at 9.15am. Those in the judging pit, (mostly wing flyers) had been told that all round flying scouts must land with a PLF as there was no padding at all to land on, and they should measure out to 20 meters.

 The winds started off relatively high with canopies coming more or less straight down, and at the end of the round some good scores had been achieved with S McGuirk, B Haworth & S.Sykes taking an early lead.

 It then started to rain so flying was stopped and we had to wait for ½ an hour. 

Round 2 started but quickly stopped again by rain and the decision was made to stop for 2 hours for lunch.

 On coming back out winds had changed by 180^o, so a drifter was put up on the new direction only to find they could not get to the target, so the line was relayed and the drifter put up got close to the center. So the comp was back on.

 It was at this stage out of fairness to all round flyers that round 2 would start again from scratch so that the scouts all had the same conditions.; but they could keep their 2^nd round score if they wanted to.  So Chris Wright had a difficult choice as he had got a score, which he was happy with, or does he have another flight. He went off to get a Waterbird with steering lines and some advise from his CFI Ann and after a chat decided to go for the flight. This proved to be a good decision as he improved on his score by 6m.

 It was during this round that Roy Hall got an impressive 1.7m score but was judged not to have done a PLF but after explaining that he did not want to land on a judge so did a forward roll instead was allowed the score.

 As the winds got lower even the round canopies were gaining forward momentum, this caught out a few of the flyers, one nearly landing on the judges table!

 So we started round 3 with no wind to speak off, (so little in fact that the camp dual flying was suspended). The round continued without any hiccups and completed about 7.30pm, when it was decided to call it a day. Everyone was informed the wing competition would commence at 7am the next day weather permitting.

 On going out to the target the next morning, the wind was quite strong 13-15mph, so with consultation with Chief Judge the comp started.  Nikki Spence at the target had all the young Scout flyers learning the art of judging and they became quite proficient  & did an excellent job during the wing competition. The judges were told that they should measure up to 10m.

 After the first flight it was obvious that the target approach would have to be quite hot and going any distant behind the target would result in dropping short.  Considering the strong winds and no target padding some very creditable scores were had with flyers doing stand up landings; with B Haworth and A Webster taking the early leads.

 There were only a few re-jumps due to winds just over 15mph, and it was agreed that for the newer wing pilots that it was good experience for them in these conditions.

 Luckily the wing comp completed 3 rounds by 12.15pm and it was declared over as presentations were at 2pm. Just as we finished packing away it started to rain again.

 The general feeling was that overall the championships had been a success with 3 completed rounds for all categories, which has not happened for a few years.  It was good to see the new young scouts coming into the sport and putting their new found flying skills to the test and also learning the new skill of judging.  I look forward to competing against them it the future.

 I would like to extend a big thanks to Nikki Spence for being Chief Judge and for GLSW &Surrey SPC for the use of their equipment and land rover.

 It should be noted that all members of the 14^th Wimbledon are also members of GLSW & Surrey SPC.

To see a Scoresheet for this event, Click Here (Excel Format)