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Arran Paragliding Competition

September 5, 2007 on 2:04 pm | In Paragliding |

Arran Paragliding Competition 1st + 2nd Sept 2007

Arran Paragliding Competition - Part of the Paragliding Scottish Nationals

Ian Wallace joint second with Kenny Cooper and Gordon Smyth goes for the spot landing.

The Arran Paragliding competition was held this weekend. Twenty pilots from all over the UK, a Brazilian and our locally trained South African pilot all joined in to compete in a round of the Scottish Paragliding Nationals.

The forcast was not good but the skies cleared and perfect soarable conditions allowed pilots to soar along the cliffs at Drumadoon, using the Kings caves as one turnpoint and another turnpoint on the cliff, A third turnpoint of a tent on the shore brought a lot of pilots down as the lift did not extend so far out. They could admire the strange rock sculptures that are all over the shore as they walked back up. There was a final spot landing back on top of take off for those with enough hieght. Pilots enjoyed the challenge and ballasted up with an evening meal at the Ormidale Hotel.

Neil Cruickshank from Northern Paragliding escaped the office and came flying. Bringing a bunch of Skywalk demos for us to try. He has left with us an extra small and a Small size chilli skywalk gliders if any qualified pilots would like a shot.

Sunday the winds were right for Catacol and pilots gained lots of hieght in thermals and wave lift exploring the Catacol glen. Winds were strengthening so the task was set of a turn point along the coast to Lochranza then an open xcountry task following the road to the south to keep the pilots from flying into the high hills, incase they were blown backwards.

Scottish pilot David Thomson who learnt with flying fever many moons ago won the Arran Cup. He has been leading the UK cross country league for a lot of this season with flights of over 100km.