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Shocking news from Spain: the youngest of the three Rodriguez brothers, Alejandro Rodriguez Fernandez died after an accident close to his hometown Albacete in Spain.

In summer of 2007, Pal Takats developed the connection how to enter a Helicopter directly from a Misty Flip. It means taking some energy with Wing-Overs or just from the exit of another maneuver, swing down straight under the glider, and spin it while the pilot is still climbing upwards. Instead of letting the wing shoot out from the Misty Flip, the energy will be braked down and the pendulum transforms directly and smoothly into a Helicopter. He presented it for the public and the judges at Paranoia Acrobatixxx as the first step to add this connection to the official competition's maneuver list. Till today it didn't happened, because the judges did not saw it as an independent, new maneuver combination (however the pilots themself did and started to perform it as a choreography element in their runs).
Back then, Pal already knew that this maneuver has a lot of potential and more undiscovered possibilities. In the last 2 years he was working to improove his technique, pushing the limits step by step further out. The ultimate goal was: performing the most radical Helicopter entry ever, straight from a close-to-vertical spinny swing, a so-called Asschopper. It is basically the most extreme version of the Misty Flip, entered from a Spiral or Asymmetric Spiral to the opposite side. Due to the amount of energy and the different style that's used to enter an Asschopper, in the beginning the whole movement really looks like the entry of a high Tumbling or Infinity, but then the glider will be spinned out (while the pilot is right above it!) and forced into the Helicopter rotation.
Thanks to U-Turn's new masterpiece the Thriller and last week's training in the Swiss-Alps finally brought the break-through for Pal and he managed to perform numerous successful transitions!

As he reported: "I can't tell how happy I am to finally realize this figure! The unique feeling of learning something totally new gave me a huge kick and it is great to feel so motivated for acro again just like 3-4 years ago! I had this idea in my head for more then 1.5 years. I had the feeling that it should be somehow doable, but it seemed to be such a big challenge that sometimes I wasn't really sure anymore if it can work out. Now, after a long winter sleep I had the chance to train a bit again and try out something which finally brought success and opened new dimensions! Right now I am only able to perform it nicely more or less one time out of three executions. It definitely needs more training to reach a better ratio but if it will take a couple of weeks or months or even a year, I really don't know...Anyway, I must say that for me this is the greatest connection ever: it has everything in it, all the tricks, all the techniques I've ever mastered, squeezed together into one beautiful move, all running down in just a second! In one moment you are like entering an Infinity and in the next one you are already turning in a Heli, practically pulling a coconut spin when the glider is right below you...it'is truly an art! The leading and the energy control just needs to be perfect, otherwise really nothing will work and there is simply no possibility, neither time to make any corrections...but this is exactly the beauty of it!"

Soon a complete video will follow to present the transition from different angles!
Till then enjoy this short intro:

"For the third year in a row Antoine Montant has once again dominated the art of speed flying.

Antoine Montant, for the third year in a row has won the Speed Flying Pro Les Arcs 2010, the referred to worldwide competition that combines skiing and piloting quickly a wing.

The rest of the podium consists of François Bon, one of the innovators of Speed Flying
who has today performed in his hometown with serenity as well as the zesty Yoan Castagnoli who finished third and was highly noticed for his inventiveness, his enthusiasm and his involvement. A third winning party devoted to experience and opening doors to new blood.

« Yo (Castagnoli) and Vince (Reffet) are agitated, they are jumping every where! Antoine Montant comments. I privilege skiing, to have strong supports, finding technical paths with changing rhythms: staying calm during the delicate parts and letting my hair down when I can. »

The competition was divided into two freeride sets, which were fought out Wednesday on the flanks of the Aiguille Rouge situated on the side of the Arandelières which is The Arcs territory.
The speed flyers are free to choose their itinerary, by skiing on the snow and flying on this magnificent untouched side, between corridors and snow powdered fields. A high speed ballet between the rocks. Thier descent is graded on three criterias by a jury : the technique ( the difficulty of the figures), the style (fluidity, the harmony of the skiing and the flying), and the course chosen.

If the control Antoine Montant has in this sport is confirmed, he has won with little advance, the general level of the Swiss, the Austrian and the German competitors has considerably increased. « Until now, Yohan Castagnoli notes, only one and only speed flyer distinguished himself from the others : Antoine. But today three or four have made his position questionable. »

The best is always the best, but he is no longer all alone way up there on the mountain. Speed flying has started to evolve and today Antoine has surely felt the wind of the other wings against his skin.

François Bon and Antoine Montant will now set off to produce a Speed Flying premiere on a mythical side of the Alpes. The destination, still being kept secret,
will be revealed on this website."

Fore more info, pictures, videos and results follow; http://www.speedflyingpro.com/

Brazil's biggest lake hosted the second stage of the Open Paragliding Acro Competition nearby the city of Linhares. During the training day on Friday and the first competition day on Saturday the weather conditions were quite mixed. From the early morning hours several rainshowers and thunderstorms passed the area, causing big variances in the strenght and direction of the wind.

The take-off place was a beautiful sandy beach on the east side of the lake, suitable to launch in a 180 degree angle. The raft and the event was right on the opposite side which seemed optimal, but it's position often made it difficult to tow the pilots into the flying box due to the dominating NW-W wind.
Another problem was that the lakeside is everywhere surrounded with a 50-70 meter high steep slope which caused strong rotor in the landing place and sometimes made it even dangerous to land on the floating platform, especially in the afternoon hours when the see breeze reached the area. During this period the hill on the opposite (take-off) side was nicely soarable even with small acro wings...

3 runs were planned for Saturday and Sunday but due to the variable wind, rain showers, technical problems with the boats and often unsufficient altitude to perform the maneuvers things were happening slowly and only 2 runs could be completed (one with 3 and one with only 2 maneuvers).

Final, overall results of the Open competition (incl. Marobá-, and Linhares Acro)

1. Pál Takáts (Hungary, U-Turn Thriller)
2. Yves Berlovitz (Switzerland, Paratech Acro)
3. Hernan Pittoco (Argentina, SOL Supersonic)
4. Renato Lopez (Brazil, SOL Supersonic)
5. Christophe Guillet (Switzerland, U-Turn Thriller)

Brazilian results of the Linhares Acro

1. Renato Lopes (SOL)
2. Rodrigo Machado (SOL)
3. Mauricio Braga (Paratech)
4. Rafael Goberna (SOL)
5. Ronaldo Cardoso Camargo (Paratech)

The organization has announced that a final, third event of the Brazilian National Acro Championships will take place in April at the same location (only counting for the brazilian ranking).

Despite the - mainly location related - problems I must admit that on the other hand no competition ever before has provided such a service for the pilots as this one. For the entry fee of 250 EUR practically 11 days of accomodation, food, drinks, flying and transports between the locations! You can compare it to one of our greatest European events in Italy where for 100 EUR you can sleep for 4 days in your own car in a busy parking place, take bath in the lake and use a terrible public toilet where you wouldn't even send in your biggest enemy for a ride...).
The financial support by the government is very strong and the organization team is very motivated to improve things for next year (like with professional FAI judges, more towing boats, etc.).

Watch the photo galleries, results and more information on the official website.

The first part of the Brazilian Open Acro Championships at the Marobá beach in Presidente Kennedy has ended. Finally 17 pilots (incl. 4 swiss, 1 argentinien and 1 hungarian) are participating. 

During the 4 days of the event (2-2 training and competition days)  a number of around only 30 flights were flown in total by all pilots together. The reasons for that were various. 
There were 2 towing boats, but one of them got damaged by the waves while putting it into the sea right on the first day...