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World Fly Games Champion, Yes please!

Posted on September 17, 2012 in Dean Eldridge   

Well it was a long way to go from the east coast of Spain to northern Quebec for a weekend competition but thankfully it all paid off splendidly. It started with an 8 hour drive from the Costa Brava in Spain with very little time to pack everything after a busy but very enjoyable week teaching Brazilian film producer Sylvestre Campe to fly.

From Madrid to Montreal we had to transit through Frankfurt where, unbeknown to me, my fuel tank had been confiscated as a ‘hazardous item.’ Those bloody officious Germans!

Apart from that though it was a pretty smooth journey to Mont Joli in Quebec where all of the pilots participating in the event were very warmly received in the airport by the Paramotop.tv crew with a wonderful welcoming party complete with food and beverages!

The first couple of days we were given some relaxation time and also for all the regulations and permissions for us to fly to be finalised which gave us time for activities such as Go-Karting which we were all excited about and a round of golf which didn’t sound so interesting at first but turned out to be such a laugh. Hopefully there was some grass left on the course after all our failed hits!

The testing started on the Thursday for this very special event, the first of it’s kind in North America and also the first pylon race to be setup completely over water. I was a little apprehensive at first as I had a borrowed fuel tank from one of the Canadian spectators (thanks Daniel!) strapped and taped onto my Parajet Zenith and also a motor that was only performing on full throttle so I was busy on the ground fettling for the most part while others got some good practice in.

On the Friday I had made a few engine tweaks and felt a little more confident in my engine despite having a few issues and so switched from my bigger Paramania GTR20 down to the more speedy 18m size and felt pretty good on it despite still not having great performance from my motor.

So it came time for race day on the Saturday and after all the build up it started to rain right when we were ready for take off. An hour spent packing away and waiting for the showers to finish and we were ready to go again. As soon as we were all in the air the rain came again but we decided to persevere this time and completed 3 tasks before the conditions became worse and we were forced to land. Unfortunately this was to be the end of the competition as the next day, Sunday, was completely blown out and wet. However, with 3 tasks completed we had a valid competition and as I had completed each task in 1st place(!!) then gained the top spot of the podium. Of course it would have been great to win with more tasks finished but no one would have turned down the position I was in and someone has to win so I feel good being the Champion! With the highest ever prize in a paramotor competition of 5000 Canadian dollars too, it was doubly sweet!

It’s going to be a rapid return journey now to Spain and then a day of driving to St. Hilaire du Touvet for the Coup Icare flying festival where I’ll be attending the Icarobatix slalom race against some of my great friends from this last weekend and also some other great pilots from around the world. I’m ready and comfortable and hope to do another good job. Maybe see you there..?!

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