March 2nd, 2018

Day 1, Yesterday

The last of the 2018 Paraski Championships Series is in Vrchlabi, Czech Republik. The organizer of 2019 FAI Paraski World Championship is using this opportunity to test the competition management and they have invited all key personnel here,  a year before the actual WPC.

On Thursday 1st March, Meet Director Sarka Blaskova, (CZE Alternate IPC Delegate), with the valuable assistance of local Paraski experts Martin Gabla and Petr Jires and the help of the whole Czech Paraski team have prepared a new and attractive Accuracy Landing area at the top of Bubakov chair lift.

Also Franz Singraber (AUT) put his Accuracy Landing scoring system in place, built up the anemometer and prepared all startlists for the following day, Friday 2nd March which will start with giant Slalom Competition followed by two rounds Accuarcy Landing.

That extra flavour for Parski participants will be that everybody needs to bring skis to the Accuracy Landing target area in order to get down from there after the jumps.

So the historical spirit of Paraski is fully alive. The Paraski competitions started 70 years ago, developing from mountain rescue operations in a time when no powerful helicopters were available.(https://www.fai.org/page/ipc-paraski) The teams had to jump with good accuracy on top of a mountain and then ski down to the area where they were needed, e.g. avalange rescue area.

At 9.00 pm the competition officially started with the 1st Team Managers Meeting. Chief Judge Dare Svetina (SLO) introduced his panel and invited all to ask any questions about regulations or scoring: but as almost all participants are experienced FAI Paraski competitors with only three without previous results, there was no serious discussion and everyone could take a rest before the competition day.

Outdoor action will start on 2nd March at 9am with a course inspection followed by the start of the  Giant Slalom at 10am.

Gernot Rittenschober