Tethered Flight in Chinese—or a Very Special Judges’ Course

The adventure took place from November 6 to 11, 2018. After a long journey of nearly 24 hours, Peter was officially welcomed with full honors by a Chinese delegation at the major airport in the industrial city of Zhengzhou. Zhengzhou is a city with a population of 8.5 million and is located 600 km south of Beijing. From that point on, Peter was cared for with the utmost attention and respect by a three-person care team throughout his entire stay.
The “Henan Province Air Sports School” is a state-run institution that trains skydivers, airplane and helicopter pilots, model aircraft pilots, and maintenance technicians. State-of-the-art facilities and equipment, as well as the latest training rooms, are available to all of them.

are available. For example, tethered glider pilots train on their own perfect 70-meter hard-surface circle, and there are ideal runways and plenty of space for flying R/C models. But the best part is: All trainees and instructors are full-time professionals, funded by the government. The Chinese proudly presented their exemplary training center and impressed everyone with spectacular flight demonstrations. Naturally, Peter was particularly fascinated by the tethered flight acrobatics demonstrations. He was asked to comment on the maneuvers after each flight and explain his scoring. But that was precisely the problem. Because the flight figures that the Chinese masters drew in the air with their e-Sharks,

were nearly perfect and gave little cause for criticism. As a result, the debriefings were relatively brief in each case. Nevertheless, everyone involved was visibly satisfied.

But Peter had actually traveled to China to conduct a judging training session. For this purpose, he had prepared a comprehensive training presentation designed to last two days. After all the various sightseeing tours, flight demonstrations, group meals, and excursions, as well as various award ceremonies, there was barely enough time left in the end for a two-hour training session. Given the high level of knowledge among all participants, this was a reasonable decision. Among the approximately 30 participants were several aerobatics world champions and highly trained,

experienced national judges. It was impressive to see how the highly qualified participants listened very quietly and with the utmost attention to Peter’s remarks and carefully took notes on everything he said. The open discussion that followed proved to be a challenge at times—especially for the interpreter. Peter returned home quite exhausted after a week in China. For him, however, the experience was one of a kind. He was particularly fascinated by the Chinese people’s warmth, integrity, modesty, and tireless determination to always give their best—in short: Chinese professionalism. One more note on the technology: Since 2016, the professional members of the Chinese F2B national team have been flying three original electric Sharks—these

configuration (see table on the right).

The Chinese are currently developing their own design for the 2020 World Championships. They asked Peter for the plans for the “My Way” and have since received them.

*Ursi Borer*