The first IPC World Freestyle and Skysurf World Championships were held at Efes, Turkey on September 13-21, 1997. During official practice, competitors had the option of performing their compulsory routines and having them scored. BJ Worth (USA) was the FAI controller for freestyle skydiving and skysurfing.

September 10 was official arrival day for judges and a judges briefing was conducted on Sept. 11 and 12, 1997. Chief Judge was Roger Flinn (England) and Igor Van Aperer (Netherlands) was event judge for freestyle and Ray Williams (Australia) was event judge for skysurfing. Assistant chief judge was Füsun Eruç, a sweet and kind Turkish girl. The panel of judges also consisted of Janet Bloemendaal (Netherlands), Gail Bradley (Australia), Ann Marie Branet (France), Florian Ebner (Germany), Peter Hittenberger (Austria), Tamara Koyn (USA), Maria Mozouch (Sweden), Ruth Sieber (Switzerland), and Silvia Wagner (Austria).

There were 3 training judges for freestyle and skysurfing accompanying the panel--Heidi Kjögx (Denmark), Gaudenzia Martinengo (Italy), and Kathryn Ricketts (Australia). They participated in the judges briefing, practiced scoring the dives during the meet, and took a written test as well as a practical judges' evaluation. Each morning, a team of buses carried the competitors and meet staff from the various hotels to the competition site. Every morning, Heidi had another interesting bus story to tell. On her first morning, the bus turned a corner so tightly that she learned that the bus could actually drive on 2 wheels. The next day the bus had an engine fire and, on the following day, there were bullet holes in the windshield.

On September 12, a competitors' meeting was held at the Akdeniz Inn in Kusadasi, a nearby town to Efes. The briefing was presented by the meet director, Patrice Girardin of France and Roger Flinn of England, the chief judge. In addition to assigning jump order and the standard briefing (manifest procedures, discussion on the judging process, video procedures, etc.), competitors were cautioned to not make any aggressive landing techniques as the competition site was far from any medical facilities.

All event participants received a special gift pack including numerous souvenirs to remember the World Air Games by.

The opening ceremonies were held on September 13. Sorted out by country with the judges and other staffing in separate groups, the competitors for all the parachuting disciplines paraded through Efes. Welcome and opening speeches were made.

During the first day of competition on September 14, 31 freestyle teams completed 2 rounds of competition and 24 skysurfing teams completed 3 rounds of competition. There were a total of 55 teams--4 women skysurfing teams from 4 countries, 20 men skysurfing teams from 15 countries, 16 men freestyle teams from 10 countries, and 15 women freestyle teams from 12 countries. Overall, skysurfing and freestyle competitors came from 22 different countries. Freestyle competitors jumped from a caravan and skysurf competitors jumped from a Casa at 13,500 feet.

With recent problems with her left shoulder, which originally started from a wind tunnel accident last year when she was teaching a freestyle course in Switerland, Dale Stuart, 6-time gold medalist in world freestyle competition, had to withdraw from the competition. Her shoulder had dislocated again shortly before the competition. Many seemed to know that she would have won the competition had she been able to participate.

On September 15, a special guest dinner was organized for VIPs and judges at Koy Restaurant in the small village of Sirince. The side lines of the small cobblestone streets were filled with merchants selling souvenirs. After dinner, THK gave gift boxes of Turkish style candy and then a belly dancer danced along with party music. It was a good party.

During compulsory rounds, competitors had to perform 5 different compulsory sequences as described in the rules. The quality of execution of those move sequences were evaluated. During the free round, competitors could perform anything that they imagined in a 45 second routine. Free rounds are evaluated for execution, artistic impression, difficulty, and camera flying. Difficulty, execution, and artistic scores were earned mostly by the performer only. Competitors performed 3 compulsory routines and 7 free routines throughout the 10 round competition.

In general, the World Air Games were televised live between September 15 and 21 on Eurosport and Turkish National TV.

Freestyle and Skysurfing competition finished on Thursday, September 18, earlier than planned. While it was fairly windy (15-20mph) every afternoon, the competition proceeded without any weather delays. The afternoon of the last day was more windy (20-25mph).

Following the competition, an Open Meeting IPC Committee Freestyle Skydiving and Skysurfing was held by Ronald Overdijk at the Akdeniz Inn. Competitors had the opportunity to express there views and ideas for future competitions in an organized manner.

The awards ceremony was held in the afternoon of September 20. While in the Efes town square with everyone lined up beside their country's flags, the awards for all the parachuting disciplines were awarded.

That night, September 20, there was a competitors' bouquet and party at the Tuson Hotel and the closing ceremonies were held at the Efes airfield in the afternoon of the following day.

The most exhilarating aspect of the competition rests upon the inspirational nature of the routines that the competitors performed.

At the end of the competition, the complete score breakdowns including the individual scores for each area from each judge were provided to the competitors. The following chart includes the total score for each jump and the total score for the team.

First, the freestylists complete 2 rounds performing their compulsory routines.

Chifumi is now flying more assertively in greater control of her movements rather than allowing the wind to lead her dance as much as she had in the past.

Olav Zipser comes back on the scene as a freestylist this year with a surprisingly smooth performance. He wore just shorts and maintained control in his bare skin. I recall him telling me some time ago that no jumpsuit and bare skin is the purest way one can fly. Having no control surfaces of a jumpsuit adds to the difficulty of controlling maneuvers for several reasons. Anyone, who has made no suit dives, will recall the slippery sensation that they felt. This also compounds the difficulty of performing moves especially for stopping moves cleanly or making abrupt transitions. In spite of this, Olav looked more graceful than ever. Although, he could be seen visibly compensating for his lacking control surfaces by the way he flexed his knees to come upright (via a front loop) again from a head-down straddle. Secondly, with just bare skin exposed to the airflow and streamlined body positioning in the air, his routines fall extremely fast. The camera flyers working for the TV crew could not keep up with their fast fallrate.

For starting their compulsory routines, many of the competitors exited with leg lock grips with just the freestylist's upper body visible in the frame. In these exits, the camera flyer starts from a rear float position with the freestylist in front facing the tail. This exit technique got to appear very common and typical real quick. However, Thomas from Denmark performed this exit differently, adding a layer of humor. Seemingly like jello, his arms flopped freely and wildly uncontrolled in the relative wind. Upon breaking the leg lock, he moves into a cleanly executed straddle standup to begin his compulsory sequences.

4 teams competed in the women's division in skysurfing. Just able to stand on the board and barely able to perform only very basic moves, Marta Ferreira (along with camera flyer, Caria Costa) was a brave competitor representing her country, Portugal.

Viviane, the top women skysurfer, performs the zig zag movements of the slalom very well. While performing the slalom movement, a skysurfer assumes the tracking position and changes the direction of the track by 90 degrees. In the case of this competition, skysurfers must change the direction of their tracking 4 times. She actually changes the direction of her track by a complete 90 degrees and actually travels in the direction before changing to the next direction. In the video, a viewer sees her actually shifting back n' forth in front of the scenery behind her.

The skysurfing compulsory round did not finish without any entertainment. After performing a compulsory sequence, one skysurfer quickly had to pull up his pants again as they had fell down.

Once the first two compulsory rounds were complete, the freestylists and skysurfers were free to release their creativity. During the free rounds, several major trends became apparent.

Especially in the men's freestyle division, the freeflying style has become more popular. The freeflying style carries with it several characteristics--the manner in which the 2 team members fly relative to one another, the jumpsuits they wear, the involvement of head-down moves, and the little games that they play. The freefly style permeates the Women's division as well.

Many freeflyers have a tendency to include head-down moves. As Stefania launched into an "AFF head-down exit," her charming sweet face is pleasantly framed on the video. The exit was very smooth without the jerking motions which usually seem to accompany such exits in which only a small portion of the freestylist is in frame. During an AFF head-down exit, one freeflyer takes grips with each hand on the 3-ring cover of the other freeflyer and launch with both freeflyers pointing their heads into the prop blast.

Galit of Israel, Manfred of Austria, and many other freestylists included a simple head-down straddle in their routines. Boaz, from Israel, spun on his head for a good portion of one of his free routines. Nicolas from France, while in the head-down straddle holds his arms perfectly straight out from his shoulders and straight. With his strong symmetrical arm position and green and white jumpsuit, Nicolas looked as if he was wearing a green V-shaped shield on his chest. To finish the routine, Thomas of Denmark assumes a head-down straddle just slightly higher than his camera flyer, Rasten, and assumes a no lift dive position drastically dropping in front of the camera and into the distance below. At the conclusion of their last round of the competition, Eli's legs catch the sun's rays as he spins in a head-down straddle position. After performing a smooth graceful routine in the women's division, both Karin of Switzerland and Gemma of Australia finish their routines in a head-down straddle as well.

More advanced variations on the head-down position, involving asymmetrical body positions, continuous movements, and/or having the hands over the head, were also performed. Mike Ortiz and Olav Zipser, both representing the USA, run while in the head-down position. Andrea from Austria, while wearing her baggy purple and blue "clown" suit with diamond patterns, included a head-down straddle as well as running movements in her routine. In contrast to the loose body form displayed in running motions, Lucrezit of Switzerland performs head-down split switches with perfectly straight legs and strong toe-point in her routine. After establishing and releasing a single handed grip, Mike finishes his dive by making a "superman" dive in which he places both arms over his head and his legs together. Fritz, Mike's camera flyer, maintains fallrate right beside Mike as he holds his Superman dive position. As Stefania performs her Superman dive, she runs at the same time. She also performs a head-down pirouette with her hand on the knee of her bent leg. The other leg is straight and that same arm is positioned over her head. Chifumi of Japan performs a head-down straddle pirouette with her arms forming a circle in front of her body. Olav representing the USA, in the head-down position, performs swimming motions similar to a breath stroke. As he moves his arms over his head, he must be sure to extend them straight downward into the wind flow, otherwise the wind can grab his arms pulling them forward or backward. This error would result in a loss of control of the relativity and, perhaps, even the loss of balance in this move.

Many of those involved in the freefly trend wore generally wearing baggy suits. Winged suits were not as popular among the competitors as in years past. Tie-died suits are picking up popularity as well. Omar (red/orange), Mike (yellow/white), Eli (red/white & various), and others were wearing them.

While exhibiting more of a freeform body shape rather than straight legs and good toe-point, freefliers tend to show personality, themes, and little games in their routines.

In his first free round routine, Mike Ortiz representing the USA starts off with a spinning head-down straddle. Then, he stops, making a half cartwheel to a standing orientation. Then, he cartwheels back head-down then back to upright, then a half loop. Then, he cartwheels back headup instantly snapping back to head-down. The theme of his routine was deciding on whether he wanted to be headup or head-down and the sudden change in his tempo in changing from one position to the other exaggerated the humor of this dive. He finishes his dive in the same head-down spin with which he started. This choreographically packaged the dive as one whole cohesive statement.

Ronald Overdijk of Holland, dressed as a fun white freefly clown with thin orange stripes going in various directions, starts his dive from the rear float position and begins swimming over the top of Henny into a head-down position in a half wheel rotation. (More on Wheels later.) Then, Ronald uprights and runs this way and that and then runs right overhead as Henny films from beneath. (However, on their last free rounds, Ronald gave up his clown freefly suit to perform a more traditional freestyle routine in his white spandex tights. Ronald performs a classical standing straddle spin while Henny films from beneath, a classic camera move developed in years past.)

Eli Thompson and Greg Gasson from USA take turns as being the camera flyer and the freestylist. During the compulsory round, Greg performed the compulsory moves and then, Eli performed the free routines while Greg filmed. To start a free routine, Eli stands up tall in the door and, with our view from below the door sill, it seems certain that he will fall on top of us. To capture the scene, Greg had climbed to a position hanging beneath the plane.

Judith Graile and Ulli Wambach from Germany were a comical pair. Ulli grabbed her nose and pulled her out of the plane and held onto her that way. On a following dive, while sitting in the door facing one another, Ulli wraps his hands around her neck, starts strangling her, and pulls her out of the plane into a head-down position. (Obviously for safety reasons, there was another grip established out-of-sight to control the tension.) Once breaking apart, she performs a head-down spin with one hand on the hip and the other over her head with both elbows bent. To finish, she waves "bye" while in the head-down position, rotates 180 degrees, and runs away still while head-down.

Boaz from Israel presents a surprise ending for his last competition routine. He wears a black shirt and jeans, another jumpsuit trend reflected among freeflyers. While headup, he begins walking and then he walks into a head-down position via a half Space Lab rotation and continues his walking while head-down. (A Space Lab is a move during which the freestylist performs a slow moving back layout while "walking" around the loop.) For the most part, the camera flying was average. Boaz finishes by performing the usual standup and falling away below and out of sight. The earth is in view of the camera. Suddenly, Boaz ascends into the frame in close proximity while still holding that standup with his arms tucked. This all happens within the 45 second time for the routine. (With my background in freeflying, I know Boaz had to do a nice back-down slow fall position or something similar and carefully get transitioned cleanly back into the standup with the arms tucked again right before coming back into view.)

Many teams, including Ronald from the Netherlands, Boaz from Israel, and Judith from Germany, performed moves during which the partners travel under and over one another. These over/under transitional moves have been referred to as wheel or eagle rotations and an assortment of various names in the freeflying community. To perform a wheel, the two partners begin facing one another, typically with one head-down and the other headup. Then, traveling in the direction of the head, both partners proceed to move over and under one another. After one half a wheel, the two partners will be in the opposite orientations on the opposite side but still facing one another. Freeflyers have multiple variations on the basic wheel movement which can involve one or both partners performing a flip when moving under or over one another.

From their exit position, Auton and Patrik of Sweden perform a half wheel rotation. They set up in the door with Auton in the aft position facing forward and Patrik in the front position facing aft. Then, Auton travels over the top of Patrik in another half rotation from head-down to headup traveling in the direction of his feet. In finishing other routines, they perform wheels or eagle rotations. Mike and Fritz from the USA also performed quite a few wheel rotations in some of their routines. After a few plain wheels, Mike would perform a move during each one. For example, while moving over the top of Fritz, he performed a double front loop to finish in the head-down position level with Fritz again. Omar and Orly from USA also perform bunch of wheels and then Omar makes a surprise tucked front loop as he sails over the top of a wheel rotation.

Scott Smith performs front loops with his legs in a "diamond" position (with the knees pointed outward and the toes touching) and then as a team, they proceed into a wheel rotation with Scott continuing to hold his legs in the diamond position. It was impressive that he kept his body form perfectly all the while participating in a wheel moving in the direction of his head. During over/under transitional moves, it is more difficult for the camera flyer to be close and for the performer to stay in control within the burble. It is also more difficult to present good clean body form and do your part in controlling the relativity. It is this element that will make 2-way skydancing a more difficult discipline than freeflying in the future of skydiving.

As the competitors perform these variations on wheel rotations, the camera flyer captures an unique visual of the competitor as the sky and ground appear to shift places behind the competitor. These and other team moves illustrate a style of making video which is inspired from and made possible by freeflying techniques.

• Horizontal Orbit--a complete or partial arcing path even, below, or above subject.
• Vertical Orbit--a complete or partial arcing path over and under subject.
• Upside-down Frame--the subject and scenery are upside-down on the screen.
• Sideways Frame--the subject and scenery are sideways on the screen.
• Ascending/Descending Movements--the act of changing the level relative to the subject.
• Frame Roll--the subject and scenery rotate within the frame. It can be performed even with, looking up, or looking down on subject.
• Frame Turn--the camera rotation causes the subject to move into and out of either the right or left side of the frame.
• Frame Loop--the camera rotation causes the subject to move into and out of either the top or bottom of the frame.
• Or, any combination of the above actions and/or additional yet to be conceived 3-D camera flying.

The various wheel rotations performed by the teams are examples of vertical orbiting maneuvers. Teams also included horizontal orbiting actions in their routines as well. For example, Mike and his camera flyer, Fritz, begin a head-down orbit. During the orbit, Mike performs individual single head-down pirouettes while the horizon line continues to slide behind them as they maintain their horizontal orbit.

Knut from Germany did a good deal of shooting from below Guido sometimes even while rotating himself creating sometimes a wild affect on his partner's freestyle sequences. The wild effects are more dramatic especially when the sky behind Guido is featureless.

Camera flyers often rotate around the camera to perform a camera roll. Because they try to keep the camera in place and rotate their bodies around the camera, this is more difficult to perform than just simply performing a cartwheel type action about the C.G., especially when flying close to the subject. (If the distance between the performer and camera flyer is greater then it will be less visible if the camera flyer's rotation was not centered on the camera. Also, if the camera flyer is flying face down, it's easier to perform such a roll as the camera is already on the axis of rotation.)

When the camera flyer makes a camera roll in exact timing with a performer's looping rotation, the team move is commonly referred to as a synced roll. As Chris from the USA performs a Stag Backloop, Grant performs a half synced roll to the head-down position. Then, after a couple moves and along with Chris' cartwheel, Grant performs a half synced roll back to a headup filming position. (BTW, Chris began training only last May, just 3 months before the competition, and looked just as smooth as other competitors who had been training for years!) Karin and Karsten Dieck perform synced camera movements in their routine as well.

In skysurfing, Mike and Andy from Great Britain showed some strong team work nicely punctuated with synced rolls. First, Mike exits backing out of the Casa and smoothly makes a half backloop into the head-down position into a Helicopter. From a standing position facing to the left, Mike performs a back 1 1/2 twist, repeats the move again, and then on the third rotation, Andy performs a synced camera roll along with Mike as he makes a single simple backloop.

Knut Krecker from Germany includes some unusual shooting at the end of Guido's routines. For example, Knut finishes one routine in a back track twist while filming his own entire body in plain view of his wide angle lens. Knut finishes up another routine by making a bunch of loops, again, filming his own black and white spotted jumpsuit.

Unknown to the judges, Knut, Adrian, and others mounted their camera upside-down so that they could film in their preferred head-down stance and produce normal upright video. This was obvious only during the climbout (before the start of the working time), during break-off (usually after working time), and by a few other clues. While this presented a normal image during the routine, there were, however, a few confusing visual elements. For example, it can be somewhat disconcerting to the viewer when Adrian finishes their routine filming Olav in a track including a portion of his own body in the track position in the top portion of the frame with his wide angle lens. To start their dive, Guido and Knut perform a tube exit with Knut on the floor and Guido on top. Because Knut has a wide angle lens and his camera is mounted upside-down, you see the black and white legs of Knut's jumpsuit at the top of the frame with Guido in the center bottom portion of the frame.

BTW, many competitors were using digital video cameras. This was obvious as I had noticed a number of digital video flaws in which a tiny portion of the image freezes for an instant.

Many teams in both freestyle and skysurfing ranging through the entire skill range included some form of docking (hands to hands, hands to feet, hands to board, etc.) in their routines. For example, Judith and Ulli made a number of linked exits such as when Ulli was pinching her nose or strangling her neck. They kick off their last round with the Butterfly exit commonly practiced by freefliers. During a Butterfly exit, the two partners exit with a hand grip and tumble with one going over the other. Guido and Knut starting their butterfly exit from in the door with Knut leaning out from the plane. To start another jump, Knut and Guido perform a tube exit with Knut on the floor and Guido on top. Montse from Spain finishes a dive with Alejandro docking on her right foot while she is flying on her back.

During a skysurfing exit, camera flyer Rob from Australia grabs the nose of Chris's board. Chris sits, leaning back some, as they ride the hill together entering into a slow horizontal rotation. Mick and Mike, a skysurfing team also from Australia, perform some kind of butterfly action for their exit. Their Butterfly move spun with oscillations in level. Starting off another round of competition, Mike makes a diving exit hanging onto Mick's legs with his board trailing behind. Mike finishes his routine by taking a double handed grip on Mick's foot.

At any freestyle competition, there are always competitors who are inventing new moves.

In his routine, Olav performs a Kaleidoscope which is a head-down move in which his legs are laid back with a strong arch and he is spinning around his head. Then, in another move, he bends one leg grabbing that ankle with the same hand. With an arch in his body, he rotates this difficult to balance position on his head. It is clearly visible that he manipulates the air flow for maintaining that balance with the firmness of his opposite hand and palm in front of his body.

Guido of Germany included some slowly rotating side front loops in his routine.

Manfred performs a variation on tucked backloops with the legs spread and with his hands in the folds of his knees. (BTW, right in front of his 10th round title slate on the ground, Manfred jumps up into a complete aerial back flip and lands on his feet!)

Nicolas Arnaud from France was attempting triple twists in his routines. Nicolas finishes his routine with a spinning move (Skator's Spin) during which one leg is forward and the other is positioned directly beneath with the knee bent 90 degrees. He is leaning over the forward leg while spinning.

Simona from Italy performs a barrel rolling action with a fan kick action directed towards the sky. The move is completely a horizontal rolling action. She repeats the move going through a number of these "fan-kick" rolls in a row.

Boaz Goren from Israel performs an exit during which he is "flying" over his camera flyer in a face down position with his arms straight out from his shoulders and waving like a swans' wings.

Kerry Roberts from Australia starts her routine with a back right Eiffel exit and then performs a Dali Standup with the front foot touching the knee of the back leg. Both knees are bent approximately 90 degrees.

Stefania from Italy performs several different moves with her hips straight and her knees bent to 90 degrees. In the first, she is head-down making pirouettes in this position. She also performs back loops and full twisting backloops while holding this position. Stefania also performs a Chinese split with one knee bent 90 degrees. Luki also included this move in her routine as well.

To start his dives, Thomas from Denmark performed a front loop into a Straddle Standup throwing his right hand forward displaying the peace sign for which freeflyers have become known for doing. He performs a Daffy pirouette with both hands on his hips and then raises one hand over his head with one elbow bent. Stefania also performs a Daffy with her hands on her hips as well. Thomas includes a spinning standing pose in which he is partially tucked with legs bent beneath him and leaning forward. He also performs cartwheels with his legs held in a "diamond" position in which the knees are bent and pointing out to the sides with the feet together. Then he performs a series of cartwheels; Straddle cartwheel followed by a full twisting cartwheel followed by another cartwheel back into another full twisting cartwheel.

While it was a move originally performed in world competition in 1994, Andrea's Chellies look quite pretty and graceful with her long legs. (When I commented to her, she was very happy to realize that it was understood how it is difficult for tall people to perform freestyle in control while keeping those long limbs straight.) Chellies are back loops with full twists with the knees and hips bent almost to 90 degrees.

Scott Smith from USA performs also a double twisting cartwheel starting and stopping in a straddle standup. To finish his routine, Scott gets in a headup kneeling position and leans back to move forward off the left side of the screen.

When I asked a number of the freestylists what their new moves were called, many of them explained that they hadn't named their new moves. I recall that one of my dance instructors pointed out that naming a move can take away from it's dynamic ability to evolve and continue to have growing possibilities.

In general, there were numerous routines that had nice sequences and a good feel to them.

Men's world champion Omar Alhegelan from USA performs an assortment of moves including rapidly twisting Chellie rotations while dressed in a brilliant orange reddish tie-died suit. Omar also performs a spinning Flamingo position while leaning forward.

Women's world champion Lucrezit Manni-Hunold from Switzerland starts off her routine with a Back Y-Scale exit move. Throughout all her air work, Luki shows strong body form and excellent toe point. Starting from a right standing T pirouetting to the right, she rolls into a right barrel roll swinging her left leg over her right into a downward motion transitioning through a Front T into a Chinese split. While leaning over, she proceeds into a right spinning Chinese split with her left knee bent 90 degrees.

Karin who placed second and is also from Switzerland flies similar to Luki. Reminiscent of Dale Stuart's smooth clean style, she performs pike back stops, Daffy pirouettes, and finishes off her routine with a head-down straddle.

Once beginning the free rounds, Chifumi from Japan allowed the wind to be her guide to dance. This is the point where the line between being in control and out-of-control becomes somewhat blurred. In one particular routine, she transitions fluently to a Helix spin from a compass reverse turn (a transition from one standing T facing one side to a standing T facing the opposite direction while changing the legs). In another routine, she includes a stag backloop to a T head-down loop reversal into a front layout accompanied with a sync roll by her camera flyer, Koji.

Freestylists, regardless of their skill level, included novelties in their routines as well.

For an exit move, Patrik from Sweden flies below looking up, Auton, who is straight above and prone, points straight at the camera and then Patrik points back at him with his hand within the frame.

Joan from Spain, starts his dive by sitting on the door sill of the caravan terrified of jumping. "No! No!" He bulked in the door. And, then once in the slip stream, he clawed for air. He, then, transitioned into a more typical freestyle routine. To start another dive, Joan perform a train exit with Francisco (camera flyer) in the back as the caboose. Joan was arching, looking over backwards geeking at the camera.

Nelly Perchverty from France starts her routine with a cute touch. In rapid succession all starting from a straddle V-seat, she places one hand behind her head and back out again. Then, the other hand. Then, she bends one leg in and back out and then she does the same with the opposite leg. She tucks a leg again to transition into the next portion of her routine. She brings back the notion of the theme later in her routine by performing a compass stag kick. She finishes her routine with a stag standup with both hands over her head and dropping away.

Another one of the men competitors started off his jump by displaying the word "start" in the palm of one hand. At the conclusion of his routine, he displayed his other palm with the word "end."

During the break-off, which normally presents the view of the ground in the video, Fritz of the FlyBoyz representing the USA turns on the titling functions of his camera and the team name, "Flyboyz" is seen within the 45 second working time.

Galit from Israel finishes her last round routine by laying prone and kissing the camera lens. The 45 second time freezes the video just after the kiss with her smiling face well framed.

Montse, a 64 year old freestylist from Spain, has a strong love and passion for being in the air and performing freestyle. She, certainly, was admired for her spirit in competing and sharing her love. She varied her routines from round to round but performed very simple moves. She performed percussive leg movements while back down, frisbee's, Tee Switches, backloops, a Flying Tee during which the arms are moved in a swan-like manner, and more.

As the freestyle competition draws to a conclusion, competitors begin copying one another's moves. For example, several competitors tried to imitate Olav's head-down spinning move in which he was holding the ankle of one leg with a hand behind himself.

In skysurfing, teams shredded the skies performing techniques seen on the XTreme Games. Mihail from Russia performed a number of the skysurfing moves popular in the extreme games such as the Helicopter and the Hen House Surprise. Many skysurfers included the Hen House Surprise in their routines. There were some really well performed ones and some poorly performed ones. The more advanced skysurfers found some way of adding additional flare to the way that they performed the Hen House Surprise. During his Hen House Surprise, Mihail places his left hand on his hip. Oliver of Team Pulse from Switzerland performs his Hen House Surprise holding his left hand over his head pointing at the ground.

In skysurfing, there is a growing trend towards performing high speed spins. For example, Oliver performs the tidy bowl in the hole maneuver during which he includes a wicked fast rotating Helicopter. The Invisible Man is another high speed spin in which the skysurfer while standing rotates so rapidly that it is difficult to make out any bodily features of the surfer himself. The Invisible Man has been performed at 5 revolutions per second. Valery from Russia performs this move with an especially fast rotation in his red and white vibrant suit and Mike Frost finishes his dive with this move. A number of other competitors included the Invisible Man in their routines.

Pierre Chaford from Brazil, wearing the colors of his country, green with black and white accents, choreographs their routine well as one cohesive whole performing many of the popular skysurfing moves from the Xtreme Games. As he performs an Invisible Man, the black stripes on his arms created a very pronounced strobe-like effect. Pierre finishes one of his routines in a head-down pose moving out of the top of the frame. For me, it looked like Pierre was playing the drums with his hands as he moved out the top of the screen while another saw that he was scaling an invisible rope.

The skysurfers do come up with some creative moves as well. For example, Csaba from Hungary performs a bent knee helicopter while grasping the folds of his knees with both hands. He gets into this move from a standard Helicopter and then transitions out of this move accelerating again into another Helicopter.

During one particular jump, Scott Smith transitions into a Gallilean and drops below Peter. Then, suddenly, Scott presents his board flat to the relative wind into some head-down bent knee spinning position. Peter suddenly falls past them and then is filming looking up at Scott's spinning head with the sky in the background. The video looked impressive to many.

Even the more intermediate level skysurfers find something creative to perform. For example, Gškhan from Turkey performs a face spin with the sky board positioned on his seat and with a rail grab--one hand behind his back to reach the board.

To finish their routine, Hilton from South Africa performs back layouts as he travels from the center of the screen off to the left side. And Mick from Australia frames a close-up of Milton's head as he performs a Helicopter to finish their routine.

In general, the apparel and board designs are becoming more and more creative. In other words, there were more variations on the designs painted on the board. For example Josef from Austria painted the bottom of his board light blue with a white squiggle line from nose to tail and the top of his board white with a light blue squiggle line. This year, no skysurfer used any unusually shaped boards. However, the board size did vary among the competitors. There's nothing in the rules that say a competitor can't use a small board. Thus, the board size was considered in the difficulty score.

Men's world champion skysurfer Oliver from Team Pulse wore an orange and red jumpsuit, had a board comprised of diagonal orange and red stripes, and he had dyed his hair a bright red. He finished up by performing his last round of competition by releasing smoke from his board. As he spins and twists through the various moves, the smoke actually twists and rotates as it would from aerobatic planes in an airshow.

Damian from the USA wears white shorts with a black spiraling stripe and a black shirt with white vertical stripes. The barber pole effect this outfit created when he performed a Helicopter would have been much stronger if he was wearing pants. (During another round of competition, I glanced up from the computer screen where I was entering scores at the time and just missed the end of a move. Did I just catch him perform a Helicopter with the camera flyer presenting a sideways view of the move?)

Several small incidentals reminds anyone that freeflying is potentially dangerous and that skysurfing involves even greater risks.

On a flail and losing control of the relativity, freestylist Aner from Israel, who was above his camera flyer, Ader, suddenly assumes a no lift dive and nearly hits Ader. This made me gasp as I saw it happen on the video screen.

Near the end of a dive during a head-down move, Robin Berg's board came off one foot. This emergency is a reminder that skysurfing is dangerous. It turns out that the worn shoe laces on the one foot broke.

Ronald Overdijk is the IPC chair of the freestyle and skysurf sub-committee.

Rules go through a 2 year cycle. After a World Championship, major changes can be made and start with a meeting such as this one. Changes are written at the IPC meeting in February and the rules are published. The new rules come into force on the following May. Changes after May 1 are for the purposes of safety and clarity.

Discussion was about the pool of compulsory moves, order of the moves, incorporation of camera moves, camera score, detailed execution plan, specific sequences, selection of judgeable moves, influence of the exit, complete description of a complete dive, and static start/stop of each move.

Ronald presents the notion of a random draw.

One competitor feels it's difficult to keep current on all the possible moves. Thus, this would take away time from practicing for the free round. It's the transition between the moves that's the most difficult to learn. Observe that Formation Skydivers basically practice only compulsory sequences when preparing for and competing in their event.

Ronald presents the idea that it would be possible to include easier compulsory moves in the pool and the pool would be kept small--10 moves, for example. And, yes, there would be compulsories for the camera flyer and the camera flying would count as a portion of the score on the compulsory moves.

A pool of moves with camera flying moves is good--a move pool shows the ability of the performer.

What is the goal of a random draw?

Compulsory should all be done first and not intermixed with the free round. Don't do a draw because that's moving away from the concept of the compulsory.

With a random draw, the freestylist may not get through all the maneuvers within working time. It was a challenge for the competitors to learn to complete all 5 of this year's compulsory sequences within the time even though they were free to choose the order of the sequences.

A move pool requires too much training for the competitors to prepare. For example, a 10 move pool would at least double the training time and effort than what the current 5 sequences required.

5 compulsory moves could be defined along with 3 or so camera moves.

Ronald comments that the current compulsory moves cover a range of performance aspects such as flexibility, combining several actions at the same time, etc.

Competitors expressed a need for clear concise criteria for judging and it must be published in advance.

Most want to keep the compulsory routine.

Another competitor proposes a fixed start and finish for each compulsory as this makes it clearer to the judges.

A competitor suggests performing one fixed routine. Another adds that by performing a fixed routine, the athletes help the judges to judge better.

Ronald cautions that a fully described routine would be boring. However, other competitors add the notion that it's drill practice anyway for performing a compulsory routine--it's just a different order for each competitor.

At this time, most everyone favors the notion that they would like 5 compulsories with a camera move in a fixed order.

A competitor suggests to maintain flexibility in the routine so that competitors can adapt to different aircraft, adjust to the sun-line, etc. Competitors need to be able to adapt the routine to the conditions that present themselves as those conditions can not be anticipated.

Another suggests to have a start and finish of each compulsory move so that they connect easily.

Judging transitions in a fully described routine would be difficult and harder for competitors to receive positive feedback. Competitors can fall apart and restart when performing individual blocks of sequences. In a fully described routine, if they stumble, it will be difficult to recognize where they are in the routine.

Perhaps, we should have 5 single moves.

The presentation should be exactly described. That way there's no variation in views and influence on the score.

The following decisions were made by voting.
• Continuation of the compulsory component was overwhelming.
• Order of compulsory moves to remain at discretion of the team. (Judges concurred with this decision.)
• No introduction of a pool of compulsory moves (at this point in time).
• Static start and stop of each compulsory move.

Suggestions: Camera score should be included in the scores for the compulsory jumps. Compulsory moves for the camera flyer. Expansion of execution plan.

The proposal for reducing the number of rounds from 10 to 8 or 6 was put on the floor. The main reason for this proposal was that there is not that much variety from one round to the next. Thus, what is the purpose for having 10 rounds? One competitor concurs. Even though it was mentioned that variety would boost artistic scores, it was realized that this aspect was not scored very well at this meet as the panel of judges was changed several times during the competition. Another competitor explains that making more jumps means obtaining better score separation as each competitor must perform all of the rounds well. Next, another proposal for there to be a cut with semi finals was presented. Where should the cut occur? How many should continue into the finals? Should there be a semi-finals and then a finals? These proposals are inter-related.

The following decisions were made by voting.
• No reduction in number of rounds.
• Acceptance of a cut for final rounds.
• The cut commences after the 7th round to incorporate 8th round compulsory and 9th/10th rounds as free rounds.
• The cut is 50% of the teams with a minimum of 6 teams. (All these teams do the three final rounds.)

In the free round, 4 criteria are presently used. The question was whether or not this is adequate and the decision was that no change was necessary on the present criteria. Although competitors did seem to feel that the judges need to judge each area separately and each area needs to be defined.

Concerns were expressed regarding the assessment of difficulty. Comments from the judges confirmed the competitors fears that this criteria was not suitably addressed. Questions included... Can we label new moves as difficult regardless of their simplicity or complexity? A particular competitor insisted that something new is more difficult than copying a hard move because it requires imagination and self-training techniques. This same competitor also proposes that using wings make it easier to perform freestyle, i.e., there was the proposal to put limitations on jumpsuit/wings/etc. It was pointed out that the IPC Committee refrained from any form of limitation to enhance innovation, freedom of expression, and to allow freestyle to grow. There was an acceptance that difficulty can be an individual trait and varies from person to person. Someone stated that the number of jumps a competitor invests in training should also determine the difficulty.

Suggestions: New moves should be given the benefit of the doubt as to its difficulty. Create a database of moves highlighting assumed difficulty of each move. This decision should be left to the experienced competitors. A competitor suggested that a panel of 10 freestylists would rate the moves. Many seemed to like this idea. Accessibility of the database should be through NAC's and FAI web site.

There was a belief that not all judges were as current as was required for this WPC. A competitor suggests that judges need to read freestylists' papers (if the competitors will write them) and watch all the old freestyle meets and to know the history. Individual judges should acquire videotapes and results of recent international competitions.

Another concern was that the present scoring system could be manipulated by emotional judging. Judges, because they have human nature, may tend to favor teams and thus dropping the high and low would remove these biases. Another suggests not to drop the highest and lowest scores. For example, Norman Kent, who knows camera flying well, may score really high. If he scores the highest then his experience doesn't count in the judging as he's been cut off.

A competitor proposes using an ordinal system. 1st place goes to the person who is 1st in most of the judge's scores. He, also, points out that the scores look too low for us to call ourselves world class athletes.

The following decisions were made.
• Drop the highest and lowest score per criteria.
• Observation: The chief judge being alerted to this decision programmed the results to remove the highest and lowest total scores. This resulted in no changes in the rankings.

Suggestions: Have separate judges for the separate criteria (as is done in sports like gymnastics and ice skating). Availability of videotapes and results of recent international competitions to judges and competitors. These tapes should be of commercial quality.

Freefly competition would involve a 3 person team. Competitors felt that it's too soon to put rules on it as it could limit this brand new discipline too soon and too much. For example, consider freeflying while tracking and sky dancing. These aspects have been hardly developed at all. Thus, the decision was to not include freeflying within the current cycle.

The proposer of the 2nd World Cup Freestyle Skydiving and Skysurfing, Carlos V. Marques from Portugal is proposing a test competition for freeflying in conjunction with the above meet. Anticipated dates are September 19-27, 1998 in Evora, Portugal. Proposed aircraft is the Twin Otter. Entry fee would be approximately 850 USD.

General note on protocol for proposals for changes. The committee will put the above decisions on the agenda for the IPC meeting in Portugal, February 4-8, 1998. This agenda has to be sent to the IPC secretary 75 days prior to the meeting. The agenda will be sent to the NAC's 45 days before the meeting. Decisions will be sent to all NAC's and the FAI web site. Effective May 1, 1998.