8th July 2018

As we have come to expect this week, there is a good crowd here to watch the Prize Giving and Closing Ceremony at the end of these successful World Meets.   An excellent job from all concerned, making the most of the weather conditions, all events were completed and we have four new World Champions and seven new World and Continental Records.  The Closing Ceremony and Prize Giving were orchestrated by Regan Tetlow and his Polish counterpart Dawid Kutryn.

Before the actual ceremony started we were visited by this airship as a precursor to the Balloon Fiesta which would follow the prize-giving.

Regan started the proceedings by welcoming everyone and giving thanks to the sponsors of these World Meets:

Ministry of Sport and Turism; Marshal's Office of Lower Silesia; Staropolank Water Company; Milard Developer; Flyspot Indoor Skydiving Warsawa dn Katowice; KIM Peugeot salon and car service; Warter Aviation - aviation fuel ; Beauty Clinic Bieniek; Artistic Ceramic Bolestawiec.

He then introduced Silvia Wagner, President of the Jury to declare that the competition had been run according to the FAI Rules and the results had been checked and verified and all was satisfactory.  We then had speeches from a range of officials.

Regan Tetlow and Silvia Wagner

Pawel Randa	Waldemar Wysocki
Jakub Bronowicki	Aleksander Godzilo Godlewski

We then moved to the reason we were here - to recognise and give medals to the various medal winners for this competition.  For the 7th FAI World Canopy Piloting Championships medals are awarded to the winners of each task, Accuracy, Distance and Speed the Overall winner and Team winner.  Each team consisted of the nominated competitors of 3 for each NAC (country) entered (if 3 or more represent that nation).

Gillian Rayner, IPC Presdent is here to give the medals and a gift package presented by Agnieszka Olczyk of Flyspot.

Accuracy medals presented to: Gold, Curtis Bartholomew (USA) : Silver, Ivan Semenyaka (UKR) ; Bronze, Roman Dubsky (SVK)

Distance medals presented to: Gold, Cedric Veiga Rios (FRA)  : Silver, Max Manow (GER) : Bronze, Nicholas Batsch (USA)

Speed medals presented to : Gold, Andrew Woolf (AUS) : Silver, Nicholas Batsch (USA) : Bronze, Armando Fatturoso (ITA)

Overall medals presented to: Gold, Nicholas Batsch (USA) : Silver, Cedric Veiga Rios (FRA) : Bronze, Curtis Bartholomew (USA)

Team medals were presented to:  Gold, United States of America : Silver, France : Bronze, United Arab Emirates

We then moved to the time to make history, the acknowledgement of the first medal winners of the 1st FAI World Canopy Piloting Freestyle Championships

Freestyle Medals presented to : Gold, Abdulbari Qubaisi (UAE) ; Silver, Pablo Hermandez Moll (ESP), Bronze, Justin Price (USA)

Following the medal presentations Gillian Rayner, IPC President, made a short speech thanking all involved in both these successful World Championships of a discipline that really does bring our sport to the attention of the public and she commented on how we all (parachuting) benefited from this exciting profile.  With that she declared the competitions closed and to the playing of the FAI Anthem, the Flag was lowered and the public were invited to stay and watch the Balloon Fiesta whilst the competitors and all those involved in the World Championships went to the banquet and party!

Goodbye to all, have safe journeys home and see you next year in South Africa.