In the spring of last year, the USHPA competition committee formed a workgroup to determine if there were changes that could be made to our competition system that might help the association achieve its growth goals and increase participation in competition. While the notion of changing the competition system to grow the sports of hang gliding and paragliding seems far fetched, the possibility of increasing USHPA member participation in competition seem reasonable and a worthwhile endeavor. There is, however, a problem with the way the competition workgroup is proceeding with this project as outlined below:

• The competition community (comp pilots, meet directors, meet organizers) was not included in the process of determining what problems may exist and how to address them. Proceeding in this way is a violation of section 1.4 of the USHPA competition rulebook.


• The workgroup developed a proposed new system which essentially discards our exiting system and rulebook. This was done in a way that makes it extremely difficult to compare their proposal with our existing system. Requests for a redline document or an editable version of their draft proposal have been declined.


• There was a comment period on the proposed new system but the comments have not been made public. Requests to see the comments have been rejected by the workgroup. Inquiries as to the process for incorporating the comments into the new system have gone unanswered.


• The workgroup is working under the assumption that the USHPA BOD vote to authorize the workgroup to continue their efforts functions as an approval to change the competition validity system for 2009. This is in spite of the fact that the new validity system they proposed is universally disliked by the hang gliding and paragliding comp pilots and is believed to be detrimental to our ranking system and National Team selection.


• There is an apparent conflict of interest in the workgroup. Since two of the workgroup's members are comp organizers and since the comp pilots were excluded it can be argued that workgroup's efforts are biased towards event organizers and against the competitors.


• The workgroup appears to have erroneous preconceived notions about our competition system and competition pilots and their proposed system appears tainted by their prejudices.

If you agree that this conduct is not beneficial to the USHPA and to our competition system you must take steps to help stop it. Please click here and enter your name and USHPA number to be added to a list requesting the following actions (you do not need to be a comp pilot to participate).

• Keep the existing validity system for 2009 and until an improved system, that is approved by the competition community, is developed


• Task the workgroup to engage in an open discussion with the competition community to improve the validity system (there is a very good draft proposal by Greg Babush)


• Instruct the workgroup to suspend its current course, follow our existing rules and work directly with the competition community to determine if there are any real deficiencies in our existing competition system and come up with real solutions.

Important: In addition to adding your name to the list above PLEASE contact your regional director(s) listed below and ask them to support the three actions above. This is a very important step since there is a USHPA BOD meeting coming up in March. Lastly, please ask your fellow pilots, whether they compete or not, to participate as well.