Saturday 1-7-2000
    "Well this is a really stupid way to die", gasped someone on the verge of exhaustion during the trying climb up to the 1470m high starting ground, "Kriska Gora", barely midway up the hill. Truly unjoyful was the climb even for those who took frequent and lengthy breaks and drank beer out of cans, for they arrived atop the crest in a really pitiful state.




    Luckily some good samaritan had built a frieght cable car which took up, gradually, twenty at a time, the heavy bags of the pilots up to the take off place. And because the starting list alone consisted of an even 63 names, not counting non-competing pilots, it took three hours to get all the bags up.

    Despite the prediction by meteorologists of local storms, it was decided not to waste the first day sitting atop the mountain and a "Race to Goal" was called, the goal being on the landing ground below the hill, by the village of Senicno.




    "Well that's it, I have to go. It's stronger than I", pronounced, shortly after the briefing, Mirek Varvarovsky and hurried off to the forest with a wad of toilet paper. The window for the 56km long discipline with a total of three turning points was opened at 13:20 and because a relatively swift south-west wind, strengthened by thermics, allowed a problem free catch, the first wave of competitors took off immediately upon opening of the window.

    It was first necessary to fly around the first turning point and at 14:30 already be photographing the second so-called marker which was placed below the runway at the loading point of the cable car.

    After 14:00 it began to grow progressively more overcast, but already the first group of five competitors were setting out over the lower stop of the cable car to photograph the marker going on to disappear over the horizon and beneath the dark bases.

    Despite the fact that some racers didn't even get to photoraphing the marker, at 11:30 two Slovenian pilots appeared first above the goal line. The first Czech, Mirek "Radar" Stehula arrived at the goal line 15 minutes later, followed one minute and half later by the enthused Mirek Volny. Another minute later Frantisek Pavlousek flew into the goal and two minutes after him Mirek Varvarovsky paddled in on his aerodynamic "Kayak".



    "Never in my entire life have I seen so many frontstalls and clatters as I did today", Mirek "Radar" Stehula, who had tried to rise above the crest at a difficult and turbulent spot, described colorfully at the goal.



    Following over the goal line were Kamil Solc, Dusan Kultan, Ivo Videnka, Radek "Kuzman" Bocek, Jarda Grulich and at the last moment when everyone had already stopped hoping, at 8 minutes past 18:00 Karel Vrbensky the warrior appeared. It had taken him 3 hours and 38 minutes and in the overall positioning he came in at 12th place.