RULES X-PYR 2012

 

Regulations are subject to change without notice, before the start of the race.

1.   OVERVIEW

1.1   The X-PYR is a hiking and paragliding competition for a selected group of pilots, who will take participate as a part of 2 person-team (Pilot and assistant).

1.2   The core idea is to cross the Pyrenees from West to East , begining on the Cantabric shore to end up on the Mediterranean shore. First to make it, only by paragliding and hiking, will be the winner.

The organization will establish official turnpoints with different radius through which the pilots will have to go through (see art. 9.2).

1.3   All race decisions will be taken by the Race Committee, formed by:

Íñigo Redín: Race Director
Xavier Catalá: Judge
Carlos Mengíbar: Judge

Any question about the race, must be addressed to the Race Director: Íñigo Redín.

2.   CONDITIONS TO PARTICIPATE

2.1   Only teams selected by the organization, from those pre-registered, will be allowed to take part on the X-Pyr, plus 2 wildcard teams the organization might include following its own criteria.

2.2   Participants must register as a team. Teams may only have two members – an assistant and a Pilot. Single registration is not allowed.

2.3   All team members must be highly qualified and experienced to take part on the race.

2.4   It is compulsory to have a pilot licence in force to take part on the X-Pyr as a pilot.

2.5   Each pilot must compulsory have a third party civil liability insurance, as well as an accident policy that covers all possible expenses resulting from a rescue (including evacuation by helicopter, if needed), in the countries through which the event takes place.

Insurance policies will be verified before the start of the race.

NO PILOT WILL BE ALLOWED TO PARTICIPATE WITHOUT THOSE INSURANCE POLICIES

2.6 Teams (both pilot and assistant) will be required to sign a disclaimer provided by the organisation committee.

2.7  The teams must organise themselves before and during the race. They are not allowed to seek out or accept professional third party advice during the event, excepts for the material or support the organization might supply for the race.

2.8 It is compulsory to have paid the registration fees before the deadline indicated by the organization.

3.   SELECTION

3.1   The number of participants will be limited to a maximum of 20 teams, plus 2 additional teams that might be invited, giving a maximum total of 22 teams.
In any case, if the organization reserves itself the right to modify this number if needed.

3.2   The organization will select the teams participant among the pre-registered teams.

 

4. RACE SCHEDULE

4.1   15th february: opening of the pre-registrations period
4.2   20th April: ending of the pre-registrations period
4.3   25th April: deadline to announce the final selection of teams allowed to take part on the race
4.4   3rd-4th August: teams interviews and photo shoots/filming.
Material check and testing. Meetings with team members.
4.5   5th August: official start of the race at 11:00am
4.6  End of the race. The first team will finish the race when reaching the goal. The rest of the teams will have 24 hours to finish the race or get as closer as possible to the goal. After this time the race will be over.
4.7   There will be a maximum 12 days period to complete the race, this is until August the 17th, at 11:00am.
If no team has completed the race by this date, positions will be taken at this time.
In case a team reaches the goal less than 24 hours before the maximum period to complete the race, the 24 hours extension will be maintained for the rest of the teams to reach the goal, even if going over the 12 days maximum race time.
4.8   All participants still in the race by this time will have to attend the final race party. This will take place the following afternoon after the end of the race. In case the race finishes after mid-day, the party will take place the next day.
4.9   The race can only be cancelled by the organization.

5. GENERAL CONDITIONS

5.1   A team is made up of 2 participants: the pilot and the assistant. Each pilot chooses his/her own assistant when making the pre-registration.

5.2   During the race, the pilot must fly or walk always wearing his/her minimum equipment. Any other transportation meaning is strictly prohibited. Failing to comply with this rule would mean immediate disqualification of the team.

5.3   During the race, the pilots have to make an uninterrupted rest from 10:30pm till 05:30am. The pilot is not allowed to move by more than 250 meters from his/her stop position during rest periods. In case of need, an authorization for a move can be requested to the Race Director. Failing to comply with this rule will mean a 12 hours penalty.

5.4   The assistant is allowed to use any mean of transportation, but is not authorize to fly by his/her pilot, nor use any other meaning to support his/her pilot in the air.

5.5   Only the assistant will be responsible for the organization of the team and satisfy the needs of the pilots. The teams must organize themselves before and during the race. They are not allowed to seek out or accept professional third party advice during the event, excepts for those parts of their way which might require assistance for security reasons, etc.; in any case, any external help should be previously authorized by the organization.

5.6   The assistant must be reachable by cellphone 24 hours per day.

5.7   It is expected from all the team members to show a positive attitude and deference towards the media (those from the competition itself as well as external) trying to make their work as easy as possible for the sake of the good image of the race and participants.

5.8   All pilots must post daily updates on the website. They will be able to make by sending videos, pictures, text messages, voice-recordings, etc. … . The pilots will have to send at least 1 writed entry for the blog and 2 pictures per day, and at least 1 video every 2 days.

5.9   All the teams are requested to send videos (minimum 2 minutes per day) every 48 hours. This material will be sent over by organizing a meeting point between the assistant and an organization staff.

5.10   Each team must be prepared to go through spot checks during the race. Those random checks will be compulsory, and can focus on the equipment of the pilots as well as the means of transportation of the teams.

5.11   Pilots can be obliged to take doping tests at any moment along the competition. Should the pilot refuses to pass the test, or the test return a positive or non-negative, he/she would be immediately disqualified from the race.
The Race Committee will refer to the newest prohibited list published by the World Anti-Doping Authority (WADA) and available at www.wada-ama.org

Tests will be carried out by the doctor of the competition.

5.12   The minimum penalty for having infringed any rule will be of 4 hours.

5.13   Any pilot or team can abandon the race at any time, by notifying their resignation to the organization.

5.14   The organization can modify any rule before the start of the competition, in which case participants would be conveniently informed before the new rule enters into force.

5.15   Pilots with penalties will have to add those to the compulsory rest periods. Failing to comply with this rule will involve an immediate disqualification.

5.16   The organization reserves itself the right to suggest a withdraw from the competition, or as a last resource, even disqualify a team if it estimates safety of team members is at risk.

6. FLYING RULES

6.1   It is strictly forbidden to fly between 9:00pm and 7:00am (from sunset to dawn).

6.2   All pilots have to respect VFR regulations (Visual Flight Rules). Any pilot not respecting those rules will take full responsability of any legal consequence.
If sufficient evidence can be gathered to prove a pilot flies into clouds, he will be sanctionned. The organization reserves itself the right to decide the kind of penalty.

Any pilot flying into forbidden zones defined by the organization will be disqualified immediately. The altitudes at which pilots are flying will be verified by live tracking recorded GPS altitudes. If a backup track (IGC) is used to verify a violation, then this GPS height will be used as evidence.

The fligh path will be checked by GPS log. The exact notification of the forbidden areas will be done at the briefing before the race start. The organization will supply all teams with printed material of the forbidden zones, etc..

6.3   Launching on take-off must be done without any help. Holding the paraglider or the pilot is only permitted for safety reasons, on structural parts belonging to the normal flight equipment and must only be held by hand. No winch towing of any kind is allowed (neither mechanical nor manual). Failing to comply with this rule with mean immediate disqualification.

7. EQUIPMENT

7.1   The X-PYR is a cross-country flying race, and consequently the use of 16 m2 or less gliders (speedgliging) is strictly prohibited. It is also forbidden to use gliders exceeding 6 kg/m² wing loads.

7.2   The pilot must always bear with him his/her minimum equipment, no matter he/she is flying or hiking.
The minimum equipment is made up of the following:

• Paragliding
• Harness
• Emergency parachute
• Helmet
• Mobile phone
• Live-tracking device (supplied by the organization)
• SPOT GPS MESSENGER device (supplied by the organization)

7.3  Each pilot will bear with him/her 2 GPS tracking devices (tracker through cellphone line and SPOT through satellite). Both will be supplied by the organization. Each team will be responsible for their functioning and care. Also the assistant will take with him a tracker device.

7.4  On top of the GPS device for live-tracking, each pilot will be advised/required to bring with him/her his/her own gps logger device in order to record his own track. Each team will be responsible of its onw track record.

The track might be used for flight path validation when meeting the following requirements:

• The IGC file contains baromtric altitude or satellite.
• The flight log file must include a digital signature.
• Each team needs to ensure they have the appropriate cables to connect their own GPS logger device to a portable computer (the organization will use GPSDump software to download the flight logs).

7.5 Any pilot failing to comply the rule of permanently bringing with him the minimum equipment will be immediately disqualified.

7.6   No item of the minimum equipment is to be changed along the race. A logical exception would be in cases such as destruction, theft or unintentional lost of any component in which case a replacement could be admited, always with previous notification to the organization. Not respecting this rule will involve a penalty of 24 hours.

7.7   The organization will check all the equipment before the begining of the competition. Please remember that it will not be allowed to exceed the maximum “in-flight” weight your paraglider is approved for,  as well as for the emergency parachute, etc..

8. DISPLAY OF LOGOS AND BRANDS

8.1   The teams will be required to wear, if possible, the official clothing of the race on every picture, video, as well as in any interview or material used by any media.

8.2   The t-shirt must always be visible and on top of any other clothing during the fligths. Failing to comply with this rule will involve a time penalty. Pilots are allowed to place their own sponsor logos, etc. on the arms of the t-shirt, always ensuring the official brands and logos of the competition fully visible.

8.3   Helmet: it must compulsory carry the official logo of the competition. Pilots must keep free and area of 10×10 cm on the front part of the helmet to place a sticker provided by the organization. A 5 cm. buffer area around the X-Pyr sticker must kept clear for visibility purposes.

9. THE ROUTE

9.1   Each team is free to choose their own route as far as they pass through the official turnpoints selected by the organization as shown in section 9.2.

9.2   It is compulsory Pilots go through the following turnpoints:

• Start: Hondarribia (start of the timed race)
• B1: Larrún
  Pilots will have to pass through an inflatable arch installed on the top of the mountain.
• B2: Pico de Orhi
  Radius: 1500 m
• B3: Collarada
  Radius: 1500 m.
• B4: Cotiella
  Radius: 2400 m.
• B5: Pic de L’Orri
  Radius: 1000 m
• B6: Taga
  Radius: 1500 m.
• B7: Sant Pere de Rodes (end of the timed race)
  Radius: 3000 m.
• Goal: Port de la Selva

The organization will provide the teams the exact coordinates for every turnpoint.

9.3   Pilots are not permitted to use any tunnel connection between different valleys and no highway or motorway tunnels.

10. ROUTE DOCUMENTATION

10.1   The live-tracking device sends information through phone line to the internet, allowing the following of his/her flight path in real-time. This flight log serves as well as a confirmation track of the route followed by the pilot.

10.2   The organization could check at any time the backup flight track of every pilot.

10.3   The backup flight track must have an interval of 15 seconds between points.

10.4   A valid tracklog  must meet the following requirements:

• Every time a tracklog is started, the pilot must not be more than 250 meters away from the last point of the previous tracklog.
• There must be no areas without trackpoints lasting for more than 5 minutes.
• On the ground, there must be no speed (average) above 20 km/h for more than 10 minutes.
• In flight, there must be no speed (average) above 80 km/h for more than 20 minutos.
• The track-log must show no restricted areas have been violated. Any track missing points close to a restricted area, and suspicious to have gone through a restricted area, will involve the disqualification of the pilot, and whenever the back-up track-log does not help to prove the restricted area has not been violated.
• To take into account possible gps accuracy problems, a 100 meter security buffer on the interior of the restricted areas. Entering on that buffer security area will involve a 12 hour penalty, while going into the restricted area will mean the disqualification of the team.
• The red line shows a tracklog which involves the disqualification of the pilot. Even if there are no track-log point inside the restricted area, the track clearly shows that the area has been violated by flight of the pilot.
• The orange line shows a tracklog which has gone through the buffer security area. Therefore, the pilot will get a 12 hours penalty.
• The green line shows a tracklog free of any restiction area problem.
• In case there is any difference between the online and backup tracklogs, the less harmfull tracklog for the pilot will be taken into account.

10.5   Any pilot failing to comply with the rules regarding the certification of the route, may be subjet to further sanctions decided by the organization.

10.6   If a pilot cannot document a route or present a complete track-log, he/she will loose the time for which there is no log. In this case, this time will be treated as a penalty, this compulsory entering into for after the following rest period.
If there is any suspicion the pilot has used no authorized means of transportation during a period without track-log points, he/she will be obliged to go back and start again from the last track-log point before the lapse without points. If this important fail to the rules is confirmed, the team will be immediately disqualified.

10.7   Each team is adviced to practice with their track-log devices, to test its functioning as well as iron out any problem that may arise, before the competition.

10.8   All the track-logs must be saved in format readable by organization. It must be always be taken into account tracklogs must be saved in flight but also on the ground.

10.9   All the GPS devices for backup track-logs must have DATUM: WGS 84.

10.10   Once the race is over (24 hours after the first team reach goal or 12 days after the start of the race) a classification will be published. The final position of every team will be obtained after the time* it took them to reach the goal, or the distance** (number of km.) to finish line.

* Timed raced will begin from the start in Hondarribia, and will keep running until the first pilot reach the radius of the B7 turnpoint – Sant Pere de Rodes.
** Number of km.: indicates the distance in kilometers between pilot´s position and the goal. Going through the turnpoints (the radious) ahead in his/her route until the finish line. The pilots having gone through the bigger number of turnpoints will have better positions than those having less, even if the former were at are further away in “number of kms.”.

11. ROUTE/TRACK LOG EVALUATION

11.1   Each team will be able to provide a complete track log.

11.2   The routes will be evaluated every day, based on the online track. In case an irregularity might be noticed when checking an online track, the pilot will be requested to provide his/her backup track to the organization inside the following 12 hours from the moment the backup track is officially requested.

11.3   If there is any incidence in the tracklog of any pilot, a special icon will be displayed on the web.