AE Bits Tuesday 14  September

by Brian Buckland
09.14.04 - 10:30 AM

Finally....we are here. The meeting is about to start for the draw and the first round should be in the air just after noon. Here is the break down of teams attending:

  • Freefly 16 Teams
  • Freestyle female 13 Teams
  • Freestyle male 5 Teams
  • Skysurf female 4 Teams
  • Skysurf female 7 Teams

As soon as I have the draw I will post it up......more to come soon....off to the meeting.

10:30 PM

The draw went well this morning....teams were able to get almost all of their questions answered and the judges were able to take time and explain what counted for points and what didn't. It all seemed clear to me, but I guess time will tell if it was clear enough. I can tell you one thing for sure....all of the teams were anxious to get in the air and get this competition under way!

After the meeting it was very apparent that we were running on Brazilian time with a little siesta for lunch, which was quite good by the way.......only to start up with round 1 immediately afterwards. Well......with this being the first round and everything moving to Boituva at the very last minute......we were able to finish Round 1 skysurf and freestyle. Round 1 of freefly will be completed tomorrow morning. Most feel that it will take into Saturday to complete the competition at this rate.....it's all good, just a lot of waiting.

The competition jumps were cut short mainly because we had the opening ceremonies this evening just before sunset. Tons of locals showed up for the event including the mayor of Boituva who gave a little speech to welcome the competitors to Brazil. Juliana Se helped MC with Paulo Zanella aka skyzan, who without this event would have never happened. Thanks much to both!!! And of course we can NOT forget James Dean....that's right...James Dean is here and he has been a HUGE supporter of this event. Many thanks to him as well!!!

With that said.....here are a BUNCH of pictures.....mainly of opening ceremonies since we only had 1 round......well, almost 1 round. All of the ground pictures of the actual opening ceremonies come compliments of Gawan Puelzl. Thanks for these!!!! All other shots were by yours truly. Enjoy.....

Ok....lights out....Let's see how many rounds we can do tomorrow! Oh....before I forget....a big Happy Birthday to Steve Curtis! And yeah....I know...too many pics of the US team in this post.....it's all good.....don't worry....I'll spread the love......you'll see shots of the 'insert your countries name here' teams before you know it!!!

Brian Buckland - freekfly.com

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