W Sumatra To Host World Paragliding Championship

Bukittinggi, West Sumatra, March 22 (Antara)- West Sumatra will host the first of the seven series of the World Paragliding Championship Precision Landing which is scheduled to take place on April 26-28, 2013, a spokesman has said. The World paragliding championship will take place at the Bukit Langkisau in the Pesisir Selatan district town of Painan, West Sumatra, a public relations officer of the event organizing committee, Tagor Siagian said on Friday. To date, some 20 fliers from Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, South Korea, Japan, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam and China have registered their participation in the event, he said. According to him, general chairman of the Paragliding Accuracy World Cup (PGAWC) and International Aerosport Federation (FAI), accepted the West Sumatra`s proposal to host the event considering the great interest of the Indonesian athletes in joining the paragliding along with the beautiful and challenging locations to fly. "This also shows that the world paragliding ranking officials do not neglect the achievement of the Indonesian paragliding athletes since the last five years," he said. As an example, three of Indonesian female athletes namely Ifa Kurniawati (2010), Milawati Sirin (2011) and Lis Andriana (2012) became champions in the PGAWC in three consecutive years. In addition, the Indonesian athletes also became overall champions in the Asian Beach Games I in Bali in 2008, and in the 2011 SEA Games by grabbing ten out of the total 12 numbers contested.