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Event info

The Kiwi Open is the first leg of the New Zealand Paragliding Open Series (national championships). It is being held the week after the Manilla XC Camp, with one day in-between. More information at www.

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Flying site

Manilla's Mt Borah (880mASL) has been a flying site since the early 1990's when a few local and Newcastle/North Coast Hang Glider pilots established some small cut out HG launches on the West, South and East faces.

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  • 120 Pilots max allowed
  • 15 Countries presented
  • ✅ All certified wings allowed
  • 🏆 FAI Status = CAT 2 🏅
  • left before start of event

Event info

The Kiwi Open is the first leg of the New Zealand Paragliding Open Series (national championships). It is being held the week after the Manilla XC Camp, with one day in-between. More information at www.kiwiopen.com.
A massive thanks goes to Godfrey Wenness of Manilla Paragliding for allowing the competition to be hosted from Mt Borah.

Flying site

Manilla's Mt Borah (880mASL) has been a flying site since the early 1990's when a few local and Newcastle/North Coast Hang Glider pilots established some small cut out HG launches on the West, South and East faces. Godfrey Wenness purchased the property “The Mountain” in 1994 and, with additional land in 2005, it now contains all of the private lands associated with Mt Borah. The west escarpment/slope of the Baldwin Ranges (of which Mt Borah is a part) is Dept of Land and Water Conservation “Crown Land“ which the Manilla SkySailors Club has an access license to allow vehicular travel from the top to the west LZ and also back to the east-side via the saddle track.

During the 1990's, in addition to 16kms of access roads being built, a new north launch was added and the existing launches were expanded to cater for more pilots, large events and easy top landings. In 2004 three UL runways were completed at Godfrey's house to cater for those who often flew in. Launch and facility improvements worth A$392,000.00 including major road works were completed for the 2007 10th FAI Paragliding World Championships event. This included artificial grass on all 4 launches - in total over 17,000sqm was laid and pegged down !

The only costs for pilots to fly Mt Borah over the years has been the local club annual site fee of A$30 which goes 100% towards admin costs and its obligation with Godfrey to maintain the Mt Borah site on a 50/50 cost share basis.

Since 1994 Manilla has hosted 18 international level paragliding events organised by Godfrey Wenness, 15 NSW State Hang Gliding Championships organised by Newcastle HG Club, and many annual fly-in's including the famous easter-time PG State of Origin which attracts over 100 pilots and is the largest paragliding event in Australia aside from the main international one held here.

Recently Mt Borah has become the host of a fast growing Radio Control Glider festival called Manilla Slope Fest. Numbers for the Sept 2011 event will exceed 100 ! There is also an annual 4WD extreme challenge which is part of the ARB National Extreme 4X4 Series.

Over the years many paragliding records (National and World) have been flown from Mt Borah, not to mention hundreds of personal bests every season. Hang Gliders have also flown 300kms flights open distance and triangles. Below is a list of the major Paragliding milestones :

Some paragliding Records from Mt Borah :
1/02/98 - 11/98 Aust National Record Open Dist : 235kms, Godfrey Wenness, Advance Omega 4
16/11/98 - 6/02 World Record Open Distance : 335kms, Godfrey Wenness, Advance Omega 4
6/03/02 - 1/03 Aust Declared Goal Distance and Official FAI Competition Worlds Longest Task : 161kms, Godfrey Wenness, Advance Omega 5R
13/01/03 - Aust Declared Goal Distance : 245kms, Godfrey Wenness, Advance Omega 6 Proto
9/01/05 - Australian National Womens Open Distance : 178kms, Michelle Baptist (Belgium), Advance Omega 6

Source: http://www.flymanilla.com/

Mt Borah
take off : 30°40'44" (30.6789)S; 150°36'32" (150.609)E - Elevation : 895 m.
landing : 30°40'59" (30.6831)S; 150°35'49" (150.597)E - Elevation : 538 m.

Mt Borah has 4 spacious launch grounds, all covered in asroturf (N,S,E,W: 340 - 440m AGL).

Selection and entry fee

Entry Fee:
◦Early Bird = NZ$150, until 31 Nov
◦Not-quite-so-early Bird = NZ$165, until 31 Dec
◦Full Entry Fee = NZ/A$200

Pilot Selection:
Entry places will be allocated (on the 31st October) on the following basis, in the following order:
•25 places based on WPRS ranking (NZ and Australian Pilots can qualify this way), then
•25 places for remaining NZ pilots based on NZ Ladder National Rankings (as at end of last season), then
•25 places Australian pilots based on WPRS points, then
•15 placed will be allocated on a first come first served basis.
Then, sufficient places will be held to ensure FAI's 25% international pilots rule is met. These places will be held until the rule is satisfied, or until 31st January 2016, whichever is sooner.
If any places remain, 10 wild cards will be held. These will be allocated no later than 31st December or they will revert to first come, first served.
Any remaining places will then be allocated on a first come, first served basis.

Permitted Gliders:
Open class gliders are not permitted. CCC gliders are permitted provided they are listed by FAI as approved (http://www.fai.org/civl-our-sport/competition-class-paragliders).

Payment:
Payment of entry fee is required to secure your place in the competition. Payment is required within 14 days of being offered a place.
Entry fees can be paid into the following NZ bank account account: Paraventures, 06-0949-0246859-00.
International entrants can email info@paraventures.co.nz for details on international bank transfer or Paypal options.

Prize fund and scoring categories

Overall
New Zealand

General schedule

Registration: 5pm - 8pm Sunday 7th February 2016
Competition Days: Monday 8th – Sunday 14th February 2016
Refer to www.kiwiopen.com for further details.

Daily schedule

Daily briefings at 9am.

Accommodation and Activities

http://flymanilla.com/ManillaEvents,AccomInfo/Accomodation/tabid/146/Default.aspx

How to get here


Manilla Australia

Plane

The nearest international airport is Sydney. Driving to Manilla takes about 6-8 hours.
There is a regional airport in Tamworth serviced by Qantas (http://www.qantas.com.au/), Virgin (http://www.virginaustralia.com.au/) and Jetgo (http://www.jetgo.com/). Tamworth is about an hours drive from Manilla.

Bus

Greyhound operates daily services from Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne to Tamworth via its national network : www.greyhound.com.au

There is a local bus service between Manilla and Tamworth on weekdays only. Bus # 443 : Dep Tamworth 10.40am (Kable Av) and 3.50pm (Train Station), Dep Manilla 7.32 am and 11.25am. Check web site for updated timetable info : www.tamworthbuslines.com.au

There is also a Manilla to Tamworth daily bus service available via Country Link (see below) that Dep Tamworth Railway Station 4pm and Dep Manilla 10am every day.

Train

There is a train service from Sydney to Tamworth. This leaves central Sydney at about 9.30am and arrives in Tamworth mid afternoon. There are trains scheduled daily for each of the days leading up to the comp. Visit the NSW Train Link website http://www.nswtrainlink.info/ for more info.

Car

From Sydney (409kms) via M1 Motorway towards Newcastle, then towards Singleton via Hunter Motorway and New England Hwy (A15) through the Hunter Valley to Muswellbrook and Tamworth, then Fossickers Way (B95) to Manilla. Travel time from M1 Motorway entry at Hornsby is approx 4.5hrs. Travel time from Central Sydney to M1 at Hornsby varies between 30mins and 1hr depending on traffic. From March 2014 the new Hunter Motorway has reduced the total travel time by 30-45mins !

From Brisbane there are 2 options. Via New England Highway (Warwick, Armidale, Tamworth, Manilla) 622kms, 7hrs. Via Cunningham Hwy and Fossickers Way (Warwick, Ingelwood, Texas, Yetman, Warialda, Bingara, Barraba, Manilla) 530kms, 6hrs.

Tamworth > Manilla is 45kms, approx 30mins driving time.

Manilla > Mt Borah is 12kms, approx 10 minutes driving time.

Be careful when using web based maps such as Google and WhereIs for driving directions !!!! Not all routes shown are the shortest ones - always check a real map first !!!!!! Full driving directions from Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne and North Coast NSW are at the bottom of this page !

Downloads

Waypoint files

Organizers

Mark Hardman
Organizer
Johnny Hopper
Scorer & Technical Delegate

Contacts

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