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Event info

Welcome to Mexican and Candian nationals to be held from the 27th of November till 3rd of December 2022 in Temascaltepec and Valle de Bravo, Mexico. A friendly competition in wolrd class site, with one of the most reliable weather conditions.

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Flying site

Valle de Bravo is known for being not only a good place to fly but also for its consistency of many good and reliable flyable days. The best flying season starts on January and it goes until April when the rain season starts.

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  • 131 Pilots Confirmed
  • 131 Pilots total registered
  • 300 USD Entry fee
Go to Pilot List
  • 120 Pilots max allowed
  • 20 Countries presented
  • ✅ All certified wings allowed
  • 🏆 FAI Status = CAT 2 🏅
  • left before start of event
  • Registration will open on
    16/05 15:21 (America/Mexico_City)

  • 🚁

    The region supports helicopter rescues

    Helicopter rescue
  • ⚕️

    There will be medical rescue services at launch

    Medic on takeoff
  • 📱

    The region generally has good phone coverage

    Good phone coverage
  • 📻

    We will be monitoring radios for your safety whilst you fly

    Radio coverage
  • 🚐

    There will be vehicles supplied to take you to launch

    Launch Transport
  • 🥾

    There will be retrieve vehicles available to return pilots to HQ

    Retrieve included
  • 💩

    There are toilets at, or near, the launch

    Toilets on takeoff
  • 🏋️

    There will be ballast water available at launch

    Ballast on takeoff
  • 🥪

    There will be daily lunch packs for pilots

    Lunch packs
  • 🎉

    There will be an organised party during or after the event

    Party
  • 🎵

    There will be live music or a DJ at the event

    Live music
  • ♻️

    The organisers support reducing the use of unnecessary plastic at the event. This includes NOT giving disposable water bottles

    Plastic reduction

Prize funds and scoring categories

  • Serial
  • Open
  • Sport
  • Intermediate
  • National Canadian
  • National Mexican
  • Women
  • Canadian Women
  • Canadian Serial
  • Canadian Sport
  • Canadian Intermediate

Event info

Welcome to Mexican and Candian nationals to be held from the 27th of November till 3rd of December 2022 in Temascaltepec and Valle de Bravo, Mexico. A friendly competition in wolrd class site, with one of the most reliable weather conditions. We thank you for visiting us and we hope your stay and flights in Temascaltepec and Valle de Bravo to be most pleasuring and memorable.

Flying site

Valle de Bravo is known for being not only a good place to fly but also for its consistency of many good and reliable flyable days. The best flying season starts on January and it goes until April when the rain season starts. Rainy days are also flyable for a few hours, just don´t expect the best XC conditions. Rain season ends in September and from then to December days are usually very mellow and nice to fly, perfect conditions for students, beginners or just relax flying.

Take off : One of the best flying sites in Mexico. During the months of December to March the conditions allow for flights on the 100's km order, with cloud bases of 4,500 plus meters MSL. The launch was expanded on 2008 by the government of the Estado de Mexico as part of the improvements for the Mexico 2009 FAI Paragliding Worlds Championship. There's a lot of room for parking and public bathrooms.
GPS coordinates, Take off: 19°3'41" (19.0616)N; 100°5'27" (100.091)W - Elevation : 2336 m.

Landing : The official landing site is a big grass field of 2.5km on the pleteu right in front of the launch. Snaks and drinks are available at the landing on the weekends and flying season.
GPS coordinates, Landing: 19°2'45" (19.0459)N; 100°6'32" (100.109)W - Elevation : 1775 m.

Going there: Take the road from Valle de Bravo to Temascaltepec and turn right in the Albarrada road sign. Follow the signs on the dirt road to the launch.

XC Routes: The favorite cross country flight is in the direction of Valle de Bravo, to land on the lakeside landing of Santa Maria, 14km to the NNW. Flying to any other direction is perfectly possible, including the big volcano (Nevado de Toluca). Auto retrieve by rural communal taxi cabs is easy and very cheap.


Weather hazards: From February to the beginning of the rain season (usually June) the conditions get stronger, with rough air and strong winds almost all day. During the rain season conditions are mellow, but there is risk of fast overdeveloping, with strong thunderstorms. Rain season usually ends on September or October, from there to December conditions are really good getting stronger every day. Most days on the zone are blue days with blue thermals, but expect really strong thermals on the flying season.

Flight regulation: Basically none, but pay attention to the small airstrip on the plateau were the landing field is, sometimes you can find hang glider towing operations. There's another small airstrip for small airplanes on the way to Valle de Bravo, common VFR rules apply.


Flying areas: Valle has two very different spots for flying; the first one is “La Torre” (The Tower), this is really close from town and just about a mile and a half distance from the landing spot right at the shore of the lake (30 minutes ride up). This is a ridge soaring area and then a flight over the town with a great view. This is the basic place for medium and beginner pilots and the usual spot for the commercial tandem flights.

The launch site is very small and steep, be sure you know how to properly do a reverse launch, it also might be too crowded during weekends because of the whole local tandem commercial operation, be sure to respect the order of the line for launching. Good kiting skills are also good for you and your glider; the concrete platform of the launch site is quite abrasive for the glider if you drag it around too much.

Beware the lake landing zone is small. If you are not used to small landing zones you might not want to land there. If you do land there be willing to go in the water rather than crash into a fence or trees. You can do your approach over land or over the lake, but I will suggest doing it over the water if you are not fully able to control your glide.

Most of the run over the landing zone is done basically sideways to the wind, keep this on mind for your approach speed and always remember to check the windsocks and water trails over the lake before landing, especially on the afternoon when the wind direction usually changes completely.

You will find plenty of kids at the landing offering you to fold your glider and put all your gear back into the backpack. Most pilots will reject this because they will not trust the folding to anyone else but themselves and specially not to a bunch of kids. Well, I bet you a beer at the landing zone, that most of those kids can fold your glider and setup your great much better than you do!

Use this service, make them feel useful, they are just trying to work, earn some money and be together with the paraglider pilots they hugely admire, share some words with them if you can, they will really appreciate it. Usual "fee" for the service is less of a euro, but you can give them more if you feel like or share them some candies or something.

The next flying site to discuss is the world famous “El Peñón” (The Big Rock). El Peñón is a competition level place and great for some good XC about nine linear miles or 14 Kms. away from Valle, XC from El Peñón to Valle is a local tradition. Some say this is the best place to fly in México (XC), and it’s actually were annual international competition “Monarca Paragliding Cup” takes place every year in January plus one FAI World Championship in 2009 and one PWC Super Final in 2012.

I would recommend flying El Peñón early in the morning when the day just starts to turn on or late at the afternoon glassoff to prevent the blasting of the turbulent thermals of El Peñón, at least a couple of times until you get familiarized with the place. Avoid launching between noon and 3:00 PM on sunny days of the high season. Flying mid day at El Peñón is about big air all over the place, some particular well known thermal trigger spots like The Wall, Crazy Thermal, G-Spot and many others, can be really strong and turbulent. Flying El Peñón is tricky; it has fooled more than one before! But if you can catch up with the Peñon’s ways, you can sure have some helluva ride.

The launch area is wide and grassy and it´s hardly crowded even with many pilots trying to takeoff. Reverse launch is a must and be ready for a bumpy ride from the very few first seconds of your flight, so no fooling around with your harness, brake handles, instruments or anything else at least until you get high, never right in front of the launch area. Try to quickly get as high as possible at the launch, they are many thermals coming up all the time wide spread, if you´re flying to the Peñón itself or to the back, try to gain at least 400/500 Mts. over the launch for a safe ride.

There are a few classic XC routes to Valle, but I would recommend trying first the Peñitas/Zacamecate/Jovan/CocaCola/Valle route which runs basically over the main road to the Peñón you will use to reach the launch, so it´s pretty intuitive. Peñitas would be the "backwards piano", kind of a tricky spot but plenty of room to land. Right next to Peñitas is the Zacamecate mountain which is a nice catapult to reach cloud base. The Jován is a small road restaurant which is easy to reach on your first XC with 2 or 3 thermal climbs, food is very good and cheap, and there´s plenty of room to land nearby.

The piano landing zone of the Peñón is quite big and it´s over a plateau called "Africa" because of its shape. If you´re not planning to leave the valley for a XC and don´t like rough conditions just be sure not to try to land there at noon or you will find thermal power boosting you up again for hours making your landing quite hard and scary. The ravine before the piano landing zone and plateau can be used as a sink hole to quickly lose some height, but be careful to do your final approach over the plateau and not too low over the ravine or you could sink into the rotor and spend some really hard time there. there you will find many skilled kids that can fold your wing pretty well for about less than an euro too.

Try to get briefed before doing any XC to know where you can land, but most specially were you can´t land! You will find some big fancy states were they don't like us landing there, sometimes you might be greeted by their security personal with guns and have a hard time to leave the place. Funny enough it´s almost only on those fancy states were you could find yourself on trouble after landing there, there's a huge misunderstanding about the forbidden places to land when it comes to regular farming fields; most of the time farmers just expect you to give some symbolical retribution for the use of their private properties! Most pilots won't give anything to these people and even be rude with them, this is why they are not always welcome. Remember, this is a poor country and all they ask is about an euro per landing on their fields, which is pretty reasonable if you ask me.

For example, the race track behind the Jován is usually avoided by most pilots because the land care keeper of the place is considerate a dangerous man with a shotgun. Truth is, I always land there when I´m heading to eat at the Jován... I always chat with the guy or his kids, let his kids fold my glider and give him something on retribution so I´m always quite welcome to land there! I don't always pay except for the folding (which is actual work); I usually carry cigarettes and M&M candies; I share a chat and a couple of cigarettes to the land care keeper (they all smoke) and some M&M candies to the children (they won't melt and you can share many of those), this is usually much more appreciated than money since it shows you care for them.

When landing at any rural zone, be careful with some not so evident hazards you might not see from high; most of the time dark spots in the grass doesn't mean dark grass but dark brown rocks instead of grey ones. Most bushes on the dry zones have some sort of thorns or edgy splinters that might damage your glider, greener bushes are most of the time safer. Beware of wire fences, they are everywhere and usually setup with thin sticks so they are hard to spot from the air. Also try to avoid fields with animals if possible, not only you will scare the animals but also you might get some undesirable stains on your glider!

If you go for XC flights, another important factor to take on account is that this place is a little bit illogical sometimes; wind directions and speed may be different every day in different nearby spots, so I know more than just a few pilots have flown directly to a rotor zone expecting to find lift. Can´t blame anyone, this have happen to me many times over many years and I haven´t still figured out the whole picture here. It's usual to be able to see smoke all the time somewhere around, use any reference you can to keep track of the wind. Blue days are very common in Valle, try to learn to read the ground for thermal triggers as much as possible, this is very handy in this place!

You will find everybody at Valle very friendly and cooperative, about half of the local pilots speak at least some basic English. The first I recommend to do at your arrival would be visiting the gang at the landing at “Santa María”, remember to pay your temporal (3 month) local club fee there. Shuttles from the different local clubs for both La Torre and El Peñón destinations depart from the landing field all the time and directly from the local clubs (all of them at a walk distance from the landing field, they are quite obvious if you follow the main street close to the lake), just be sure to board the correct shuttle to La Torre or The Peñón depending on your flight intentions. Usual fee is around 3 euros for La Torre or 6 euros to El Peñón.

Selection and entry fee

The entry fee is 300 USD
120 pilots maximum are allowed to join the event. The first 100 places will be reserved for Mexican and Canadian pilots the remaining places will be available to anyone wishing to participate based on a first come first serve basis, priority will be given to best Ranked Pilots.

Entry fee includes:

General information and Competition program.
Transportation from the headquarters to the take-off and back.
Daily retrieve during the competition task limits.
Daily lunch packet with hydration.
T-shirt and other goodies.
Free access to all social events and closing ceremony party!

Entry requirements:

Registration and entry fee payment.
Valid FAI Sporting license with 2022 stamp (for WPRS).
Pilot License IPPI 3, 4 or 5 or national equivalent.
Third party and Medical insurance.
Fully certificated and operational Paraglider, harness with back protection, certificated helmet, reserve parachute, IGC logging capable GPS, 2m radio (144/160 Mhz. frequency range capable) and mobile phone.

Mobile Phone note - It's strongly suggested to acquire a Mexican SIM card from Mexican mobile telephone company “Telcel” to use during the competition for coverage and dialing feasibility. Usually pre-paid system SIM cards cost no more than $5 US Dlls. and a pre-paid system cheap mobile unit with SIM card included around $30 US Dlls.

Documents required at registration

  • Issued by your local NAC on behalf of the FAI. You cannot normally compete in an FAI event without one. Contact your National Association (NAC)

    FAI Sporting Licence
  • The FAI IPPI card is an International card that states your skill level. It is issued by your National Association and matches the level or your flying Licence

    FAI IPPI Card
  • The organiser requires you to present your National flying licence.

    National Licence
  • You will need to sign an applicaton form at the venue. Usually the organiser will provide it on arrival.

    Signed Application form
  • You will need to sign a waiver or release document to show you understand the risks. Usually the organiser will provide it on arrival.

    Signed Waiver/Release form

Cancellation Policy

Refund will be available up to 1 week before the beginning of the event deducting a 20% fee.
No refund will be made for cancellations made 7 days or less from the beginning of the event.

Prize fund and scoring categories

• 1st, 2nd and 3rd ranked - SERIAL (LTF 2-3, or EN D)
• 1st, 2nd and 3rd ranked - SPORT (LTF 2 or EN C)
• 1st, 2nd and 3rd ranked - INTERMEDIATE (LTF 1-2 or EN B)
• 1st, 2nd and 3rd ranked - LADIES
• 1st, 2nd and 3rd ranked - OPEN CCC
• 1st, 2nd and 3rd ranked - NATIONAL CANADIAN
• 1st, 2nd and 3rd ranked - NATIONAL MEXICAN

General schedule

Sunday, 27th of November 2022
Registration / Training task
Monday, 28th ‐ Saturday, 3rd of December 2022
Contest flying days
Saturday, 3rd of December 2022
Prize‐giving, closing ceremony

Daily schedule

07:00 - Headquarter opens
07:30 - Deadline for the previous day protests
08:00 - Transportation to Take off
10:00 - Meet Director / Task and Safety Committee meetings
10:30 - Pilots' briefing / Previous task official results announcements / Task definition
11:00 - Window open
16:00 - Scoring office opens
19:00 - Scoring office closes
20:00 - Provisional results announcement / Headquarter closes

Accommodation and Activities

Once in Valle, you have several choices, from the very cheap up to the very exclusive. Cheapest options are offering a simple room. There are no Bed & Breakfast places in Valle, but many people will rent a room at their homes for a really small fee, you can ask for these at the Santa María landing field or any local. Usual fee would be around 10 euros the night (15 CAD). Hotels are spread all around the town, some of the cheapest are those you can find directly outside the Valle de Bravo bus station terminal, but I would recommend getting something closer to the landing zone to avoid long walks or unnecessary daily extra taxi rides.

They are some hotels at the Santa María landing zone or close to the local clubs, some really close to them! That's very convenient because it will save you from long walks every day carrying your gear all around town. Except for the competition days happening every year, it's usually not necessary to arrive with a hotel reservation ready, especially if you will be arriving during the week and not during the weekend. In this case, I would recommend to arrive to the place first, check the hotels and take whatever fits you better to your own personal taste, budget and needs.

If you happen to be traveling with a party of friends, there are a few better recommendations for you; small parties of three or four guys can share a cabin with a kitchen outside Valle at the Avándaro suburbs. This cabins when splitting the daily cost between 3 or 4 pilots becomes much cheaper than most hotels with few extras like a view, pool and other services and a kitchen if you don't mind cooking to save some time and money from time to time. Being in Avándaro will put you in a situation where you can't simply walk to the landing zone or local clubs to search for the next shuttle, but you can have pre-arranged a pickup hour with any local cab driver to take you to the launch, they will usually charge you a little bit more than the shuttle, but when paid together by 2 or 3 pilots it becomes actually cheaper to do this.

Larger groups may consider renting a full house. There are many options for only a couple of rooms of many rooms with pool and other services. Most of these rentals are quite expensive at first look since we're talking about luxury homes here, but since we're talking about big houses, price divides among big parties comes usually way cheaper than most hotels rooms available in town. There are some of these rentals really close to the landing zone or other strategic spots, but pre-arranged daily pick up for your party with some of the local shuttles for an extra fee might be a good idea.

How to get here

To take a bus ride to Valle go to bus station named "Observatorio" (Observatory). Taxi from Mexico airport to bus station cost $200 Mexican pesos (around 11 euros - 15CAD)

Time schedules for the Valle the bravo bus may vary, but basically you will find daily departures from 5:00 AM up to 5:00 PM, one every hour. (For example, 5:15, 6:15, 7:15 and so on)
Be sure to buy and to ride the "Libramiento" bus route to Valle and *NOT* the "Amanalco" route. The new "Libramiento" route will take you to Valle in less than three hours thanks to the fact that about half of the way uses the new highway.


Temascaltepec Mexico

Plane

First, get your flight directly to Mexico City. Having the extra ride on an airplane to the Toluca airport is a waste of money and not that much time saving as you could believe.

Bus

To take a bus ride to Valle go to bus station named "Observatorio" (Observatory). Taxi from Mexico airport to bus station cost $200 Mexican pesos (around 11 euros)

Time schedules for the Valle the bravo bus may vary, but basically you will find daily departures from 5:00 AM up to 5:00 PM, one every hour. (For example, 5:15, 6:15, 7:15 and so on)
Be sure to buy and to ride the "Libramiento" bus route to Valle and *NOT* the "Amanalco" route. The new "Libramiento" route will take you to Valle in less than three hours thanks to the fact that about half of the way uses the new highway.

Downloads

Waypoint files

Organizers

Manuel Quintanilla
Estamos ubicados en el estado de Mexico, Valle de Bravo, específicamente en el area de El Peñon.
Daniel Jaramillo
Organizer
Manuel Quintanilla
Organizer
Julie Bouchard-Roussin
HPAC delegate
J.P. Robert Vandenbegine
HPAC delegate
Juan Gonzalez
Score keeper

Contacts

Socials

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Tasks and results

Task 1

28 Nov, 2022

54.3 km — Race to goal

Task 5

02 Dec, 2022

105.2 km — Race to goal

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