Applegater Spring 2012 17
paragliding
US World Team. The next world
competition will be held July 13-26,
2013, in Sopot, Bulgaria. There were four
men and one woman on the previous US
world team. At the upcoming Rat Race,
cumulative points from last year and this
year’s competitions will determine the
new US team. In 2007, Seattle resident
Tom McCune, whose first competition
was the Rat Race, earned a bronze medal
at the Paragliding World Championships
in Australia, becoming the first American
to medal since the competition began in
1989.
Giving back. Mike and Gail are
proud of what they and their pilots
give back to the local community—in
a multitude of ways. Here are some
examples:
• Fundraising dinner. Here is your
chance to meet the world’s top paragliding
pilots. This year’s fundraising dinner will
be held at Fiasco Winery on Sunday, June
17, from 6 – 9 pm. For the first time,
RVHPA is hosting the dinner and it is open
to the public. Local club members will be
cooking and donating food, and there is no
charge to the public. Mike and Gail expect
upwards of 300 attendees. Donations are
appreciated.
• A scholarship in the name of the
Hunter Family Charitable Fund has been
awarded to a deserving student in past
years. Andy Pallotta was chosen by the
Hunter family last year. (See Andy’s article
in the Winter 2012 Applegater or online at
www.applegater.org.)
• This year’s donation by the Hunter
Family Charitable Fund will be directed
to the Magdalene Home for homeless
pregnant and parenting teen girls in
Medford, and also will be used to purchase
preemie car seats for parents in need
through the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit
at Rogue Valley Medical Center.
• Charitable contributions by
paraglider pilots are used to make
significant improvements in the Ruch area.
For example: a new roof for the Applegate/
Ruch RAT (Rural Action Team) Sheriff’s
office, and computer equipment, band
equipment and playground equipment
for Ruch School. The club also has held
aviation assemblies at Ruch School.
Boon to the local economy. Not
only do pilots stay in the area throughout
the competition, but some of their families
come, too. “Pilots love that there’s so much
to do in the valley for their families,” said
Gail. Some pilots rent homes, some stay
in local hotels. Other pilots and their
families camp out at Cantrall-Buckley
Park (usually 75-plus pilots and families
totaling around 125 people) and frequent
local establishments. And because it’s
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“Nationals” this year, even more pilots are
expected at the event.
In addition to the pilots, there are also
35 volunteers from all over the country
during the week who help make the Rat
Race what it is and contribute to the local
economy, too.
Race Day. With one race each day,
here is what goes on during a typical day
of competition:
• 9 am—Pilots meet in the Haley’s
2,100-square-foot classroom where,
among other things, Mike goes over
weather conditions. Last year Mike
canceled one day of the competition
because the lift was too big (strong) even
though conditions were good (not windy).
(For those who know the lingo, this means
that the turbulated area between up and
down was too strong.)
• 10:30 – 11 am—All gather at the
top of Woodrat Mountain. It takes two
57-passenger school buses, a 20-passenger
bus, and volunteers’ vans to shuttle all the
pilots to the top. A truck follows with all
the gear.
• Noon—Start of the race. Pilots are
required to sign in at launch and sign out
when they land.
• Pilots hover in the air up to over an
hour as high as they can get in one spot.
• 1:15 pm—The pilots take off to
tackle an average 30- to 40-mile course.
Last year there were 1,300 launches over
seven days. The Task Selection Committee
picks a different course every day, and pilots
use GPS with “turn points” (longitude and
latitude) to navigate along the racecourse.
As an example, a race route might be from
Woodrat to Grants Pass, Grants Pass to
Gold Hill, Gold Hill to Jacksonville, and
Jacksonville to the Fly High/Longsword
Vineyards landing zone.
• “Retrieve and Safety Coordinators”
stay at the top of the mountain until the
end of the race. Pilots call them when
they land.
• When a race is over for the day, free-
flyers and tandem flyers go up until dark.
• One race lasts three to five hours
and is mentally exhausting. As an example
of how grueling the race really is, only 30%
of the pilots complete it. This means that
the 70% who don’t complete the race are
picked up along the race route each day.
“We litter the countryside with pilots,”
Mike admits.
Join in on the adventure. In addition
to the fundraising dinner and watching live
feeds at Fiasco and other locations, the
public can, for a fee, view the competition
from atop Woodrat Mountain and reserve
a tandem paragliding flight with a tandem-
certified pilot before or after the race each
day. Tandem flights can last from 20 to 45
From left to right, Rat Race volunteer Roger Brock with organizers Gail and Mike Haley.
Mike and Gail Haley—
Rat Race organizers extraordinaire
Mike Haley is one of the pioneers of the hang-gliding sport. “I
always knew I wanted to fly, but didn’t have any money when I was
young. I built my first two hang gliders back in the 70s,” said Mike.
Since taking up paragliding he has soared up to 18-19,000 feet above
sea level without oxygen. The record altitude at Woodrat Mountain
is 13,000 feet (accomplished by a pilot after the Rat Race was over).
“I’d still like to learn to fly helicopters,” Mike admits.
Gail, too, has her paragliding license, but says she’s “not as
passionate as Mike.” She is, however, passionate about the pilots and
about organizing the Rat Race to perfection.
Mike is on the Board of Directors of the national association
(USHPA) and chairs the competition committee. (The Federal Aviation
Administration allows USHPA to govern in the United States and be
self-regulating—unlike other aviation entities—because of the stellar
job that USHPA has done for over 35 years.)
minutes depending on weather conditions,
and they can go as high as 4,000 to 5,000
feet above Woodrat Mountain, which is
at 3,700 feet above sea level. Annually,
100 to 150 adventuresome folks fly off the
mountain with an instructor in a tandem
glider designed for two people. For those
so inclined, you can make your reservations
at Fiasco Winery, the public Rat Race
headquarters this year.
The public is invited to pick up the
competing pilots when they land—they’re
the ones with the large backpacks—and
give them a ride to Fiasco Winery.
For more information on this
year’s Rat Race, visit the Fiasco Winery
race headquarters on Highway 238
in Jacksonville or go online to www.
mphsports.com. Also, watch this excellent
nine-minute video by Oregon Public
Broadcasting filmed by a cameraman
who flew tandem during the 2011 Rat
Race (http://www.opb.org/programs/ofg/
segments/view/1789).
Here’s what a Rat Race pilot had to say
about the race a few years ago: “This is the
best run, best organized, best orchestrated
event there is in the Northwest. Whether
you finish in the top ten or dead last, you’ll
have a great time and you’ll become a better
pilot, too.”
Barbara Holiday
sfholiday@aol.com
NOTE: More Rat Race photos can be seen
online at www.applegater.org.