Hi there, everybody. Welcome to another episode of the Cloudbase Mayhem. Before we get into today's show with Martin Scheel, I wanted to share, and you'll see this as you read Cross Country Magazine, my article about this, but I just got back from the Swiss World Cup, and I have a story to share, a sense of what not to do when you're under a lot of stress. Yes, it's very important to know when to stand down, to pick the right days. If you don't, then things can go sideways. Just talking about the risks of flying while really distracted. The Swiss World Cup, we had one early task the first day, and then had three days of rain.
Weren't able to fly, and then had a short task, and then two glorious tasks the last two days of the comp. And I had bombed out the first day, so that was kind of my drop. So I needed to put together the remaining days and fly pretty well. The second task I did pretty well, and the third task did better, and I was kind of crawling back and excited about the last day. The conditions were perfect. The forecast was epic. We were going to have another amazing task in that incredible arena. And then as night fell, the night before. Before the last task, I got a horrible phone call from a friend of mine back home.
One of my best friends, dear friend, and my main backcountry ski partner over the last decade, Terry O 'Connor, was actually on the show about the COVID pandemic a few years back. And he was caught in an avalanche. Terry did not make it.
Anyway, you can imagine. It was a rough night, and woke up, and I got a couple hours sleep, and woke up in the morning, and my roommates there were, you know, gave me a big hug, and it's just kind of one of those, you don't believe it's happened. You can't process it. This human's not very good at dealing with someone leaving too soon. And it was pretty obvious that I shouldn't fly, and it doesn't matter, you know, the results. And so. But I kept justifying, well, I should probably go up the hill, it's such a beautiful day, maybe I'll take one last flight, and take Terry with me. Anyway, I justified it in all kinds of reasons that, you know, I'm good at this, and I can fly distracted,
and I might as well just. Anyway, I justified it by a number of different, oh, I'll fly, if it doesn't feel good, I'll land. And then I went up the hill, and I got my stuff together, and I flew, and it was awful. And just a miserable experience, but I kept thinking, well, it'll get better. And I, so I kept flying, and had a great start, and then things just started going, I mean, I was just making the worst decisions, and wasn't flying well, and kept getting caught, and stuck, and too low, and just kept defending for whatever reason. And I'll just keep going, I'll keep going. Even one of the, one stage got really tall, and was heading back over the lake, and, you know, I was on full bar, and had my hands through the toggles, and reached up to change my goggles, and just fully put the wing in a massive spin, which ended up in an auto rotation, lost thousands of feet, straightening it all out.
I mean, just, I wasn't there. Anyway, finally, gave up at the last turn point, because I couldn't. Imagine being in goal with all the jubilation, and being around all these people, and landed, and then just sat for an hour, and had a really good cry. And anyway, the point of it is, is we really do need to know when to stand down. It's important. We shouldn't fly distracted. We got to know, we got to pick the days, and we can't let things like results, or even the desire to be. And the air, cloud, where we are, mentally, we make mistakes, and luckily this one had no consequences, other than just beating myself up, mentally, for making the mistake.
Okay, on to happier thoughts. This talk is with Martin Scheel. We did it on one of the, one of the rainy days. I went and visited him in his split spot in Interlochen, that they were using for the comp, and a fascinating individual. I've been wanting to interview. Martin for years, he's a weather guru. Like I said, he organized and, and has run the Swiss league since the mid nineties. He has been responsible for their kind of culture of greatness over the years. We talk a little bit about Chrigel, of course, and who he is, and his talents, and Stefan Morgenthaler, and just what they have been able to accomplish there with the Swiss league. It's something I've always wanted to do. You know, they run the Swiss league every weekend, all spring and summer, and I've created a lot of amazing pilots, and it's a great training program and regimen.
And you'll hear about all that in the show. Uh, Martin was a world-class, one of the best climbers in the world back in the day, and just got into flying and it took over his life. He's still got a lot of passion for it. He's an amazing photographer. I remember when I first started getting into the sport 20 something years ago, I remember his images and, uh, he was out there flying around with us every day, making cool videos and images. And of the comp, but a lot of passion, interesting individual, and fun talk. Enjoy Martin.
What a treasure. Thanks for taking some time out of your very busy day right now, getting ready. Well, making this world cup go. And it's nice to be able to do this in person. Most of the time I do this online. So it's nice to meet you finally, after all these years, I've been looking at your photography since I got into this sport, which is more than 20 years ago now. So, uh, thank you for filling our pages with wonderful images and putting on these competitions and, uh, taking the time to say, hello.
Yeah. Hi, nice to meet you. Nice
to meet you. We talked a little bit before we started recording about your background, but, uh, for the Swiss, of course, and the Germans, they, they know much about your background, but maybe a lot of the listeners don't know so much. Tell us about how, tell us your, your history.
Yeah. Okay. Um, actually I started rock climbing with 13 years and from then on my, my life was climbing and all parents and teachers hated me because you were more focused
on the climbing than school.
Yeah. So you, you asked me to speak about stories. So, okay. I, I, from this time I have one learning in the apprenticeship. I, I always, I called them in the morning and said, okay, today I go climbing. Um, they could not accept this. And, uh, after maybe 10 times or more, I, they tried to fire me. So, uh, I, I did not want that. They fire me because of when I start something, I would like to finish it. So it was after two and a half year of my apprenticeship. Um, they, they offered me one year. holiday, or not holiday, but a break for me.
That was perfect. Yeah, nice. So after this one year break, I did not call them in the morning to say that I'm going climbing; I called them that I'm sick, and from that moment on everything was good.
So this is one of the learnings in the in the world in the world I had to do, honestly.
Honest, to be honest, is not always perfect, right?
but i
think I'm still too honest for a lot of people in the paragliding world. I don't know if I want something, I push for it. Yeah, good. So that sounds like more good stories after, yeah, after the, yeah, during the apprenticeship, I just had every minute climbing, ice climbing, mountaineering, and everything. I was getting more and more professional, and this, how many years I had? I was about 28, I think. Something like this, a flight school in Austria said, uh, was inviting me to to do this school there, power gliding school.
Before, I always said power grinding is boring compared with mountaineering and climbing. So after my, yeah, I was more or less professional climber, and after this, I started in Austria flying, and from that moment, I just was thinking only for flying. Hmm, really right away? Yeah, more or less, because there was just the first gliders where almost could take thermals, and I was really going into this. Give me a year, when was this? Yeah, Must be 80, 88. Okay, okay. Profile was the glider.
The profile from Eldercock came out, and our teacher there was, uh, one of the pilots, one of the best pilots or something, and he, he gave me his glider. Yeah, cool. Yeah, so first flight, first parachute stall for many hundred meters, your first flight, yeah, with this glider. Oh, so I was going down straight, straight, straight. I've had no idea what's happening, you know, in this time. This was not known as problem, and I, I started to pull a little bit, you know, on different lines, and finally something has to happen.
Yeah, finally it was getting out. Wow, that was my first flight with this glider, but yeah, maybe I forgot my first flight in general. You, you like stories? I love stories. Go ahead.
more the better, a
friend of me that was two years before I went to Austria to school. Friend of mine was saying, "Hey, you have to, you have to try paragliding," and so we went up to one of our mountains where we climbed a lot and there was a little hill, but after the hill there was a, it was going down and he said, "Yeah, just take like this stuff and on here below you break, okay easy," but it had thermal, so it was good wind and was going, I was going above this uh first hill, you know, where you were supposed
to land yeah
I did not land, so I was going down and down and down. It was a slope just about at the glide angle of the glider, yeah. And there were trees coming. Oh, what do I do? I did not know that, right? That I have to pull right to make right turn, so I just tried a little bit. It was like on the force on the on the parachuting stall story. I just tried, what's happening on on if I pull on these lines? I was cutting around the trees and landed safely the way we learn
these days
That was my first flight, and then the first flight was this...
glider, yeah. So, uh, yeah, but want to know about my career? So, well, yeah.
but what I mean, back then when that happened, you, you know, you do a parachute all the ground was, it just ignorance is bliss, so it didn't really scare you that much because what's happening, or I went
to Helmut, to the to the teacher, and I told him, "Hey, what's happening?" And then he told me, "Oh yeah, that could be um, I make you the glide a little bit faster." And but by then I knew what's happening, and and parachute install is okay, sort of, if you know what's happening, and that was okay then, but
There wasn't any SIV going on or training, and you probably didn't have a reserve, I would imagine. No, no way, we have just
This really light harness and like mountaineering, now I mean alpine. Oh yeah, if I go to alpine climbing with paraglider, I don't have anything, right? Like in these times, yeah. But that what's happening then. I, I as I was professional rock climber, I, I went, I went to a brand. I, I could barely fly straight, but I went to the brand and asked, "What do you pay if I fly for you?" And it was Swing, and Swing was, uh, yeah, okay. Okay, I'll pay you 3,000 a year and give you all the material and say, okay, that's good. But I did not really know paragliding.
But I had a good photographer and we were quite fast. Were you a
photographer back
then? No, no, no. I learned that afterwards from him. Ah, okay. Robert Bush. You maybe know him. Yes, of course. Yeah, he was my friend and we made many, many climbs together and working together, you see. So we published, so everything okay with Swing. But as I am, I was thinking maybe the glider could be a little bit better like this and this. But at this time, only Hediger and Pierre Remy were the designers of Swing. Yeah. But they had a financial problem with the boss. So they left and founded Paratech. And then the boss was trying to make a new glider.
And we went to the slope for pulling it up and it flew about very bad. And I said to him, hey, that glider cannot fly because of that and that. Then he said, more or less, yeah, make your own one. So I was going. I was going into aerodynamics and thinking a little bit and blah, blah, blah. And finally, I have made my first glider. You know, that's all on paper. Yeah. I mean, no compute and nothing. Sure, sure. Sick lines and. There's no
apps to design a glider back then.
So, but the first glider was a really big success. It was the Zenith. And from then, okay, I'm paragliding manufacturer now or constructor. Did
you have background in engineering or yeah,
my apprenticeship was electronics, but it's like, yeah, if you, if you know, engineering, I think you can think from one thing to another.
Yeah. And then, uh, yeah, things were going on. I started to be test pilot as well. I flew a lot. And then one of my great moments was. Yeah. To win with my own paraglider, the first league competition in Switzerland. When, what year is that? Yeah, it must be 99, 89,
89. Yeah. That's when
the league started here in Switzerland.
90, 90, probably 90. Yeah.
And was this, was this, you know, kind of directly from hang gliding? Was this the same guys that were into hang gliding? No. Was
This the same guys that were forming
this or is that a whole new thing? The league was
founded on base of the hang gliding league. Okay. So it was more or less the rules and everything was copied. Yeah. But we have got, uh, own boss. Eve boss was the first, uh, Swiss league chief. And the thing was more or less the same as from hang gliding, but we have got our own big budget and everything. Hmm. Yeah. So. Yeah. So I was flying and flying and was getting better and better. And I did competitions with my own gliders, which was, uh, very cool. Yeah. It's good. I
love that you barely knew how to fly and you went and got sponsored with swing. I love that. That I just turned out a fly on publication.
I mean, for a sponsor, it does not matter if I am the best or not. Sure. Finally, the, the amount of pictures in the magazines. Uh, the, the payment for the sponsors, uh, that was working out. Yeah. And then I was, um, funny is maybe the story about the Minoa. Um, I've yeah, I repeat, there was no computer, so I was building a one-to-one model from not, not from entire half of a glider, but of pieces, you know, from maybe a certain on the, on the wing tip. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Maybe a third of the glider. And then in the middle, I took another quarter of the buyer.
I, I made really a one-to-one model with which I filled this air with a little bit pressure and like this, I could make the, in German, it's called the, the, the whole fabric has really complicated form and now it's made from the computer. But, uh, by that time, nobody was. Able to do it on the computer. Mm-hmm so I made a one-to-one model more less for the Minoa, the Minoa and maybe you remember the, it was basically. First lighter with the shark nose, I, I, I saw them on the profile, but what would be better would, would make it better.
So I tried to pull the nose in without simulation and something, but I made one without the. shark nose, and the other one with shark nose, and it flew better with the shark nose. So really, yeah, it did not look really like a shark because our profile was different, yeah. But, uh, I was experimenting just by heart. Wow, and the menorah, there are a lot of other things with techniques like the, yeah, I've put a fabric above the whole thing. I did not make the inner, the inner cells dividing from the lines.
I had every line had a normal rip, but above I had an epsilon of every rip. It was more or less an epsilon, and the room inside of the epsilon I filled with air. from the back. So, what you normally have, you have a lot of pull on the nose, around on the top, say, yeah, it pulls like an idiot because that's you get, and now you get from the back, you got minus pressure in, so it, it's not blown up as the rest of the ring. It is, it is got a little bit minus pressure from the back.
So, this was the surface of the menorah was really flat and
You're calling it minnow, like a minnow, like a
little fish. No, I don't know what it's called, you know? Okay, it was a word. Yeah, yeah. But the the glider itself, I mean, it was too much material. It was difficult to take off. It was pretty quickly in a negative spin, and I don't want to say this glider was perfect, but it was a lot of technology in it, which has been used years after for the computer again. Yeah.
Wow, and but you started, you got into competitions pretty early, you got in, yeah?
I started the average the first league, huh? Yeah, but you won. Yeah, ah, cool. Actually, I, I must say, I did not win because I was a good pilot. I was, I did win because I realized after the first turn I made, we had the latest stage, we had a task of, I don't know, 20 kilometers or something like this, 30 maybe, which was a lot, you know, in this time. And I did it. I was pretty slow, like, yeah, I was not a good pilot, so I was slow. But I have had the idea to make it a second time, and the conditions were much better. So I just did it a second time, and the second time I was the fastest.
That's why I won.
Nice.
And
did you, have you kept with climbing and mountaineering all the way through? Is that still a passion? No, that was
actually, for me, a little bit of drama to stop climbing, because I mean, I was pretty good, one of the best in the world. Yeah, sort of. And all your being, I mean, it's like you get rid of all your safety, of all your friends. Of all your... That's your community, that's your world. Community, my world, everything. I was just getting rid of that, and this is quite difficult.
But you, but flying was that compelling. Yeah, I was
just, I was just so addicted for flying that I could not, I could not climb anymore. I mean, I was going to climbing like, like I have to, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I was going flying, because my heart was pulling me to, in the air. Wow. And yeah, that's about it. But
it sounds like you transitioned to making that a living quite quickly. You're designing... Yeah, that's,
yeah. I was still doing some of my job climbing. And then I was, I was working for Swing. I mean, when I was designer and test pilot, I mean, it's horrible what designers, or at least test pilots, do on. But I was living out of that, yeah.
And...
And did you, did you have a vision even back then? Did you, where did you see yourself going? Was it just, I'm just flying at all costs? No, I never have visions.
I never have visions. It wasn't,
I'm going to be the best in the world at flying. I just
have my heart, and my heart pulls me somewhere. And I never was going, I want to be the best, or I want to achieve that goal or something. I just do what my heart... I'm almost unable to do something against my heart. I think that's from my parents and childhood. I really, if I do something against my heart, I feel like a prisoner, like in a prison. It's... Where
did you grow up?
Even now, you know? And... And... And I have some hassles with my, with the federation I work for. And if I have to do something which is not really from my wish and my heart, then I'm unable to work. That's... Or I do... It's against your being.
Where did you grow up, Martin?
Yeah, near Zurich. Near Zurich. Okay. And yeah, school and apprenticeship was horrible. My father was horrible.
I don't want to go too deep in this, but it's from there.
And then, in 93,
Miki Koppler was the league chef.
And yeah, he did his job. But I was... I did say, hey, you should have something for the new people. For the young ones. Let's make a junior challenge. It was 93. I made my first course for the young pilots. I mean, I was not old. I was 33. And the other ones were maybe 23, 25. And in one of these first courses was Morgenthaler. Really? He flew better than I did. And I remember that... Because in that period, I had... I had... I wanted to be better as my student. Sure, yeah. And he flew better. And it was quite okay.
I must be a good one. And he still is one of the best. Yeah. And Chrigel came. And Abby came. Everybody was in my junior challenge finally. And we still do it now. You still do it? Yeah, yeah. Not one. I missed not one. Really? Still a great week. Yeah, with the young ones. I
know a little bit about the league. Give us some background there. What is it? Why does it exist? Yeah,
but first I would like to finish the story. How did I get into paragliding and into the league? Because in 93, I invented more or less the junior challenge. Now it's called the newcomer challenge. And in 95, our league chief disappeared somehow. Nobody was around. And I was working for Swing. I did not sing. I didn't have anything to make it. But I said, okay, I can do it for a moment. I can organize a little bit. And then I'm getting more and more into the league work. And Swing was sold to Germany. So I did not want to go to Germany.
So I said, okay, I stop there and I take the league. It was 95, 96. And then since then, I'm... Yeah, the chief of the Swiss league.
Since then? Yeah. Wow. That's quite some history. Yeah, yeah. It's a long time. And
for the pictures, I realized pretty fast that for looking for sponsors, I need pictures. So I went to my old friend, Reby, and told him, hey, what do I have to put on the camera for my settings? Yeah, I did that and it worked. So I became... I somehow saw the photographer. Yes. But just... Very exceptional one. Yeah. I think where I'm good is I can fly with one hand in the gaggle. Yeah. And because I do this since 30 years, often I just fly one hand and it's not a big difference to two hand.
And like this, I learned to make... I make these gaggle shots, which you probably know. Oh, yeah. That's the thing. And now I make videos in the gaggle, which I really like. Yeah.
But, yeah, I'm not a professional photographer. But
you can be in the right spot.
Yeah, I'm in the right spot on the right moment. And I learned a little bit with flash and all this stuff. And finally, I've made marketing.
Yeah, I started marketing and communication. Yeah. Just for fun, sort of. And I had my own agency for 10 years or more, 15.
But finally, yeah, it's not my heart there, you know. It's to sell things which you don't use or need. It's somehow strange.
But to work with the young people on flying and organizing comps, and this... Yeah. After 10 years of marketing, I realized, no, that's not the way where I want to go. So I stopped that. And since then, I just have this 50 % job for the league.
And that job, you were saying before we got going, that that's more on the organization side. You're not teaching so much anymore or you're still doing a lot of teaching?
Yeah, the job did change a little bit. When I took the league... In 1995, I was team leader on the world's, all the World Cups and everything. So I was working a lot with the pilots. And in Switzerland, at home, the trainings were organized basically by the clubs. So they have made the Swiss Cup and all these. And I have the Swiss League Cups. These are flexible trainings. And I was organizing, but it was somehow easier, you know, not as much. We did not have trackers and all that stuff.
We just have had the cameras and what I had to organize is a laboratory to develop the films. So we bought... You mean for
taking pictures of the waypoints and stuff? Yeah, for the waypoints. Yeah.
Pictures. And yeah, we had our own laboratories, a little small black and white. And it was not so much work for the organizing the events. But maybe since 10 years, there's more technology behind and more knowledge. Task setting is getting more and more demanding. Mm-hmm. And the organizing... The organizers, the clubs, they did more and more just go backwards in...
They organized the travel to the takeoff and the grill and the landing. But all the technical things, more or less at the moment, that's our duty. Mm-hmm. So from the team leader and working with the pilots, I've got more and more into the... Yeah, organizer of events. Mm-hmm. So I lost that a little bit, but now we have Fabrice. He has the... We share the job. Mm-hmm. And Fabrice is working with the people, with the pilots. So that works out very well now. He's a great guy. And yeah, we work together really smooth.
And what is the motivation for, you know, so Chrigel and Morgenthaler, when they got into it, was this... Was this already, even back then, was this, oh, I'm going to join this because this could be a career? This could be... Or they just were crazy passionate about flying, and this was the entry into...
No, I think... Why does someone want to become a Swiss national? If you say Morgenthaler and Chrigel, they are two different careers. Mm-hmm. So Morgenthaler, I don't know if he agrees, but I think... I think it was for him pretty clear that he will work on his profession because he is, how do you call them, an engineer. Yeah, he has a very good job and everything. So for him, paragliding is a hobby. Yeah. And I think that was since... He never was thinking to do paragliding as a profession.
As a profession. Yeah. As a profession. As a profession. So yeah, where Chrigel pretty soon started to to be a profession professional thinking pilot, his parents flew, he he started flying as a youngster and when he came to the newcomer, he was already really pushing and he was quiet, you know, he was he's still quiet, yeah, yeah, very great person, but I think in his mind was pretty fast, I have to fly, yeah, so it was, it's different, yeah, yeah.
Tell me about the, you know, the objectives of the, the because I, this is something I think many countries—in America, for example, we have no concept of something like the league. We don't have any training; everybody does it pretty much on their own. If you want to become a comp pilot, you figure it out on your own. Yeah, the puzzle is to be put together through your own personal experience, finding mentors in it. But we don't have anything organized like the French, like the Swiss. Yeah, what are the, what are the objectives? How is it funded? Give us a little background on the, yeah.
The league, uh, the the objectives of the league was not, I mean, for sure we would like to win, and in this time we did win everything. Switzerland was the leading country for a long time, but uh, there was not a proper concept or something. We have our sport rule, and yeah, but basically I, I could build the league how I wanted to, and that was, yeah, that was, that's probably why I liked it. I could build up everything, and that was probably why I liked it. I could build up everything. The the board was always saying, "Yes, nice," and it was working well, and we did win, and and people were happy.
So yeah, the
Funding comes from membership, or from government, or had it?
It came only from membership, okay? Until, uh, maybe 10 years ago, the Swiss Olympic—that's, we are not Olympic, but Swiss Olympic is more or less the machine who divide, who gives all sports the budget and the rules and everything. And since, since I'm official Swiss Olympic trainer and we got quite a lot of money from them, so by now we get a lot of money from Swiss Olympic, but we have a lot to do for them, for the—I mean, we do it for the sport, but we have a lot of money from Swiss Olympic, but we have a lot to do for the—I mean, we do it for the Swiss Olympic, but we have a lot of money from Swiss Olympic, but we have a lot of money from Swiss, yeah.
And now with my retirement in two years, I
There will be a big change in the whole system. The board decided that the the sport at the moment, I'm basically directly employed below the board of the hang gliding federation, and the director is not really my boss, you know? We work together, but it, it's and I have all freedom and I could develop what I ever want. And with my retirement, I, uh, the board decided that everything goes straight down. It's a classic vertical hierarchy, and I'm really afraid that the whole system will break together because Fabris or I or other ones, we are not people; we are not made for working below a boss, and not below two bosses, you know?
So
Yeah, I think it's a big mistake, but I could, I try to help them and say, "Hey, the the psychology of us is different as of skiing." Sure, you know they, they everybody's how in other sports it is like this, and then like this, but in our sports, the young, the you start in an age where you end in another sport where you finish
yeah so
In another sport, you get with five into a system where you are, yeah, with you are a child and you do what they tell you. But in our sport, most pilots are above 20 or even older; they sure not tell them what they have to do. You have to make a system that they like to do it, and I am, I'm really afraid about the new system, but we will see, so
You know, that's now it's getting more and more, the whole world getting more and more paper and less work, yeah? And that's for me, it's really difficult to see everybody. I mean, you, you don't make a decision, but you make a decision, you can't stay in a group, you can't. I mean, that's it's not right for everybody, a working group, and you build the working group that it is like, for sure, that your decision will, you what you want will be worked out from the working group, but you don't take the responsibility for that, you know? And this I see everywhere, and all these rules and papers and safety. I mean, if we speak about safety, maybe later, and safety and hang gliding, this is such a
difficult topic let's
Talk about that now, because we were talking about that before the the show. It's quite interesting; you have, you've gotten to see the whole span of where it is now. And we were talking about the that it's gotten less and less towards pirate pilot responsibility and making their decisions and more towards the organizers. It's more, well, the task and make sure, making sure everything's safe in in a not a safe sport. It's not safe, so how do we, you know, yeah?
I think the the world in general demand more and more safety and gives less and less responsibility to the person, I mean, that's on the road or on the bike or on the... how do you educate your children or everything, you know? I think in in U.S. If you walk into a farm and you break your leg, the former is can be sued. I mean, instead that you look on the ground if there is a hole or not, the former can be sued. And and this stupid system takes more and more the impact to our world and yeah, I mean I do task setting since 30 years and
And and I think a lot about safety and what can we do and everything, and I see that more and more responsibility goes from the pilot to the to the organizer, but and I mean it's it's really strange because at one end everything must be absolutely safe on on task setting or take off or landing field, everything was super safe, but people fly harness now is a piece of paper under the back. I mean, the the Supermarine does it has a small protection which just get
the homologation, they everybody flight it without complaining, and you know exactly if you don't feel straight to your ass, you know exactly if you don't feel is no protection at all, and so it's really strange for me. And what makes me afraid is that I'm task setting and organizing the coms, especially on the task setting that we get all responsibility, more and more responsibility kept to the organizer. We finally, we cannot fly anymore competitions in the Alps or in I mean we have to Brazil or
flatland everywhere, because in the Alps you always find somewhere a lee side. It's not possible that you have a good day without I have to fly lee in the Alps; that's how you fly here. But finally, you have a lee side from the valley wind, and I can tell it on the briefing that there's a lee side on the valley breeze. You should not go there, fly high, but finally the top pilot go there, and the next they are crying level 3, and so it's really difficult to find a balance. And I have made a plenary on the first briefing, and I really hope that we can go a little bit back to pilot's responsibility.
It's not possible that all the responsibility theoretically
It's anyway, the pilot, the pressure rises up more and more to the organizer because we will lose so many good flights. I think about at the Alpencup a year ago, we had four accidents; three of them were in cable, so only one were because of the conditions, but it was horrible to have three accidents on a four-day competition, and we have a lot of speaking and a lot of people was blaming me that I fly in conditions which are not good and
We sorted out then a working group, and the working group in fast, it was like, you know, we have after the task setting team, we have a supervisor team; they look only for details.
Is a cable before or after they just—they don't have to think for the task, they just have to think for the details. And this is very good because I think my and the task set, they think more in bigger dimensions, where this is a very good thing. And this guy or girl, they just look to the edge of every cylinder. How do you take it if you come low? What happened? Okay, so that's one thing. We have this supervisor team, and the second thing is that we have more people who is enabled to cancel a task because it was often, if—if we have had a bad, or not a bad, but a a
bad, but a bad but a bad task. An organizer in Switzerland with not much knowledge, I was basically the only person who was able to cancel the task, and now we have at least one safety manager on the ground able to cancel the task, me in the air, and the third person in the air. So there was the outcome, but back to the negative side of this, thinking that the the organization is able to cancel the task because I have to set always a super safe task two weeks later, or no, maybe one later. We had a great competition together with the Germans in Olpstein, and Olpstein is, yeah, it's it's a great place for flying.
The cloud base was amazingly high; I mean, we never have so good conditions there, but we flew only in the fall, and and the great task we could have done In the big stuff, no chance to set it just for safety, and so we flew a little bit in the fall and small task, and yeah, that's quite hard. And it's only an example that we lose so much if we get too locked into that, yeah? All pressure on the task setting, and it must be safe for 100 pilots, you know? And in these 100 pilots, you have a wide range, and if you—if you have to make it safe for the last, I—I say idiot, not in sense of no
I'm seriously saying the least experienced or
No, not only least experienced, I mean more in sense of going straight, ah
yeah okay
Yeah, I mean, we have two kinds of accidents. We have the one which is not experienced, but I'm not sure if that makes more accidents as as the experienced ones who go really for it and always straight and without, you know, without
giving themselves any margin, yeah, just following the air exactly, just going I
think for both, we the task setting must be safe for both of them. And if we do it safe for both of them, we lose so many possibilities in task setting. Hmm, I mean, yeah, as I said, in the Alps you have always somewhere on the east side, or in Mexico, I mean
In well, Valle Valle, I mean, the crazy thermal, yeah? And the Superfinal in Mexico, how every day were people falling down? Yes, but yeah, that
was amazing. I've never seen so many incidents, yeah? That Superfinal, yeah.
day incidents, every I think three or four accidents, yeah. And then even Yoel, yeah. And yeah, I'm I'm asking myself, why do people go there? And they're afraid about the Alps.
yeah right
I mean, the Superfinal before was at Dicentes, yeah, and everybody was crying, "It's dangerous and crazy and everything," but we had not one incident, really not one, except a parachute deployment above take above landing, but not for it was by accident, it was by accident, yeah. So we had not one incident, not one, and then a year later, the Superfinal is at Mexico, Mexico. A lot of incidents, but nobody speaks about do you
This might have to be off the record, but we were talking about—we'll edit this so I can say it now—we'll decide, but I, my feeling was, a lot of though in Valle that year for that Superfinal, we had really high pressure, so it was rougher than normal. You know, Valle is known to be, can be quite, quite rough, but it's always rough, it's always rough, but it was unusual. I go to Valle every year because it's easy for us in Monarca, so it was unusually, it was more, a little bit more wind. It was dry, there was no clouds, and it was quite, quite sharp. But my theory is, okay, that's a little bit, and then Superfinal, and people are aggressive, fine, but a lot of those pilots were on the sub for the first time.
yeah and
the geometry to me of the sub is, you've lost a lot of your ability to see here. So many of those, you know, in the gaggle, I saw so many mid-airs that were this—those of you listening, it was the pilot below coming up and the pilot above, but in
Valle always is rough. I mean, crazy service. I mean, I lost one of our friends there, sure. So
But anyway, I think coming back to the responsibilities, I really think that pilots should be more responsible for what they do. I mean, officially they are anyway, but in competition, they should not claim always, "Oh no, there has been a rainy cloud," or "there has been a lee side," and something like this. I mean, if you are too slow, you get into rain, okay? I mean, if you are too slow, maybe you don't get goal, okay? That's normal. We cannot, if, if we are forced to avoid every of these dangers, we will lose a lot of really good flying, and I hope this changes a little bit back to
more natural one
Of my one of my favorite memories was, I believe it was the Superfinal in Colombia in Roldanillo, where there were some really big fires that year, and Chrigel was there, and the there was a day that it had gotten very, very cloudy, and the lead gaggle was, it was going to be really hit and miss to get the goal, you needed another climb, and there was no climbs to be had, and this monster fire was kicking off, and some went in it.
but it was forbidden anyway. It was, it was in the rules, it was written. No
pyro flying or whatever. Yeah, I remember Luke the next day saying, "If I see my friends go in there again, I'm not doing this anymore." He was really upset, but you know, Chrigel went in and a friend of mine was right there. I mean, it was very defined. The the column was incredibly defined, and Chrigel went in and lost the wing and recovered, and Yassin went off, went in really low, and it took him up, you know, two thousand feet above the the wing just roped up, and it took him two thousand feet above the top of the cloud, and he went to throw and thought, "If I throw, I might land back in the fire," and he waited until he drifted, drifted, drifted, and then threw. You know, it was, it was the next day. Okay, maybe we all need to be a little bit more careful with what we do, where we go.
Yeah, it's the self-responsibility. I mean, I, I all life since 13 years, I make these kind of sports, you know, climbing, then flying, and with 50 years, I started these extreme skiing, like steep faces and stuff. And I, I'm only responsible for myself, and there's no way to say, "Oh, you are guilty on something I do wrong." And but at the other end, I have to make task setting for, yeah, it's
More and more, the people put pressure to the task set as to not to make intelligent tasks, but to make safe tasks. You know, this is a difficult situation, hmm?
back to the the the the Swiss league and your job for all those years developing pilots, uh, take me through some of that. You know, what, what are the things that Chrigel comes to you in the 90s and he's young and inspired and you, you can recognize that he's got some talent? What, what do you teach the kids? What, how does, what does it go? What's the sequence? Is it just being around other good pilots and competing as much as possible? I think I
Think one of the most important things that your team has some good pilots. That's really, I mean, Chrigel grew up when Hofer was winning everything, so and Hofer grew up when Bollinger was winning.
Really was I was
For me, I was team leader, but I did not never have had enough time.
the the which
Individuals, so I was more the team leader and the whole education was more and more just the tactic and yeah, just everything around the general. I mean, I was working in mental training and everything, but not on single pilots, more on the just on the group, okay? And after, after you have been on 20 comps with the same pilot, you, you learn how he function, what he needs, and everything. So there's a lot of friendship and partnership with them, but not, uh, I'm not the coach who says, "Hey, think about that, and why do you do this?" Is
That is that, um, culture of sharing knowledge. Is that, is that a, is that a Swiss cultural thing? I, I, I always think about, I think
That's one of my biggest, um, biggest achievements. I, I could bring this team into a partner, all of them are friends, so somehow, and all of them share the knowledge, and, and we are a family. And I, I think that, that one of my strengths is that I don't, I don't speak bad about other persons; I rather try to integrate even strange persons. For sure, there are two or three persons which is a bit more difficult, but in the team, when, when one person was saying, speaking too much or whatever, I try to get
the atmosphere that everybody is integrated and everybody helps, and I mean that's troops. If your friend wins, you will be better as if you... your friend does not win, sure. So every everybody who is better as yourself is helping you, and it's not your enemy, it's... it's your... it's your help to get better. And I think this spirit has been in our group since beginning, and so we don't... didn't have that these fights on I heared about at other nations where the pilots are fighting each other.
Yeah, yeah, we are one family and we work together and we try to build up the legions in
The league, it starts in the spring and it goes all, all summer. How does it work?
Yeah, yeah, I mean, I, I make the calendar somehow in November, October, November, so and I just tried to fill up in the spring, every weekend, every second weekend with a training competition with a Swiss guy and
You go, you're totally mobile, yeah. If it's bad in Grindelwald, you'll go over to the Rome, yeah. That's moving around, that's yeah.
I started with this mobile, uh, trainings very early because in Switzerland we have a good situation. We can be mobile, we have a good infrastructure, and it is a big stress to decide where we have to go. And it's after the decision on, I have one day to organize a comp, but it's worse, I think, because nothing worse than you are at one place and that you're 200 kilometer away. It is good, so I learned pretty early to be flexible to go to the best place where you can. I mean, I'm thinking to go Wednesday somewhere else.
interesting yeah and
Then is there, you know, after, uh, day one, Fabrice, one, are you all getting together dissecting the flight, looking at track logs? Yeah, you know, what do you—what what did he do? Where was the—where were the mistakes made? We did, yeah.
We do, we do always debriefings. We do briefings already quite precise and debriefing anyway, together with the IGC thousands, yeah. Now that's, uh, but that's as I said, I, I could, I have had enough time to do this briefings, debriefings, and courses and everything, but I did not have really time to work with single pilots, but yeah, yeah.
That's it. Sounds amazing. And what's the... you said you're retiring in two years? I can't imagine. You seem to have too much energy for retiring, but...
Uh, I mean, the Federation does not think so; they want to get rid of it.
What then? Um, yeah, I have so many things to do at the moment. I am permanent stress, so maybe I got
rid of it, I got a
little bit less, yeah. I mean, I do a lot of sports still. I do basically everyday sports like climbing, running, mountaineering, skiing, or something. And yeah, I'm sure they are the World Cup wants me for filming and photos, and that'd be great. I mean, I, I think somehow it will, something will appear, yeah. And to be a, to have a little bit more time is too bad. It's, uh, yeah, let's
spend just a little bit of the time we have left, uh, imparting some knowledge for those who are listening, who are maybe getting into comps, or maybe they're, uh, they've done, you know, had a fair bit of experience in comps and maybe they're very experienced in three different things here. But what would be some kind of simple advice to each of those levels, uh, in terms of, okay, you're starting, here's what you need to be working on, and then down, what, what are the some things you've seen, you know, a Morgan dollar versus one of your 20-year-old Swiss pilots who's just, just getting into it? I don't
know, I think there are too many different kinds of psychology psychologists. I cannot say for you if this is good or bad. I, I mean, important is that you're not going to be a psychologist, you're not going to be a psychologist, you're not going to be a psychologist, you're not going to be a psychologist. Fun, important is self-motivation that you want to focus
and achievable goals and all this thing, but I mean that's all blah blah because if you take Morgan Taller and cradled again, they're totally different. I mean, you, you brought these two things into the speech; Morgan Taller is still a somehow a kid he, he goes flying for fun, and he tries things, and he, yeah, let's try this way or that way. And and sometimes, I mean, he's a fantastic pilot, but he's not really focused on the on the result where Chrigel is the upside somehow. I'm sure he has a lot of fun, but he's so focused on what he likes to achieve.
I'm when when you are when you ask me what What is the best to get to get strong? So, I, I always say, "Chrigel, look, look at Chrigel. He is focused. He goes that way, and he does not make compromises for any partner or whatever. So, if he wants to win, he buys the best bite, or even if he works for others, you know, and it's"
unrelenting yeah but
Everybody's completely different. I mean, I was personally, I always was, um, I had a lot of problems with my, uh, uh, last industries. I have a stress to be good that was blocking me completely, and so that needs complete different treatment. So, as a person, I would not use the word stress as somebody who is too easy. Um, okay, so I just cannot tell somebody what to do, but one thing, maybe just for safety, fly the glider.
You really feel that it is the best for you? Don't, don't, uh, buy one because it's cheaper or for any other reason. You really think about that. This is your own life. Is the thing where you fly on, you have your life on, you have to performance and everything. Don't make compromise on the glider and yeah, that's that's the only general thing which is valid for everybody. I'm
Going to ask you a question that I, I hate in advance because, but I have to because I get asked it so much myself, but people will say, "You know that Kriegels won eight times now with the X-Ops, and he's got all this history that a lot of don't even know, you know, the world champion and acro and everything, and he's, he's, he's, he's kind of annihilated everything he has, he has touched with this discipline, and the, the work I think you've talked about, focus." But people always say, "What's, what's the one thing? What's the thing that makes him so good?" And I always say, "It's all of it, it's all the thing." But is, was there something when he came to you, when he was, when it was 16? Was there something that's maybe not obvious? Is it just the work ethic?
What I'm looking for is, how much is—how much is talent? How much is just, uh, his, yeah?
It's, uh, I mean, he's, he's in the air since he's 10 or whatever.
He's absolute, he feels the air. I think he sinks the air, you know? And and combines with this merely top focus. I mean, I remember once I was on this Chrigel on a photo shooting and we had no space for taking off, only two or three meter, and I was going a little bit backwards to pull up the wing and he told me, "Hey, I tried that a lot. You better stand just with the the line straight and then you pull the glider in." So he, he trains everything. He trained every possible situation in advance.
It's fantastic. I mean, he's so focused on what he likes to achieve and Yeah, I have to say that, I mean, he's such a great person. Personally, we just have had a newcomer challenge two weeks ago here in Grindelwald, and so good to work with him and how he
how he works with the young people, but yeah, really, I'm really happy to have him in this, in this team. What a treasure. Well,
He, he's he's one of these who, uh, I have always found is—that's why I asked about the culture of the Swiss, because he is incredibly giving of his knowledge. On the one hand, I think probably he probably wants to give all this knowledge because it's
he
wants more competition for himself, you know? He's gotten so elite, especially in the X-Ops, that you know, I—I want everybody to be better, but it's also just—he's very generous with his, uh, sharing. Yeah, yeah.
I don't know, maybe it's from the league, but maybe it's his person. I mean, he has very nice parents, and you know, his brother and Mikhail, he's so nice as well. So I don't know, but ask himself. I mean, I don't want to speak too much. No, it's—I've said this to him too. Yeah, I
mean in in in many ways, for for most pilots, he's an enigma, you know? That it's very rare to see someone who's
At that level, you know, he's a hero, but you can touch him. Exactly, that's the great thing. I mean, if I hear him speaking to a debutant, beginner, he speaks to the beginner in the same way, a little bit like he speaks to with his friends as Morgan, Tall, and everybody. Sure, yeah, he's just a great person, and yeah, happy to have him on the team. Yeah, I bet, I bet.
Martin, thank you very much. I again, I really appreciate your time. It was nice to hear some of your stories. Uh, good luck with the the Swiss team, good luck with the comp. We've got some challenging weather here.
Yeah, good luck with the weather. Now I've made the to make the decision, uh, for tomorrow
Well, I wish you luck with that. We'll all have fun regardless, but thank you, sir. Thank you, if
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