by : Roland Hilfiker

The 25th FAI World Parachuting Championship was held at the Sun Arena near Toba in the Ise-Shima prefecture, Japan, from October 6 to October 16, 2000. The championship covers the two classical events in parachuting: Freefall Style and Accuracy Landing.300 athletes from 28 countries had entered the competitions in the men's and the women's divisions. Freefall Style puts the freefall skills of the athletes to a test. They have to perform a series of maneuvers against the clock.

A typical "style series" is made up by combinations of four 360° turns and two back loops. The current world record in performing such a series is held by Frank Bernachot (FRA): 5.40 seconds to turn 360° to the left, 360° to the right, to execute a back loop, turn 360° left, 360° right, and execute the final back loop.

Franck Bernachot (38 years, from Gap, 8500 jumps) was again a finalist at the 2000 World Parachuting Championships. After the last jump in the men's freefall style event, it was Franck's main opponent, the German Marco Pflüger (31, Granschütz, 5800 jumps), who proved to be the most consistent. In five jumps he recorded a total of 30.39 seconds. Marco was proclaimed World Champion for the first time ever. Franck Bernachot was second with 30.95 seconds, Jacques Baal (FRA) was third with 31.02.

Marco Pflüger Photo by Srecko Medven

The Accuracy Landing event was governed by new rules, which called for the jumpers to face off in a one-against-one match system during the final rounds. On an Accuracy Landing jump the athletes leave the A/C and deploy their parachutes almost immediately, they then steer it to a precision landing on a mat, where they need to strike the center with a 3 cm diameter. An automatic measuring device reads out their scores.

Men's accuracy was dominated by a strong Slovenian squad: Salkic Senad (SLO, 35, Radovijca, 7500 jumps) and Borut Erjavec (SLO, 33, Bled, 7000 jumps) came in second and first with an identical total score of 1 cm after 7 jumps, landing dead center on 6 jumps.

Marco Pflüger was 6th in Accuracy Landing and proclaimed World Overall Parachuting Champion.

The title in women's accuracy went to Monika Filipowska (POL, 27, Nowy Targ, 3300 jumps) with 3 cm in 9 jumps, second was the Chinese Ning Wei (23, Beijing, 3000 jumps) with 7 cm, and third Irena Avbelj (SLO, 34, Ljubljana, 5800 jumps), also with 7 cm. Irena won the overall title (Style and Accuracy combined).