Cedar Wright Instagram – King for a Day, by @cedarwright
People compare Paragliding to chess in the sky. I think this analogy is faulty. I once heard, “Paragliding is like playing chess with dice that are a round.” Closer to the truth? I think chasing XC records is a little bit like fishing. You cast your line and hope you catch a big one. Really, Paragliding is closer to poker than chess… a game of skill and chance.
This winter in Roldanillo I played my cards and launched my line into some absolutely epic weather. I arrived with the pie in the sky goal of breaking the FAI record for what is probably the most popular winter paragliding destination in the world. Success was unlikely, but I’ve been working on my delusional self-belief.
On the 25th of January I realized an unlikely dream and put myself and the USA flag at the top of the Roldanillo x-contest score! I pushed, I believed, and I closed a 219 Km magical mystery tour of the Valle de Cauca. Elated and exhausted, I rested. My glory was short-lived. The next day Bogdan Bialka took his record back pushing it to 230! And… the next day Kevin Phillip took to the sky with a vengeance setting a new record of 236 km…legend. The Roldanillo FAI record was beaten 3 days in a row! I spent the next two weeks in an absurd version of paragliding Groundhog Day trying to reclaim the record. On three separate occasions, the dream was within grasp but shut down by the unpredictable Pacifico winds and a pace that just wasn’t fast enough. It’s fair to say that this was a historic season for Paragliding in Roldanillo.
Of the top 50 scored flights on x-contest, 46 of them were from this year! It’s more the journey than the destination, and I’m grateful for the motivation that being a record chasing psychopath gave me. Epic scenery, wild low saves, thousands of kms, and almost 200 hours of full-bar obsession on my Enzo and Sub. While the Rolda. FAI record is more elusive than ever, I’m grateful that I got to be king for a day, and learned a ton about paragliding and the power of delusional self-belief…. which is why I’ll be taking the record back next year.
#flyozone | Posted on 02/Mar/2024 01:56:23
