Gordon Bennett Memorial

Competition Ballooning – Gordon Bennett Memorial

The rule (or information) for this task is set out in Chapter 15 of the Event Rules

The Gordon Bennett task was named in recognition of James Gordon Bennett Jr. (1841-1918), publisher of the New York Herald and sponsor of the Gordon Bennett Cup, the world’s oldest gas balloon race. This task is similar to the Maximum Distance where the competitor has to achieve a mark or valid track point within a scoring area but, in this case, not at a maximum distance from the common launch point but closest to a set goal usually a target placed just outside (by 30-50 metres) the far edge of a scoring area. This is yet another task with the challenge or frustrations of limited scoring areas with markers just out receiving a no result. Competitors can even make it worse for themselves. I remember at the 1981 World Championships, Tom Sheppard, the competition director, stating when setting this task that despite him announcing that some pilot will throw their marker at the target outside the scoring area achieving a no result somebody will do it. I did not believe him but, lo and behold, John Coleman seeing a target in his flight path for the first time got carried away and threw his marker dead centre. However, he was quite pleased as he had never thrown a marker on a target before. Target ‘fixation’ has other consequences as well. On more than one occasion a pilot has concentrated so much on their final approach into the target that they do not realise how the seconds have passed since the last burn and find themselves ploughing into the ground just before or after the target to earn a hefty penalty of 500 points if your contact is within 200 metres of the cross. I remember hearing the crew person of one pilot warning him over the radio as he descended into the target “Don’t smack the ground!”.

Figure 1: Mike Howard coming in for thr drop at the British Nationals 2012; the scoring area edge was the far side of the concrete path. Note the marker on the arm of the cross but outisde the scoring area.

Figure 2: Heavy ground contact on the approach to drop at the same target

Written by David Bareford