Tunnel Competitions with a New Face!

Unique events in Clymb, the world’s largest wind tunnel…

It’s not until you go to Clymb till you appreciate the sheer scale of this monster. You can read it’s the world’s tallest wind tunnel, at 104 feet, that it’s 32 ft diameter is almost double any other, and so the surface flying area is four times any other. Facts are facts but when first you see the flying chamber, I defy anyone’s jaw not to drop. It’s a massive playground like no other. It was only a matter of time before new competition events would be created to explore the possibilities this baby provides for flying.

I’ve returned blown away by the Emirates EASA International Parachuting Championships (EEIPC), held in Clymb Abu Dhabi. This was the third year EEIPC has been held, and each time, new events are added. EASA is the Eurasian Skydiving Association, established in 2023, with member countries in Asia, Eastern Europe and the Middle East.

Events

The policy of selecting events for EEIPC is to feature disciplines that are not officially listed in the register of the international skydiving organisations, so there is no competitive environment between them and EASA. Completely new innovative competition formats are being developed.

In Formation Skydiving, events were held in 16-way, 8-way – and 4-way with a difference, two teams battling head-to head in the tunnel at the same time!

This was the second year of ‘The Race’, after its debut at 2025’s EASA Championships, at Clymb. Competitors race round pylons at top speed in a competition to decide the fastest.

There was another brand new event this year, 8-way Sequential Freefly, featuring creative routines using every inch of the tunnel.

16-way Formation Skydiving

16-way skydiving is practised in many countries worldwide, that have access to a large enough aircraft. It used to be very popular in western Europe, but a reduction in aircraft sizes has now made it rare. The massive size of the Clymb tunnel changes all that. This is (currently) the only wind tunnel where it is possible to hold a 16-way competition. It’s just amazing to fly 16-way in the tunnel – with room to spare – and to be able to compete indoors in this discpline, at a world event. 16-way is not an ISA event.

The event used the US 16-way Dive Pool, with one different block (Macho – Nacho removed due to size). There were 3 entries, a Russian team, a US team from Paraclete, led by Kirk Verner and Jeana Billings, and an ‘American & friends’ team coached by Craig Girard and Doug Barron. The Russians were fast and furious and took gold with 146 points after 8 rounds, an average of 18.25. Craig’s team and XP flew to the best of their considerable collective ability to take silver and bronze respectively (averages of 13.3 and 8.9. Both teams had been training for a few days prior to the competition, which was a lot of fun in itself. Normally you only get about 30-40 seconds of flying time for 16-way outdoors, as it takes 15-20 seconds to put the 16-way together. That means the number of reps to train any block is limited. But in Clymb, you can fly for 2 minutes at a time, banging out the reps and muscle memory that lead to improvement.

16-way Results are here

It would be excellent to see more teams at future EASA 16-way competitions. How often can you guarantee to do 8 rounds of 16-way in a day? The social aspect of this discipline is high, with so many personalities to interact with. The variation of flying subgroups of 2, 4, 6 and 8 people makes for a lot of fun and unusual flying.

There was a healthy showing of 7 teams in 8-way, Paraclete had a veritable army of player-coach teams, all having a blast. Although some nations run Indoor Nationals in 8-way FS, it is not a recognised ISA event, so this competition offered a way for the world’s best teams to have a showdown.

It was an interesting battle for gold between the Russian National team, Tanay, and the US National team, XP8. The Russians romped out of the starting blocks, winning the first 3 rounds, in fast-and-furious style. XP8 had done 15 minutes’ training with the line-up there. Round 4 looked like a turning point, with XP8 really finding their groove with a beautiful jump, the Russians were a little glitchy and not so precise. XP8 finished strongly, winning the last 3 rounds of the meet.

However, the gap was too much to close and they finished 3 points behind Tanay, who won with 286 points, a 28.6 average! ‘UAE Kuzbass’ took bronze with a 21.5 average. Behind the big guns were four scratch teams, of which Craig Girard’s team cames out on top, with a cool 14.5 average.

8-way Results are here

I was soooo excited to watch this event. When I first saw the flying chamber at Clymb, I imagined exactly what I witnessed – two 4-way teams, in the tunnel at the same time, competing against each other. It’s hard to describe how much that adds to the excitement as a spectator – that you can clearly see which team is ahead and watch a battle take place in front of your eyes. Especially for jumps with block moves, watching to see which team would close the block first.

This was a test event. The goal is to bring it back next year, with cash prizes! The rules worked as follows: 4-way teams come to an agreement beforehand as to the wind speed. Two teams enter the tunnel and set up in their designated area of the flight chamber, about to have a head-to-head battle, resulting in a winner and a loser. They start the round, a sequence drawn exactly as normal, and fly their 35 seconds working time. The winner is the team scoring most points. This is usually evident but judges subsequently score the videos, to verify the score, or bust accordingly. All teams compete against every other team, then fly semi finals and finals, with the fastest teams together. The team winning the final battle takes gold.

There was no surprise at the winner, ‘Siberries’, the Russian national female 4-way team flew elegantly to a worthy gold.

There were two teams there from Paraclete, this tunnel/dropzone that showed up with a busload of high octane competitors, entering elite teams and player-coach teams in many variations. Paraclete 4 was a thrown-together team of female rock star jumpers who did all of 15 minutes’ training before the meet. They were in a friendly rivalry with ‘Paraclete 3 plus Carl’, with a similar amount of training. On the first round, PC3+C encroached on the XP4’s space, which raised the stakes of their contest, making the battle more personal (even more so than between husband and wife on opposing teams!) XP4 flew efficiently and quickly, and mostly outperfomed their rivals. But they lost a head-to-head with XP3+C, and ended up behind them in bronze.

Members of ‘Paraclete XP & Carl’ commented they felt bad taking silver, to XP4’s bronze, when XP4 outscored them by 11 points, See:

4-way Results here

XP4 were philosophical, embracing the exciting shape of this competition.

 “I honestly loved the format. It was so new and different, unlike anything a competitor will get anywhere else in the world. Any competition is already so nerve wracking, but the battle format put a whole other spin on it that really amped it up. Just the idea of knowing that you are in there with another team that is literally battling for the win, and the premise behind the lights changing from white to red to green to start the round. It honestly gave a whole other meaning to the word anticipation. One thing we talked about was that, usually as a team you start when you are ready, but with the battle you start when the light is green, ready or not.

“The battle format is also interesting. You can be killing it as a team, but you let up the gas for one round and you could get knocked out by another team that just had the edge on that particular sequence. It makes every single battle count, unlike some competitions where you can say “ah we could stop here and all the places are pretty much set”. It makes the whole competition exciting, from start to finish, there is never a round that doesn’t count. So, as much as I lamented that we technically lost to the boys’ team even though we got a higher score, I honestly like and respect the system. I wouldn’t want all comps to be like that, but to add the variety it is great.”

Laura Galdamez, XP4

Did Laura feel the competition could be improved for next year? She suggested the rules surrounding the cross of the halfway line – if a team invades the other team’s space and hits them, they lose the round – but this area is difficult to police or to assess when flying.

As a competitor when you are going as fast as possible, focused on your team and moving together, you don’t have time to be able to look down and find the halfway line to see if you are crossing it or the other team is. It makes the ‘if you cross halfway and hit the other team, you lose’ rule kind of a rule of luck. If you happened to guess right that they were on your side and let them hit you or did not get out of the way. [ It is also something that I could see being abused by teams just waiting for the right moment to take advantage of a stray leg or solo flyer. Maybe just a clearer center line to actually make it obvious when you are crossing it. 

Laura Galdamez, XP4

It’s exciting to think of the appeal of this event to the general public.

This was a new event this year, that had been created by Kim van der Horst, at a request from EEIPC in 2025. The organisers had been watching her Freefly Sequential Skills Camp held at Clymb, and saw the potential of vertical sequentials as a visually exciting format.

“It fit perfectly with my dream of connecting different sequential communities around the world. There are so many groups flying sequentials, each with their own unique style. The idea of bringing them all together in the 32-foot tunnel to fly, learn, and inspire each other just made total sense. The Clymb tunnel is made for this kind of flying. We want to use every dimension of the tunnel: dynamic, vertical, 3D, whatever we can come up with.”

Kim van der Horst

The structure was 5 free rounds, 3 compulsory rounds. Creative freedom was wide open. Teams combined classic sequential moves with dynamic flying, and invented new ones – flips, tricks and funky stuff. The four teams that entered the competition did the same amount of training, four hours, to prepare for event, including learning the compulsory moves, inventing and improving free routines. Although they were rivals, you could see teams supporting each other in training, and cheering when they saw a new move. (Which, they then tried to copy or better, this kept the creative juices flowing!)

For me, it was awe-inspiring to watch, and full of surprises. Eight people flying cross-over dynamic flying in changing orientations reminded me of Cirque de Soleil performances. The choreography was tight, and needed immense trust and teamwork. The flyers used the whole of this massive tunnel in a spectacular aerial ballet. I congratulate all the teams for their routines, it amazed me what these elite flyers came up with.

Ultimately, performance in the compulsories decided the competition, with the top three teams finishing within one point of each other. USA took a well deserved gold, with UAE in silver and Europe taking bronze.

The ethos that teams train for the same amount of time before the event, is an interesting facet, providing a level playing field, and an easily accessible event, with no big time and money commitment.

And the future of this discipline? We are delighted to say, VS8 will be back next year. The organizers hope to see more talented flyers come together in Abu Dhabi for a week of creative magic.

For a more in depth look at the VS 8 competition, check out Kim van der Horst’s article, here

The Air Championships was split into 3 sections, Pursuit, Relay and – the ultimate battle – The Race!

Pursuit

Pursuit was on the first competition day. It is head-to-head racing, with two racers flying two tracks in the tunnel at the same time, towards one finish line. Precision and speed decided each result and the battles became more and more thrilling, watching the raw full-on speed and competitiveness.

In the end Sebastian Garcia from Mexico won, with James Rogers (US) in second and Landon Karaberis (US) in third.

The second race day was for relays – teamwork meeting adrenaline. Every takeoff, every landing, and every move mattered, as one mistake could wipe out the whole team. The winning team was the Fanatics – James Rogers and Landon Karaberis, who’ve won pretty well every competition of every type they’ve entered for the last year. In second were lver, Sebastian and Ricardo Garcia for Mexico; gold, James Rogers and Landon Karaberis for USA; bronze, Evelina Kalugina and Andrey Karabeshkin in third for Russia.

The third and final race day was for ‘the ultimate test of skill and survival’. Five racers in the tunnel at once, all chasing glory. With referees, penalties, eliminations, and knockout rounds, it was pure aerial chaos — and only one could emerge champion. You could feel the tension amp up for this human race like no other. Even though competitors were sporting and supportive outside the tunnel, once in the chamber they were flying full-on, no-holds barred to win. In a similar result to the individual pursuit, Sebastian Garcia from Mexico won, with Landon Karaberis (US) in second and Evelina Kalugina from Russia in third.

The race events had a money prize pool, provided by RAI (Philipp Stankovich), it is hoped to add prize money in other events in future.

Air Championships Scores are here:

Watch the thrills and spills on the live streams here:

Future

Each year EEIPC has expanded, adding new events. We asked Vadim Niiazov, the Meet Director, about plans for the 2027 EEIPC. The opening ceremony included a beautiful demonstration of a planned new discipline, showcasing 2-way couples ‘dancing’ in the air. The appeal to the general public was immediately obvious when watching the beautifully crafted, elegant routine. Vadim confirmed this exciting event would be going ahead:

“We are still working on the naming of it in English. In Russian it sounds like dancing couples. We already included the event in the Russian indoor skydiving championships for the 2025 and 2024 competitions, and we had 9 couples. That was the final part of the competition, the live audience and online viewers were excited and we had great feedback. The rules are still under construction, but the event is based on principle that the couple has to show the audience some sort of story by dancing in the wind tunnel, like in figure skating.”

Vadim Niiazov

When asked about other plans, Vadim revealed:

“We would like to have a two-week competition, the first week will be indoor and the second outdoor. We hope that 16 way will be held outdoor and indoor, and we also think about adding more outdoor events, perhaps XRV, accuracy, and para-ski (with the ski part in Emirates mall). We want to invite more judges from Europe, to make as international judging crew as possible. We are trying to find funding for a 4 way battle prize pool. And next year we also want to produce live stream for every event in EEIPC 2027.

Vadim Niiazov

Increasing the scope of the live stream would be brilliant, this year it was limited to the AIR Championships. It would also be excellent to broadcast the live stream in the area around the tunnel, to help the crowd and competitors understand in more depth the dramas unfolding as the meet progresses.

Summary

There is something at this event for everyone. It’s an international, high-level, inspirational competition that anyone can enter. The meet is run with the level of pomp and ceremony of World Championships, and the friendliness of Nationals. After the competition there was an impressive prize giving ceremony at Ferrari World, followed by a supremely swish banquet and after-party, at a nearby hotel, a wonderful and fitting end to this event. January is a perfect time to visit UAE, with temperatures 20-22°C.

It’s not just the competition, it’s the training and interaction with other flyers beforehand. EEIPC is on the sharp edge of our sport, creating and developing new events and providing a meeting place for the movers and shakers. The meet, and the Clymb wind tunnel are extremely well organised. I’m excited to see how EEIPC will continue to shape the future of tunnel competitions, the audience appeal of the events is immense.

Hope to see you there next year!

To enquire about EEIPC 2027, email EurasianSkydiving or see the contact page of the EASA website here

All Photos courtesy of Ivor Boltivets / EASA