The Gordon Bennett: World’s Oldest Air Race

September 27, 2010 — It’s touted as the oldest and most prestigious aeronautical race in the world. It’s also one of the world’s slowest. Nearly two days into the 54th Coupe Aéronautique Gordon Bennett, only six hydrogen-filled balloons remained flying out of the 20 that departed Bristol, England, on Saturday. Swiss team Kurt Frieden and Pascal Witpraechtiger were in the lead Monday, having flown more than 1,106 miles and heading toward Bosnia Herzegovina. A team from France, two from Germany, one from Great Britain and one from the United States were behind them, including the 2008 race winner David Hempleman-Adams. “We're out to sea over the Med now,” wrote Hempleman-Adams in his blog on Sunday. “That means we'll be flying over water all night. I'm scared of water but that's it, we're flying. I've heard that 14 balloons have landed leaving just six in the race. We're now the only British team. I hope everyone else had good flights and I look forward to seeing all the competitors at the Survivors Dinner on Saturday. It's not just about winning. We are now feeling the weight of being the only British team left but we're really up for the challenge. It's going to be a long, cold night.” Balloons from Finland, Japan and Switzerland were the first to land during the 2010 competition. The Swiss balloon came down in the Pyrenees and the other two landed on the west coast of France, just south of Bordeaux. The race ended Sunday for some other balloonists because of air space restrictions, the Bristol News reported. Some of the gas balloons were forced to land, as they are not allowed to fly over Italy after nightfall. The winner of the Gordon Bennett race, named after the founder and publisher of the New York Herald who began the race, is the balloon that lands the furthest away from Bristol. The essential difference between the Gordon Bennett competition and any other aeronautics competition is that the competitors of the Coupe Gordon Bennett never know where they are going to land or how long they are going to stay up in the air. The longest flight had remained for a long time at 73 hours (achieved in 1908) until Wilhelm Eimers and Bernd Landsmann in 1995 kept their balloon aloft for 92 hours. The inaugural Gordon Bennett race took place in Paris in 1906 and the race has been held 54 times in 104 years. Click here to track the remaining balloonists.

Onlookers watched as competitors took off for the 54th Coupe Aeronautique Gordon Bennett balloon race. Twenty teams took off Saturday, but only six teams were still flying two days later. Photo credit: BBC The 2010 race began in Bristol. The race always starts in the country of the winner of the year before. Photo credit: BBC

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