Gordon Bennett Cup (ballooning)

Coupe Aéronautique Gordon Bennett
A silver statue of a gas balloon
SportGas ballooning
English nameGordon Bennett Cup
History
First awardSeptember 30, 1906
Editions62
First winnerFrank Purdy Lahm
Most winsVincent Leys (nine)
Most recentChristian Wagner, Stefanie Liller (2024)

The Gordon Bennett Cup (or Coupe Aéronautique Gordon Bennett) is the world's oldest gas balloon race, and is "regarded as the premier event of world balloon racing" according to the Los Angeles Times.[1][2] Referred to as the "Blue Ribbon" of aeronautics, the first race started from Paris, France, on September 30, 1906.[3] The event was sponsored by James Gordon Bennett Jr., the millionaire sportsman and owner of the New York Herald newspaper.[4] According to the organizers, the aim of the contest "is simple: to fly the furthest distance from the launch site."[4] The contest ran from 1906 to 1938, interrupted from 1914 to 1919 by World War I and in 1931, but was suspended in 1939 when the hosts, Poland, were invaded at the start of World War II. The event was not resurrected until 1979, when American Tom Heinsheimer, an atmospheric physicist, gained permission from the holders to host the trophy.[5] The competition was not officially reinstated by the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (FAI) until 1983.[6]

The record time for the winner of the event is held by Germans Wilhelm Eimers and Bernd Landsmann who remained airborne for over 92 hours in the 1995 race,[7] taking off from Switzerland and landing four days later in Latvia. The distance record is held by the Belgian duo of Bob Berben and Benoît Siméons who, in 2005, piloted their balloon 3,400 kilometers (2,100 mi) from Albuquerque, New Mexico, United States, to Squatec, Quebec, Canada.[7] The most successful pilots are French Vincent Leys who won the trophy nine times between 1997 and 2017 (six times as the main pilot, three times as the co-pilot) and Austrian Josef Starkbaum [de] (won seven times as the main pilot). American teams have won on the most occasions, with twelve victories.

The 2010 competition started in the United Kingdom, with the balloons departing from Bristol on September 25. The race was marred by the loss of the American team during a storm over the Adriatic Sea on October 1.[8] The balloon was missing until December 6, when a fishing vessel found the cabin containing the pilots' bodies off the coast of Italy.[9] The 2013 event, departing from France and landing in Portugal, was again won by the French in F-PPGB.[10]

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference nyt was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ Cite error: The named reference latimes was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ "Aero Club of the United Kingdom — Official notices to members — Gordon-Bennett Aeronautical Race, 1909". Flight Global. January 30, 1909. p. 69. Archived from the original on November 2, 2012. Retrieved September 27, 2010.
  4. ^ a b "The Coupe Aéronautique Gordon Bennett". Fédération Aéronautique Internationale. Archived from the original on October 9, 2010. Retrieved September 27, 2010.
  5. ^ Jares, Joe (June 11, 1979). "A Bunch Of Basket Cases". Sports Illustrated. Time Inc. Archived from the original on November 3, 2012. Retrieved October 5, 2010.
  6. ^ "CIA Policy Manual". Fédération Aéronautique Internationale. June 1997. p. C6/6. Archived from the original (doc) on August 9, 2011. Retrieved October 5, 2010. The First Official Gordon Bennett Cup race since 1938 will take place on 26 June 1983, from Place de la Concorde in Paris, the same spot where the first race started on September 30th 1906.
  7. ^ a b "Winning pilots and co-pilots (alphabetic list)". Fédération Aéronautique Internationale. Archived from the original (xls) on October 8, 2010. Retrieved September 27, 2010.
  8. ^ "Italian coastguards call off search for US balloonists". BBC News. October 4, 2010. Archived from the original on October 5, 2010. Retrieved October 4, 2010.
  9. ^ "Bodies of missing US balloonists found off Italy". BBC News. December 6, 2010. Archived from the original on July 4, 2017. Retrieved December 6, 2010.
  10. ^ Cite error: The named reference 2013results was invoked but never defined (see the help page).