The world’s oldest and most prestigious balloon race, the Gordon Bennett Cup, has begun in Toruń, the first time the competition has been hosted by Poland for 85 years. The contest is currently being led by a Polish team, with the final result due by the weekend.
Starting on Friday, 15 teams from six countries participating in the 64th edition of the cup began setting off in staggered launches from Toruń airport across the weekend.
Sobotni wieczór na toruńskim lotnisku👀
Uczestnicy 64. Pucharu Gordona Bennetta są w powietrzu od ponad 12 godzin. Ich zmagania możecie śledzić na bieżąco za pośrednictwem aplikacji w telefonie YB Races lub klikając w link
👉https://t.co/wU4pVfspB2fot. Wojtek Szabelski pic.twitter.com/57aN7xoasj
— Mój Toruń (@torunpl) August 22, 2021
During the competition, teams aim to fly the furthest in a straight line from their launch site in whichever direction they want. Participating teams may fly across the air space of all European countries except Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Malta and Iceland, and are not allowed to land on water.
Pairs of pilots can be airborne for three days and nights, guided by ground teams monitoring strategy and weather. The aviators use gas balloons, which are filled with a lighter-than-air gas, rather than hot-air balloons, which contain heated air.
The winner of the contest will be receive their prize on Friday or Saturday, depending on how the competition plays out. The team currently in the lead are Polish pair Krzysztof Zapart and Adam Ginalski, who have travelled over 800 kilometres and are above southern Germany at the time of writing.
The progress of the race can be followed here.
Poland is hosting the race due to winning the 2018 edition, when Mateusz Rękas and Jacek Bogdański flew 1,145 kilometres to take first place. The event was due to take place in Wrocław last year, but was postponed because of the pandemic and moved to Toruń.
The event traces its history back to 1906, when the first race set off from Paris. It was sponsored by James Gordon Bennett Jr., an American millionaire sports enthusiast and publisher of the New York Herald newspaper.
Poland has won the competition six times: in 1933, 1934, 1935, 1938, 1983 and 2018. However, while it hosted the event after the first three of those victories, the race in 1939 was cancelled due to the outbreak of the Second War and Poland was not allowed to host the event after its win in 1983 due to the introduction of martial law.
The 1995 edition of the cup ended in tragedy when American pair Alan Fraenckel and John Stuart-Jervis died after crossing the border from Poland to Belarus, where they were shot down a Belarusian military helicopter. In the 1923 race, five balloonists were killed by lightning.
Main image credit: Mój Toruń/Twitter
Maria Wilczek is deputy editor of Notes from Poland. She is a regular writer for The Times, The Economist and Al Jazeera English, and has also featured in Foreign Policy, Politico Europe, The Spectator and Gazeta Wyborcza.
