May, 2004

Pilot Interview-Claudio Mota

Our flying community is comprised of interesting and colorful pilots. In an effort to better acquaint ourselves with these various personalities, each Cloudstreet issue will look "under the helmet" and glimpse into a pilot's pursuit of flight which bonds us all together.

His first visual contact with paragliding was in 1991 at a music concert. Like many other pilots around the world, he immediately fell in love with the sport. Realizing a life-long dream, Claudio bought his first Paraglider in preparation for his first course. He tried the harness on and opened the glider numerous times in anticipation of beginning to fly. He began taking flying lessons in January of 1992 and became a Certified Flight and Tandem Instructor in less than 3 years, which enabled him to begin working for one of the first and most reputable paragliding school in Venezuela (YCC Paragliding School).

Claudio is certified by the Hang glider and Paraglider Association of Canada (HPAC) as both an Instructor and a Tandem pilot. He is also certified by the Venezuelan Association of Free Flight as an Advanced Instructor and Advanced Tandem Pilot with over 3500 hours of air time, over 1,950 tandem instructional flights logged and more than 350 students. He also enjoys an immaculate safety record - his number one emphasis is on safety and cautious decision-making. Because of his conservative approach, he has avoided any serious injuries to either himself, his tandem passengers, or his students, and has never had to deploy his reserve parachute unplanned during his 11-year paragliding career.

Good things came out of all that enthusiasm. He won the Venezuelan Nationals in 1995-Advanced category in his first attempt and was in the top five the following years. He broke an altitude record in Baie St. Paul, Quebec, in 1995 reaching an altitude of 6,500 feet. Combining his love of flying and marketing studies, his university thesis "Aerial Advertising" led the way to 3 years of aerial advertising with a Paramotor for Pepsi.

During his first year in Canada, he started the first paragliding school on Vancouver Island, won the “Chris Muller Cross Country Challenge”, won the “Top Pilot BC 2001”, won the "Hang Glider Rookie of the year" and finished 3rd in the "Lumby Cup". He was ranked number four in all of Canada.

Claudio's instructional background includes many years as a Karate teacher and a Karate coach for the Venezuelan team in 1989-1990 as well as a personal trainer. He has dedicating his life to sports. He may have inherited the teaching attitude from his father who has been a Navy mathematical and physics teacher for the last 40 years in Venezuela. He brings dedication, a passive personality, many years of experience, backed up by continuous practice. He continually aspires to keep ahead of current knowledge and technology in the field of paragliding.

Claudio continues to be actively involved in all aspects of paragliding, as a competition pilot, instructor, working hard regulating paragliding activity, searching for new sites around Vancouver Island and improving the ones that we already have. As a member of the Vancouver Island Hang glider and Paraglider Club his focus is to continue to improve paragliding in this area and to make paragliding friendly to everyone.

Cloudstreet - How did you get into Paragliding? When and where did you start flying?
Claudio - The first time that I saw somebody flying a paraglider was in the summer of 1991 when I was at a music concert in the local airport in Caracas. They had different activities to entertain the people like helicopters, F-16, skydivers, trikes, hang glider and paragliders. We were in the middle of the concert when they announced that some pilots were going to fly from the mountains so we got pretty excited with the idea to see them flying and we left the concert, drove for half hour and when we got to the launch site the last guy was just taking off in a paraglider. Seeing that was the beginning of a 3-month investigation trying to find somebody to teach me.

At that time just 2 schools were teaching and not many people knew about paragliding. I found a paraglider for sale in the newspaper, called the guy and bought it the same day. Of course the paraglider was a school glider, way too small for me and I had no money left so I couldn't start the course at that time. Two months later I had enough money but the course was full (they were teaching 12 people at the same time) so I found out that another instructor was teaching in Merida (10 hours by car from Caracas) so I took a week off, invited my mom for a holiday and we went to Merida. Of course we got there 2 days late, the course had already started… Then it was Christmas so no courses, but I signed up to start in January 1992 in Caracas Venezuela.

Why did you decide to move to Vancouver Island from Venezuela?
Claudio - I was living in Venezuela with my wife, but she is originally from Quebec. She was doing a master's degree in Caracas in international law. After she finished her course, there weren't many opportunities to work as a lawyer in Venezuela and she wanted to come back to Canada.

I had no intentions to move to Quebec because I was planning to live in a place where I can fly, big mountains and good weather. She suggested Vancouver as a first option and we ended it up in Victoria so she can finish her law degree. Like always, females inspire most of our decisions but I am glad that we came first to Vancouver Island. I really like it here and I hope that I can stay here forever, the flying is pretty good but the people are excellent.

What is your most memorable flight?
Claudio - Through 12 years of experiences there are many good moments and unforgettable flights but at this time there is no doubt in my mind that my best flight ever was from the Angel Falls. I don't think that I have ever felt that good and not just because it was my longest XC or because I stayed up such a long time. This place means a lot to me, it was a huge undertaking to organize the trip and if one thing wouldn't have worked out, the whole trip would have been canceled. I had one chance to take the shot and I got it.

What is your favorite site to fly on the Island?
Claudio - My favorite place is Dallas road. That is just a small cliff of 20 meters high in front of the ocean. From the spring to the fall there are many afternoons that you can come back after a mountain flight and spend easy another 3 hour ridge soaring this cliff on a sunny day very close to the people. There are many other air sports at this place but when you are flying, people look at you like they can't believe that you can hang in the air in such a different way. Is a great place to interact with people and let then now about our sport that's the reason I moved 5 minutes away from there. This island also has great potential for XC. Last year we started to fly the Beauforts and with very consistent thermals of 6 m/s and going up 1000 meters above launch. Don't be surprised when you hear about some pilots flying great distances from there.

What else do you enjoy other than flying?
Claudio - My life is flying. However, when I am not in the air, I like outdoor activities, going to the gym and I am still passionate about martial arts. I enjoy a simple meal besides the river, laughing and having a good time with friends. Snow boarding and flying radio control airplanes have become two of my favourite hobbies.

You recently participated in the film "Endless Thermal". Which part of that trip did you enjoy the most?
Claudio - The question should be "which part of the trip didn't you enjoy"? The truth is that it was my first time visiting those countries and basically we were going to the most beautiful places on earth for flying. I really enjoyed that trip and the experience to be able to do it with good friends was priceless.

I said earlier that my favorite place to fly is Angel Falls, not only because I was dreaming about the idea for 11 years but also all the things surrounding the flight . Going to Venezuela, being able to visit my family and friends, a private airplane flight straight to the base camp, one and a half hours of helicopter ride exploring the water falls looking for the take off, landing and the best shots for filming. Then next day I was able to spend all my day on top of the Angel Falls with the most beautiful view, the energy of the place and being one of the 5 paraglider pilots ever to fly from that place, makes me feel like that was the best thing that happened in my life.

Which do you prefer: acro or XC? Mountain or flat-land flying?
Claudio - I definitely prefer XC and mountain flights. After we finished this movie and seeing so much acro from the best pilots in the world my view about the acro has changed. I always believed that acro in paragliding wasn't more that a bunch of crazy guys risking their lives. Big mistake, all these pilots were so good, precise and technical, that I think that you require even more concentration to do these manouvres than you do being a XC pilot. Acro is growing pretty fast in popularity and I would like to learn some of those tricks…

I have almost no experience in flat-land flying. I grew up as a pilot in Venezuela and we have so many mountains that just a few pilots were trying to develop a towing system to fly on the flat-land. Like anything at the beginning it is pretty difficult and when those guys were learning how to tow, there were many accidents and I just tried to stay away from that idea.

What is the scariest flying experience you have had?
Claudio - I will never forget that one. In my second year of flying I went to Merida-Venezuela to a place called "Tierra Negra". The local pilots are used to the conditions so they take off with strong wind and even with zero visibility, any pilot who has been there before knows what I'm talking about.

Anyway, I decided to try to take off in these conditions and without a compass. You can probably imagine what happened, I pulled big ears as soon as I took off and I went straight up completely disoriented. After 10 minutes in the cloud with no other options than wait because I was ready to hit the mountain any moment, I finally was starting to see some light. I came out of the cloud in the middle of a valley with no exit. Big mountains around and a very small road, did I mentioned the time? Well it was 6:15 pm and it was going to be dark in 15 minutes.
By this time I was trying to decide on which side of the mountain I wanted to land but I didn't know were I was, but the wind direction it was pretty obvious, it was blowing down and my sink alarm had been on for 5 minutes. I was aiming for the road but it wasn't big enough so I landed on the cliff. Rolling and tumbling, etc. until I stopped, I briefly checked to see if I had broken anything, then trying to use my radio I discovered that the battery was missing after my soft landing. After looking around for a few moments I found it just as it became pitch black. Calling my friends on the radio for I while with no answer…

Should I go up this road? Or should I go down? 50-50 chance of get it right, so I decided to go up. A bit tired and looking around for a sign, finally noticed some cars driving by the mountain far on the horizon to the oppositive side from where I was walking. I decided to turn around and now go down hill, crossing the river and half way up the hill when I saw 2 other cars driving down the road from where I had just come from before. At that point, desperate, I stared to yell, the cars stopped for a moment then kept driving a bit more, stopped again like looking for somebody. So guess what, I was walking as fast as I could down hill again, crossing the river and up to the same place than before, trying to let them know that I was here.
When I finally got to the cars, four locals were looking at me like they didn't understand what was going on. Now I was really lucky, these guys where going to the same place that I was trying to go so they gave me ride. As we were driving across the river they were telling me how lucky I was that I didn't get any snakebites!!! Because the snakes come out at night to drink water from the river….

By that time it was 11:00 pm and I was starting to hear my friends, a rescue team, etc. on the radio. Half an hour later we got back together and they had a good excuse to drink beer the rest of the night.

What is your philosophy behind instruction and flying in general?
Claudio - It is pretty simple, BALANCE. Since I moved to Canada I'm trying to keep my life simple and make enough money to enjoy my freedom. The more money you have, the more you spend and probably more, then you have to work more, and don't have enough time to play.

Teaching and flying tandem is a big part of my "balance" and that is what helps me make safe decisions when I'm pushing it too much. If I were to fly by myself all the time I would probably take more chances and do acro. The instructor part of me is the one that keep me grounded.

Be UN ATTACHED. Some of us live their lives like they will be here forever and forget to be happy. I had to let go so many times in my life and it's been always for something better.

As an instructor we have to give the students the best basic tools so they can take off on their own when the moment arrives. We can't keep them forever under our wings. Just watch them and keep helping to improve their skill. A simple comment could change many things. As a pilot I felt many times attach to my old equipment, either because I didn't have enough money to buy another one or because my glider was still fine. Well, many things change when you change your equipment. Flying a new glider gives you more performance but is not just that, also more confidence in yourself, helps you being safer, gets you excited again to go flying and you will see yourself improving and trying new things.

What goals do you have for the future?
Claudio - After this big experience working on the movie "Never Ending Thermal" and having had the chance to travel that extensively for the first time, it turned on a switch me and that's what I want to do now on. Working hard during the summer and traveling to a different country every winter.

When I went to the university and had my own swimsuit factory in Venezuela I never thought that many years later I would be making my living from paragliding.
I want to make my passion for paragliding grow in people who still don't know about paragliding and let them know what are they missing.