Before passing to the subject of the paper may I ask your indulgence for my limited knowledge of English, which prevents my giving a free discourse, and constrains me to a set lecture. This I view with regret since it makes it difficult to impart to my words the lively and vivid feeling which a more formal picture of the importance and attractiveness of gliding flight may not give.

We are looking back on ten years of development and on an unbroken series of ten gliding competitions held at the Wasserkuppe in the Rhön, since 1920.