Hans-Werner Grosse

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Hans-Werner Grosse, born 28 November 1922 in Swinemünde, is a German glider pilot who has established 46 world records approved by FAI.^[1]

His free distance world record of 1,460.80 km from his home city of Lübeck (Germany) to Biarritz (France) was set on 25 April 1972 in an ASW 12. After starting in Lübeck and eleven and a half hours in flight, he landed in Biarritz in southwestern France. He held this record for more than 30 years. It was not broken until 9 January 2003 (by Klaus Ohlmann in Argentina).^[2]

This record was far from his only success. He has held a further 46 gliding world records. Among his other world records were: the largest triangular distance (1,306 km in 1981), the fastest speed round a 1,250 km triangle (133 km/h in 1980) and the fastest speed round a 300 km triangle (158 km/h also in 1980). These record flights started from Alice Springs, Australia. He came in second in the World Gliding Championships in 1970.

For his 75^th birthday, Hans-Werner Grosse was named an honorary member of the German National Gliding Team of the FAI League due to his outstanding performance in the sport of gliding. He was presented this certificate, which is unique up to this time, by the President of the International Gliding Commission (IGC) and Director of the World Gliding Championships 1999 in Bayreuth, Professor Peter Ryder, at the birthday celebration on 29 November 1997. Hans-Werner Grosse is also an honorary member of the Deutsche Clubs e.V. and the chief initiator of the eta project. He himself owns the first model of this glider, which has the best performance of any to date.

His commitment to gliding is also shown by the establishment of the project, "Jugendfördernde Maßnahmen Ost" (Measures to Support Youth East). In this project, Hans-Werner Grosse makes his high-performance ASH 25 glider available to young glider pilots in organisations in eastern Germany for the purpose of making it possible for the new generation of glider pilots to fly with modern equipment which would not usually be available to them.

Since his 35-year record from 1972 has not yet been broken in Europe, Hans-Werner Grosse has offered a prize for the pilot that manages to do it on European soil.