Alphen aan den Rijn   Wednesday September 28 2011   ritzdeluy@hotmail.com

Pictures courtesy; Bert Kuijper at Terlet 2011

The State comps in Queensland  in Warwick,  South from Toowoomba, started with a good day for Bruce Taylor, gaining the first 1000 points.But also the 2d day was  his , so 2000 points in the pocket. He flew his JS1 with a speed of 125 km. over 334 km. distance. He topped after 2 days the 18 m. class and combined 18m/open class.
On day 3 NO surprises Bruce won again! It is not that there are no other good pilots, specially in the combination with open class which Bruce tops as well, are several WGC -level-pilots, he is just good and I look forward to see how he is flying with that speed-weather in Uvalde during the WGC.
Day 4 was cancelled! Showers!!! And…showers are predicted for tomorrow as well. And…the temperature drops from 26  to 19 .

Good to see my “mate ” Gerrit [Kurstjens] is back after a period of loosing interest in competition soaring and….by being too busy with his farms! In the past I was his TC during several comps . Gerrit moved years ago from Holland to Toowoomba and is married to Pam another top pilot.
I believe that our “move down under ” in 1996 , inspired Gerrit , but also Francesco and Grietje who run Australian-Soaring-Corowa now . After packing the containers in Holland, last weekend, they moved  back to Corowa for an hopefully awesome 2011/2012 season.
Gerrit was 3d after 2 days but got no scores for day 3 , have to check on that, so dropped at this stage to 7. His wife Pam is after 3 days on spot 4. Good on her!

Finally the Dreamliner arrived in Japan. All Nippon Airways waited an extra 3 years but now they can fly this “green”machine! Due to strikes and problems, lot’s of problems, Boeing was 3 years behind schedule! Good luck for some of my Japanese friends who fly for All Nippon and maybe now on this “cool” plane. Looks beautiful and in the future we can see them everywhere as Boeing sold 800 of them.

Not long and ” Segelfliegen Magazine ” will be international and…online.  As said before , the German version is digital now ,but also still printed and from October 1 onwards the VERY FIRST International digital version will be a fact  ,look at ; www.segelfliegen-magazine.de
The ad about the English version of the most read German magazine will appear soon, so be stand- by if you are interested.
The magazine is published every 2 months.

Last I told you how good the season started in Australia, now I can add that South Africa is doing well too  in this early spring-period. Oscar [Goudriaan] flew from Potchefstroom 428 km. in JS1 with 107 km/h speed on the clock. In fact the East of Australia and the region of Potchefstroom have soarable conditions through the year. Not for big tasks , but you can enjoy your glider and the elements of weather.
The European Alps are still giving joy to pilots and some of my Finnish friends moved to Spain for a camp at Santa Cilia Jaca and fly there up to 400 km. tasks in an Arcus and Duo Discus.

Found some interesting news at our soaring site www.zweefportaal.nl. For those who are interested in the 2011 Green Flight Challenge hosted by NASA at the Moffett field [ named after Rear Admiral William A.  Moffett in 1933] and sponsored by Google, where planes as Pipistrelli , e-genius and Tauris G4 are going to “fight ” for a prize of 1 million dollar, here are 2 links I found on this site.
www.cafefoundation.org
www.blog.cafefoundation.org

See you next Sunday. Going to enjoy a late -summer -period with up to 25 dgr.Enjoy the pictures by Bert Kuijper from the NK 2011 at Terlet Holland.Ritz

Alphen aan den Rijn    Sunday September 25 2011   ritzdeluy@hotmail.com

From several places in Europe  gliders are now on their way to either Africa or Australia. From Hamburg 4 containers packed in Mengen in Germany are now on their way to Bitterwasser in Namibia. Another 2 containers from Illingen will follow soon. It looks like a busy year in Bitterwasser! Good on them! After a bad summer more pilots need good conditions for soaring to be happy and Namibia is one of the best places to go to.
Other containers , I know of, have left for Gariep Dam, Corowa and Stonefield.
Talking about a bad summer, today it is 24 dgr. here!!!And what’s more…. it will be like this for the next week. Let’s wait and see!!!

Ever heard of the Bunyan Wavecamp in NSW ? I had not and I lived for 11 years in Australia and spend a total of 23 winters over there.
Time to give you their latest news by Stuart Ferguson send via Jo: THANKS!
—-” Todate [as on Thursday September 22] we have flown every day with only Tuesday seeing 10 or so gliders returning about midday before a line of rain and snow passed over the airfield.
Wednesday has been our best day yet with some pilots climbing to around FL200 in blue conditions up over the main range with one venturing briefly south into Victoria; we also
congratulate one visitor who will be making a Gold Height Badge claim; its smiles all round
at Bunyan.
There are two rules to enjoying the Bunyan Wave Camp
1 – You have to be there
2 – You have to take a launch
Just to let you know!!!!
And…got more!

—-After a week of thermal and wave conditions on Day 7 of the Bunyan Wave Camp lived up to reputation – with conditions aloft ideal for wave at 6:30am as the first gliders were positioned on the grid conditions on the ground were calm, but at 500ft it was a different story as the combination flew through the wind shear; then it was the wild bucking bronco ride before reaching the laminar flow. By 9:30am the tugs had to be put away due to 40kt + gusts on the ground (it was gusting so hard that full coffee cups off tables).

5 Diamond Heights were flown 😉
How was your day?—–

Sad news as well as Karl-Heinz Schneider died, age 55 only. Karl Heinz was the son of Walther ,who supplied SO many people with his LS gliders as manufacturer of this business kin the past. Who has never flown in an LS glider?? Nearly everybody , is nt it?
Had not seen him for a long time, but as far as I remember his health was  never the very best.
See also ; www.soaringcafe.com

This weekend [23-25] the European Women gather in Amstelveen  not far from Amsterdam. The 7th AWE [ Aviation and Women in Europe Conference] has 10 great guest-speakers one of them Frank Versteegh former Red Bull Racer  and now still involved in air shows, [ he was in Reno when the P51 crashed] , a stewardess , a female airline captain and more . It is good to see that more and more women in the aviation world gather, as not long ago the soaring-ladies did in France and Holland. When you are interested look at;
www.aweu.org

Today the State Comps started in Warwick. Yesterday they had their practise day and today they started with a 3 hour AAT for club class, 313 km. for standard, 353 for 18 m. Scores are coming in now so if you are interested look at www.soaringspot.com
It looks like the toppers are winning this day, as in Bruce Taylor [JS1] and John Buchanan [ ASG 29] in 18 m. with at this stage 1000 and 956 points.
70 Pilots in 5 classes, as they also have a combined 15m/standard and 18m/open class.

The East of Australia starts the season with good and interesting weather. Look at the flight yesterday from Geoff Pratt on the OLC. Starting with the Morning Glory and back with thermals; 941 km. [833 FAI triangle!!!!!] in a PIK 20E !!!!!! Good on him!

So you are happy and excited to have seen the Himalaya from above , flying with  Buddha Air, ready to tell “the world “about what you have seen , on the way back to Kathmandu airport ….. and so the plane [ Beechcraft] crashes in rain and fog….no stories to tell anymore and huge sadness for families in India, Japan , Nepal and the USA and for the family of the crew of 3. 19 People died !Very SAD!!!!!!

It is good that vintage gliders are not forgotten! Some pilots really love to take their toy for a flight on nice after-summer-days as we have now here in many parts of Europe as there is a strong high over Central Europe. On Facebook I read that they loved their flight. Found a few vintage planes in my archive from Lars Ake Allerhed during the WGC opening in 2006 in Eskilstuna. Enjoy!

Ritz

Alphen aan den Rijn     Wednesday September 21 “AUTUMN”   ritzdeluy@hotmail.com

The first heavy snow has fallen in the Alps  and on TV, I saw towns in Switzerland looking like  “good Christmas cards” .But the next day it was 20 dgr. again so the snow was gone. With autumn we prepare for winter on this site of the world. No worries!
More worries for Japan, around the town of Nagoya , were some of our former guests at Sportavia live,  1 million people have been advised to fly for typhoon Roke.Not good!

One of the good things about the link to Soaring Cafe  is that I read more about the Concordia now. I am very interested in that project and I hope that with me,  many more readers are going to follow this project from Dick Butler, who by the way is going to fly in Uvalde with the Concordia at the next WGC. Great news! The wings have been put on the fuselage last week, story to be read on www.soaringcafe.com

Flying at the WGC in Uvalde  is also the JS1 , of course I should say the glider flew itself in the picture and not one but quite a few will participate there in Texas. And….the French team has just added a new JS1 to their WGC fleet in Uvalde. Who is going to fly this glider then, I do not know by now.

Sad but true! After investigation they found out that the pilot who crashed in Russia on the highway in June had too much alcohol in his blood. 47 People died!!!!

Who has not read the book Cross country soaring by Dr. Helmut Reichmann.

Picture; courtesy Sus [sister from Helmut] and Detlef Schroeder
This picture is made at the WGC in Finland in 1976.

I did not think about him for a long time. Of course you know that he died in 1992, during a squad training in the French Alps colliding with another pilot. He was 3 times World Champion [in 1970, 1974 in standard class and in 1978 in 15 m. class!] and and a lovely and very smart guy. I met him on several occasions in the far past.
My friends Jo and Tony from Australia visited during their  trip around the world  Helmut’s niece Katrin  and her parents. Tony knew Helmut well and  Katrin lived in Australia with Jo and Tony for a year between school and university.
Katrin is now a doctor working in orthopaedics in Germany and fondly called “daughter ” by Tony and Jo and her parents.  A good reason to remember Helmut, specially for the younger ones;  a top glider pilot and a very interesting guy to talk to. This way , by talking about him, he will be never forgotten.
The first Baron Hilton Cup was organised by him and Baron Hilton and before he died he was for several years team coach from the German team .He was a very influental pilot/person  in the short time he lived.

Picture courtesy; Detlef Schroeder.
On the picture young Dr. Katrin Schroeder, her mother Sus Schroeder and sister from Helmut and of course Tony Tabart.

The Kilometer-eaters  start now the overseas season. Allan Barnes is one of them,  he flew last week in Jondaryan [Australia] 479 km. in his LS 1f. Already in mid-winter he flew on July 30 a 529 km. task in an LS 8.
The ABSOLUTE -TOP- KILOMETER- EATER this year will be Alfredo Giretti who flew most flights from Rieti .At this stage he has flown 100 flights [ also in Kiripotib] and a total of 59.446,69 km. and I guess nobody is going to beat it, so he will be the best/ champion  in 2011 for the OLC world wide statistics. Good on him!
Great runner up is Pepe as he is about 10.000 km. ahead of the number 3! Well done Pepe! And we will see and hear more of him as he loves his ASH 31/21m.

Talking about Rieti, as said, my Australian friends Jo and Tony Tabart visited Rieti this summer on their world tour. Tony loved to fly once more in Rieti , after he flew there the WGC in 1985. Also in 1984 he flew the Pre WGC and that’s the year we met the Aussies and we still are great friends!!!! That’s soaring too! We even ended up for a few years [ 10] living in and running Sportavia at Tocumwal.
On the pictures Tony , now in his seventies with good old Alessandro the chief instructor from Rieti. Pictures courtesy Jo Pocklington. THANKS JO!!!!

The first competition in the 2011/12 season starts this weekend in Warwick [SE of Queensland] ; the Queensland 2011 State Soaring Championships, with toppers as Bruce Taylor and John Buchanan flying in 18m. class.
In that area there is wave, ridge- soaring, and as they claim;” the sparse darling downs plains “, usually offer conditions with 10 knots up to 10.000 ft.
When looking at the entries so far 34, I noticed the name from Sydney Dekker. Have to find out if he is the one who flew , when my son Dennis had to cut  the cable from the winch , to save Sydney [ the handle to release the rope did not work!] .Both then 14 years old , managed to “kill” all electricity in a huge town as the cut-cable hit the powerlines .They were NOT at fault and Dennis even got a mention for bravery. A real story. Have n’t seen Sydney for at-least 20 years and that was , how bizar it might sound in Tocumwal at the cemetery were Dennis is buried.
Heard Sydney is a rather wellknown professor now in the science of human factors.

You are up- to-date , see you next Sunday when it will be 20 dgr. here ! Weird weather! Cheers Ritz

All pictures in this blog courtesy Bert Kuijper.[Dutch Nationals 2011]

Alphen aan den Rijn      Sunday evening September 18 2011   ritzdeluy@hotmail.com

 Not long after I published my last blog I received a mail from Germany from the chief editor of the German Magazine “Segelfliegen”  Helge Zembold with GREAT news. 
I share it with pleasure:
“segelfliegen” ist Germany’s favourite soaring magazine, and as the
demand by international readers is extremely high, we will be publishing
an “international edition” by the 1st of October! This will also be a
fully digital magazine, like our German version that is out now for the
second time printed as well as digitalized.

You find some more information on their website
“www.segelfliegen-magazin.de“,
About the new English version ;
“segelfliegen goes international” , scroll , browse and read wherever you are , your magazine is always with you!!!
It’s so easy; The link on our website www.segelfliegen-magazin.de  leads you to the digital kiosk, where you can sign in and order your digital issue of segelfliegen -magazin international edition.
That’s it!
But it is NOT YET October 1 so , you are the first to know , but have to be a bit patient. Will come back on it!
For those who do not know the Magazine , it started in 2003 and the target group is , glider pilots, motor-glider-pilots and ultra-light-pilots and…what’s even better more then 20.000 people read  the German version.

The 26th FAI Aerobatic Championships  have been flown and finished on September 11 in Italy in Foligno. In both the male and female category the Russians were the best. But…the French were great runner up’s.
Overall final result;
1. Mikhail Mamistov  from Russia in a Sukhoi 26 M3
2. Olivier Masurel from France in a Cap 232.
Female best results;
1. Svetlana Kapanina from Russia in a Sukhoi 26 M3
2. Aude Lemordant from France in a Cap 232
And ………no secret, the best team was Russia [ 9 pilots] and France [ 9 pilots]was 2d before the USA [ 6 pilots]. 51 Male pilots were competing at Foligno Airport including 2 pilots from Australia flying the Extra and 5 ladies , from 17 different countries.

Tomorrow the gliders for Corowa  which have been all packed over the last couple of days , will be  ready for the last “finishing touch” , to depart then for Rotterdam and from the harbour there for  their long trip to Melbourne on  Tuesday. Francesco and Grietje hope that the gliders will arrive at Corowa Airport on November 5 to start flying on November 8. With more then 10 years of experience I am sure ,  it will be ALL OK, ” a piece of cake”!!!! Wishing them and a lot of my friends who fly over there a great new 2011/2012 season!!!

Richard Branson proofed already,he is not a “one-day-fly”. This time he announced on CNN that within a year his first space-ship should be ready for commercial space-flights!!! His business Virgin Galactic sold already 430 tickets for future flights he claims. KLM is very busy with this kind of speed-travelling as well. Maybe my grand children fly in the future to Australia in a few hours instead of the 20 hours I need now to get there… flying only!!!

Talking about speed , you might know that the Dutch are “born ” on a bicycle. We all have 1, some 2 and some 3 or 4 bikes. We also have great universities who support great ideas from students. In Delft is such a university, they are not only good in giving us new bright ingenieurs in aircraft construction,[ some of my friends studied there and are top glider pilots as well, ] but they also support the fastest solar-car [on a track in Australia ] and now the bicycle going with a speed of over  133 km/h. just by using the human legs!!!! At least…this is what they want to do in Nevada in the USA…breaking the world record from Canadian daredevil Sam Whittingham, who did so on September 18 2009.[133 km./h] and …….who tries this week as well/again to go faster.
The Dutch team has 9 students from Delft,  5 from Amsterdam specialised in the science of movements and 2 bicyclists.
Of course all has to fall in place to achieve the new record but everybody tries hard!!! The first attempt was 130 km/h so “only” an new European record, but they continue…want to be faster…

In the same area , not in the desert this time but at Reno also in Nevada and not too far from Minden where we practised for the 1991 WGC , but due to circumstances they were held in Uvalde in Texas, a P 51 Mustang crashed during a demo at the Reno airfield during the National Championship Airraces. The 71 year old pilot crashed in front of the gallery where lots of people were looking ,  killing 8  of them and[ badly]  injuring many more. The pilot himself died at the spot but as some state , he saved maybe more people by moving the plane away from this gallery. Tragic!

Accidently my eye fell on a site I noted a while ago to keep an eye on. It is the site from a young sport soldier from Germany; Benjamin Bachmaier. His glider and 4 other ones are shipped at the moment from Germany to Adelaide in Australia. The boys , Benjamin and his mate Fabian Peitz are going to fly at Stonefield about 40 km. North East of Gawler in their Discus 2B YB and for sure they are going to have great fun there in and over  the Barossa Valley -area and in the meantime they hope to promote the new center by flying fast and far, as Fly Down Under wants to make  it a real long-distance-flying-field! When your German is good look at ;
www.flugfieber.net  and   www.fly-down-under.com   and in the future on the OLC for their flights. Keep an eye on them as well. I got permission to translate so now and then their German for you in English.
Last Wednesday Benjamin flew 524 km. in an LS1 f, in Puimoisson in France where the sport soldiers have/had their  training-camp, Fabian flew 443 km. on Thursday .

See you on Wednesday, cheers Ritz

 click on pictures to see text and double to enlarge
 

Alphen aan den Rijn     Wednesday   September 14 2011    ritzdeluy@hotmail.com

 
The 3 pictures are from the finish from one of the gliders during the Dutch Nationals at the beautiful airfield of Terlet. Pictures courtesy Bert Kuijper.

 Yesterday I received in the mail, a pretty thin Dutch Soaring Magazine “Thermiek”.  But through the plastic cover you could already read that  more articles could be found on the web publication of this magazine. So for all Dutch and Belgium readers here is the link;
www.issuu.com/knvvl
When I read it again, I was proud on the article I wrote myself over the Dutch Nationals, 4 pages including good pictures from Frans, Jeroen and Frits, but a bit “annoyed” that somebody else added the wrong company for Maurits, who was runner up on the last day, but lost that position due to the fact he had to work/fly for his boss and left for Mexico. He is NOT  flying for Transavia!!!! 
But with my name above it , I will say sorry to Maurits.
When you prefer to read the Thermiek off-line, no worries you can download the PDF. You can find the PDF at www.thermiekfotowedstrijd.nl

Restaurant the “Thermiekbel “and service center from Terlet.

The latest issue of Gliding International  dropped on my doormat on the same day. You have heard and read about the Helli Lasch Challenge by Iain Baker, but the way John { Roake, editor of G I. } shows it in the Magazine is TOP!!!! There is Soaring-product-news, a story about Hanna Reitsch, the “sad story of a heroine of the Third Reich”, the new electric flying machine; eGenius and much more; 63 pages of great reading and looking.
www.glidinginternational.com

 Pictures from Helli Lasch Challenge [some again] courtesy Iain Baker.

 Flights nowadays are shorter as well as the days. Slowly we move to winter and down under and Africa  move to summer, but there is still some nice soaring here in Europe. I specially liked the ridge-soaring-flight [ on the hang!] with 35 up to 60 km/h wind from the S. and great looking lenties, from Porta Westfalica in Germany in a Standard Libelle ;554 km. German top pilot Reinhard Schramme flew there as well and ,”raced the ridges” with a speed of 139km/h in the ARCUS/M. What I read a SUPER day!

Dick Bradley, Reb Rebbeck and Claire Durston and Jennifer Bradley , yes daughter from…are preparing for the 2011/2012 season at Bloemfontein in S.A. The core of the season will be their Summer Performance Camp commencing on Sunday October 30 till February 18 2012. Look for all their info on ; www.soaring-safaris.com .
Also Gariep Dam is gearing up for a new season. I know some of my friends fly over there sharing an ASH 25 which is shipped to Africa already now, as I heard.For more news; www.gariepgliding.com
Of course Namibia is in full swing as well. Could not find the Bitterwasser site as it seems to be out and busy with renewal. Will keep you updated, as it is still early, but…when you want to hire a good gliders to fly in the overseas season , you should be in time to do so!
Australia’s more well known places to go to are Corowa [ www.australian-soaring-corowa.com ] and Narromine with several schools. I gave you already the sites from Tocumwal.

Got an invitation from Jutta to attend the first Rassemblement des Femmes de l’air;  A meeting for women at the airport of Niort. It is free and starts on Friday September 16 at 9.30 till Sunday September 18 .30. Must be a great weekend, a bit far for me and I have something else on already but….enjoy it when you are there!!!Enough women in soaring at the moment. A huge difference when I started in 1967. I was the one and only girl in my club at that stage.

And….when your glider needs new jaxida-covers for this upcoming winter;  just reived the new email adress from Uli Schwenk to reach him as a friend or business partner;
uli.schwenk@jaxida-cover.de

Will be back on Sunday evening, first a weekend with the family! cheers Ritz

Alphen aan den Rijn    
Sunday September 11 , a day on which 10 years ago, the world changed
ritzdeluy@hotmail.com

A day to remember this 11th of September. As everybody else,  I clearly remember  what I did on the moment the planes flew in the Twin towers. I just had a drink with my dad during my holiday in Holland and saw on a TV,  while ordering the beer in a cafe on a nice market-place, how the 2d plane hit the tower. I could not believe my eyes and thought it was a movie/animation, but the faces from other people in there told me that it was happening in New York at that time!!! And….the world,  we …could follow it live! I still can’t look at it and still have problems to believe such terrible things can happen.

Talking about sadness, there was more this week as the so maniest old plane [ Yak 42] from Russia crashed killing 43 people,[ 2 survived but are in bad condition] a lot of them top ice-hockey-players and their staff from Lokomotiv Jaroslavl. Top as in …world champions and Olympic champions and from different  parts of the world. All were happy and ready to start a new season of top -ice-hockey and it all  ends on the bank of the river Wolga . Terrible!!!
Finally the Russian president Medvedev is angry about all the crashes and promised to do something. About time with 121 people killed in 7 crashes only this year!!!!! Investigation has to show us what happened, maybe bad fuel????? as they suggest now!???? Let’s wait and see!

One of the last comps  flown in this summer season 2011 here in Europe, is in the UK at Aboyne, where  the Deeside Gliding Club , THE place to be in the UK for wave, hosts the UK Mountain Soaring Championship from September 4 till 11. And…though the weather is horrible here, they managed to fly on Sunday [ 246 km. ] with 9 finishers out of 15 pilots and on Thursday with a 2 hour AAT.
John Williams in the Antares /20m. won in 1hour 56, nicely under the set time and flying 259 km. with a speed of 129.4 km /h. Not bad!!!
Friday was scrubbed and yesterday was the last day and they tried hard. Briefing at 2PM. But another scrubbed day , we are used to it this season.
So John Williams won in the Antares with 1739 points before David Latimer in Ventus CT/17.6.

 
Mountain flying here above  Argentina.Picture courtesy Bruce Cooper

It is  great to stay in contact  with a lot of our guests/friends from the Sportavia period. Last week I got a mail from Hisashi from Japan, written in the Boeing 777 on his way to Cairns for a holiday. Hisashi was one of those guests who was most grateful for what we could offer him. He loved his cross country soaring, as that is not too easy in Japan. Most airfields are on the banks of rivers and those places are not the best for hours of good soaring, yes they are perfect for starts and landings , flying from circuits.Hisashi is planning on going back in the 2012/13 season. In the past he always brought friends with him, now it will be friends with their children!!!! And of course Tocumwal will be the place to go to.
He caught up with George and they had a good time. Great to see how good Hisashi looks, due to more exercise and healthy food!! Compliments.

 
Hisashi and George in Cairns

 
Greetings from Hongkong[courtesy Hisashi]

We had an earthquake on Thursday night at 9PM here in Holland. YES, an earthquake!!
That is pretty unusual  certainly with 4.5 on the Richter scale, but I did not feel anything while people about 15 k from here did feel it. Nothing happened but it was a real phenomena. The epi- centre was just over the border from Nijmegen on German soil. Even  journalists from all over Europe were interested as for our country this was a pretty heavy earthquake and the 3d worst in 100 years.
Experts predict/expect that in the future we might have a REAL one…..!Hope not!

As said already too many times the weather is not too good in Europe this season. One of the places to be were the mountains, specially the Alps. Over the last days longer -European -soaring -tasks were mainly in the mountains from France and Italy .
The USA was pretty blessed with good weather as I noticed at the OLC. Also this last week the longer flights were flown  in both North and South America, occupying since September 2 the top-2 spots at the world-list .
Yesterday we had a splendid day here, with up to 29 dgr. not a soaring day bytheway, but today autumn is back. Atleast we had a great spring!

This next article is not new but as  we look ahead to the start of the season soon in Bitterwasser  and as I have never shared it with you before, I do now as it is a bit of “cucumber-time” for soaring news at the moment. It is a great interview on the site of the Southern Riverina Gliding Club at Tocumwal airport, [ www.srgc.com.au] where Ingo Renner [ 70 years old since June this year] is the chief instructor and I am still a proud member. Don’t get me wrong, I “love”and support and I am proud on Eddie [ Happy Birthday!!!!] and Sheryl as well, as soaring and Tocumwal belong together!!!![ www.sportaviation.com.au ]
The interview was with Lothar Arndt who is an instructor at the SRGC with pilot Milan Petcovic from Serbia after he flew his first 1000 km at Bitterwasser. In “our” time we had quite some nice pilots arriving from Melbourne from the East European countries even bringing their families  to visit Sportavia for the weekend for joy-flights  and  soaring for theirselves.
Enjoy the article!

http://www.srgc.com.au/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=90

To finish 3 pictures from my archive[2006]  from one of my favourite soaring-photographers Kai Monkkonen from Finland .Enjoy the beginning of your week and see you on Wednesday,cheers Ritz

Alphen aan den Rijn     Wednesday September 7 2011     ritzdeluy@hotmail.com

The season is nearly over. Let 2012 be as good as this day in 2011.

To be honest the answer on that question is… NOT TOO MUCH! Some pilots are busy to clean the mud from this season from their gliders to ship them to their over-seas destination in the hope to REALLY fly over there and believe me , there will be a lot of mud!
Specially Australia ‘s quarantine does n’t like to see one bit of sand!Luckily Australian Soaring in Corowa, from Grietje and Francesco have a lot of experience and know how to deal with this and as their customers are regulars they do know what to do as well. Never a problem there!
For a few moments we hoped we would have a real nice after-summer-period ,we were HAPPY already,….. but after 3 nice days we are back to 15 dgr. tomorrow and rain -as usual-.
Now we had our first autumn-storm, yes a left-over from Irene, but no real harm has been done.

I looked with interest to the results from  Gary Ittner’s  flights last week. Being 2d behind Bruce Taylor in the Uvalde Glide 18m. pre-worlds a few weeks ago , he seems ready for the 2012 WGC at Uvalde [Texas] . Now this USA top-pilot,  from the Houston area, so used to flying in Texas, flew 2 super -fast flights in his ASG 29/18 over the Eastern Sierra ridges;on Sept.3 an 870 km. flight with a speed of 165.94 km/h. and on Sept 4 a 1013 km.distance with 164.48 km/h. NOT BAD!
Gary is already for a long time [1995 as far as I could find] on and off , in the National Team and participated in several WGC’s, till now in the 15m. class. Lately he flew as well in Eskilstuna and Lüsse.

During the last JWGC at Musbach  I was amazed/shocked to hear that one young man from the USA was removed from the team and comps. 
This is what I found about it on the SSA site News and Information [ www.ssa.org ] and if you have not read it/found it, I copied the statement as it is an important one for young people. I admire the openess they give now and hope others will learn from it and NEVER get into such a situation!!!!!!

US Team Committee Statement Regarding the 2011 Junior WGC

During the recent JWGC, the US Team Committee (USTC) determined that the behavior and conduct of one member did not meet the standards or Code of Conduct set forth in the US Team Policies and Procedures (210 USST Team Policy & Procedures Ver 14, 01/14/04 ). The behavior and conduct were discussed with the team captain and this team member.  It was made clear that the behavior would not be tolerated; and, that if not corrected, the next course of action would be removal from the team and competition. 

Inappropriate behavior persisted, leaving no option other than removal from the team and the competition. In addition, further disciplinary actions are being taken by the USTC to include, but not limited to, a reduction in the amount of reimbursement from US Team funds. 

While the USTC deeply regrets that this action was necessary, we cannot and will not abide serious material failures of the US Team members to hold to the standards of conduct expected of all team members while representing the SSA, US Team and USA.

Bill Elliott, Chairman
US Team Committee

 Of course I asked Bill for permission first. You might know Bill who together with Rand is “the engine ” behind the SoaringCafe, the very interesting site with lot’s of news not only from the USA but also from everywhere in the world;  www.soaringcafe.com add it to your favourites!
So straight away some news from Bill;
—-we do receive many posts from pilots from all over the globe.  We are just eight months old and have nearly 500 posts !
We average over 20,000 visits per month with roughly half of our visitors from outside of the US.  It is our desire to have a strong international presence with articles from around the globe. 
AND
We would be very happy for you to create a post on SoaringCafe.com.  Perhaps a short excert with one photo and then a link back to your blog to read your entire post. 
And here is Rand;

And yes , that’s what I am going to do! Very pleased to hear that such dedicated and much more professionel people as I am, like what I write in both Gliding International and in my blog. So co-operation will happen from today on!!!! Love it!!!
What we have in common is passion for soaring!!!!!!

Something totally different and less nice and…as a hotmail user [ gmail users are a target as well!!] it scared the hell out of me!!!
This is what I received from Iain Baker from Jonker Sailplanes. I , luckily, DID NOT [yet]  get such a mail, but this is an extra warning to be careful. Iain is such a nice hard working guy and now they STOLE his email account and used it for spam-fraud;
Read and shiver!!!!

It would be helpful to resend any emails sent to me or by me recently (or indeed, at anytime) as I used my email account to store a history of email correspondence with around 3500 emails

Alphen aan den Rijn     Sunday September 4 2011       ritzdeluy@hotmail.com

 Nice quiet weather in Holland with balloons passing by!

Finally some weather-improvement,that means,  for the last couple of days! Today we will have rain again but still 24, after we had thunderstorms during the night, tomorrow we will back to 18, so I enjoyed the last couple of days!!!Yesterday was an old-fashioned summer day, not only for soaring but also for swimming, as at some places it was 30 dgr.
Best flight yesterday here in Holland; 265 km. in a DG 800/18m. It was a bit stable and later during the day we could see cumulus-clouds and thermal-activity  started . Just over the border in Germany, somebody flew 484 km. in a Hornet from Aachen, with a good 300 FAI in it.
On Thursday the best flight was a nice 300 FAI triangle in a Mosquito. Yes those  “oldies”
are still going strong.
Best OLC- [wave] flight yesterday was in the USA with 941 km. in an ASH 26 E. Someway I thought they had MUCH better weather this season in the USA,  as we here in Europe , but Tom who flew the ASH 26 wrote in his comment; ” Summer is FINALLY here”. So it might not have been THAT good either.

Very pleased to see that Carsten Bauer ,[Germany]  who flew with us in Tocumwal in the past flew a nice 300 km. FAI triangle in his Carat, on the last day of August. Finally a good day again with some after-summer weather/conditions. By the way a Carat is an aeroplane and a glider more or less based on the discus. The motor is based on the old 4 cylinder horizontally VW air-cooled engine. It has a folding prop and a special undercarriage.
The  German juniors are still enjoying themselves in the mountains from Puimoisson in France, with flights just under and above 700 km. last week.
I guess , kilometer -eater Alfredo Giretti loves his new ASH 31 /21m. as well , making long flights in Rieti; another over-800 km-flight was added to his total on August 31.
I heard a few more friends have ordered an ASH 31/21m.

Great to find out that 100 years after Mr. Fokker,  flew his first plane, a Spin,  which was pretty daring, over Haarlem -town , the Fokker 100 will be back in production. NGA [Next Generation Aircrafts] before their name was REKKOF, the other way around you read FOKKER, has announced that within 2 years the prototype should be ready. The 120 -passenger-plane should be  most economical and environment-friendly.Good luck!!!

The 2d Belgian Masters at Saint Hubert, sponsored by Glider Pilot Shop, started on August 28 but had only one day till Thursday September 1. They went , at least a few went , for a speed task of 139 km. but the best flight was from one of the organisers Yves Jeanmotte with 32 km. So an invalid day!
A pity as high level pilots from France, Belgium and Holland mix here and devote their energy to be on the highest places. Goal; who proves to be the best pilot from Belgium?!
On Friday the weather there was most probably as “milky” as here, bad visibility but nice temperatures.

 Patrick Stouffs [picture from archive]

Yesterday they finally could go into the air. A task of 285 km. and 12 from 19 finished. Best was Yves Jeanmotte, putting 955 points in his pocket. Runner up was Jean Luc Colson and Bert Schmeltzer was 3d.
When the weather is the same as here they might have a window in the afternoon, when all rain and thunderstorms have passed by.

Season is more or less over, GOOD, let’s concentrate on the 2012 summer now with the 2 WGC’s in Uvalde and Chaves and hopefully exciting- good- soaring -weather, so CU on Wednesday, and….the overseas season starts soon too, so no time to worry anymore about rain and wind, we just go on, cheers Ritz