A-day-by-day retrospect on day 1 , 2 and 3 from the  Leszno WGC and other activities this week till today.

SUNDAY JULY 27 2014;
The first day of this wonderful big event organized under the FAI-flag by the Polish gliding community at Leszno, straight  away set the standard for great racing over the next 2 weeks.
Though they had ” only”  2.30 AAT’s in 15 and 18 m and 2.45 in open class , cause of expected showers , the pilots raced over the track as future champions.
The window was chosen VERY well, there was some rain over the Leszno field, for the crews and TC’s,  but the pilots on track had so to see, no problems .

In 15 m. the UK pilots were still in their ” flow”  and Leigh won the day with Phil just behind him.
From 46 pilots they had the best speed combined with the flown kilometers; 335.5 and 333.7 m. in 2.33.
Speed from 131 and 130 km. /h.
Points between 824 and 481 for the first and last pilot of the day.

In 18 m. the UK pilots had a less good day than during practice. They, one way or another “lost”  each other and  finished as 18th and 26 from 46.
ALL pilots in this class finished!!!!
A mixed top in this class lead by Polish pilot Karol Staryzak who won with 352.1 km in time 2.32 [138.8 km./h]
John Coutts from NZ was runner up and finished exactly in 2.30 but flew 10 km. less with Roman Mracek on spot 3.
BUT,..Roman in the end got only 72 km for an airspace violation at Poznan, where I arrive on Friday evening.
Points between 815 for the winner and 58 for number 46, Roman.
What a horrible start for such a good pilot. But they know the rules and the consequences.

In open class Ronald [Termaat]  from Holland flew himself with big speed , 139.5 km./h over 389.5 km. in time 2.47,35 and won the day. Followed by the French Killian and Laurent and Laurens from SA,  behind them.
In the top 10 ,5 x a JS 1-C and 3x a Quintus M , a Nimbus 4M and ASH 31Mi.
Points between 917 and 389.

As shared by the organizers.

What happened more on Sunday July 27:

—–Several over 800 km. flights from Fuente and a few 1000 k flights one by  Guy who  flew his 8th 1000 for the Fuente-season  in the Quintus M.
The first 17 flights on the OLC were all for Fuente pilots.
—–In Stoelln/Rhinow the German women started their Nationals with a practice day.The field they are flying from is the oldest airfield in the world. Otto Lilienthal jumped of the hill there.

MONDAY JULY 28 2014:

Tasks; 15 m….3.15 AAT, 18 m…….3 hour AAT and open class…..3.15 AAT.

 Tow planes ready to go for day 2!
As shared by the SA team.

During briefing the winners were honored with their daily prizes and they seem all happy/pleased with it.

Leigh, Ronald and Karol
As shared by the organizers.

Day 2 turned out to be a difficult day…..  they talked about the heat, the showers , but also 2/3 m. average climbs and the tension” what will this day bring”? Some thought that the day would turn out better than predicted , so they left later.
In the end they had severe rain and a thunderstorm just after and for some during the finish.

Here is Matthew’s story, he says it all!!!;
” Disastrous second day...

Some mis-communication lead me to break from the pack around the middle of the task, and I had a low and slow point, but recovered quite nicely, expecting to be 20 minutes overtime with a lot of extra distance. Unfortunately the 20 minutes made all the difference, with a big storm directly overhead the airfield when I returned. Aussie base reported all clear on the other side of the rain with 20k to run and 2000ft over glide, so I switched to the CTAF and headed in, still without sight of the field. In the meantime the heavens opened up and the rain thickened and intensified completely covering the finish. I got to 800m of the 3k finish ring before bailing out because of zero visibility in the torrential rain, off the clock sink and uncontrollable turbulence. I turned around, still 1200ft over glide and tried to head a bit further north to come in from a different angle, but was dumped even harder and did another 180, clearing the heavy sink at 1000ft to fly as far as I could from the storm and turbulence before dropping it into a wheat field. Unfortunately lost an undercarriage door and a lot of pride to the crop (everywhere still has the crops in), but Mirek was kind enough to do the replacement before tomorrow’s flying.

The results were as the day…..changeable. A lot of expected TOPPERS are not yet flying at their standard, others are ” bloody good”. As those 2 Polish pilots but let’s look at it class by class.

15 m; Sebastian started at 14.15 which is looking at the times rather late. Together with him his mate Jacek went on track and Mac was with them, as well as the 2 French Jean Denis and Christophe and a few more.
They all must have stayed more or less together , as they landed about the same times, BUT in between  Sebastian flew the most kilometers; 442.9 in 3.20 so a speed of 132.5 km./h. in his Polish Diana over Polish soil. Could that go wrong???????
Sebastian in the Diana 2 had the first 1000 points for this comps. Mac had 940 and Jacek 875.
6 Outlandings, 3 real and 3 virtual by infringements.

Overall Sebastian leads with less than 100 points on Mac and about 120 on Leigh.

18 m; A great day for the Polish pilots with both Karol and Lucasz gaining the 1000 points in this class, flying 420 km. in 3.01 so a nice speed of 139.2 km./h!!!!
All pilots counted for…. so no outlandings no penalty points and no infringements.

Overall Karol is ,of course , on top of the list , winning 2 days, followed by Lucasz and Peter [Hartmann] from Austria.

Open class;a real FRENCH day as all 3 French pilots including the current world champion Laurent, flew in as the best.
485 km. for the 3 of them with a speed of  139 km./h. Laurent won in the Quintus M ,followed by Killian in the JS 1-c and Sylvain in the Quintus M.
Laurens was best of the rest followed by the 2 UK pilots Pete and Andy.
Good old Uli did well on 7 and good old Dick in the CONCORDIA was on spot 8.

Overall Killian leads after 2 days before Laurent with Laurens as great 3d. Ronald unfortunately dropped from 1 to 9 and equals that place with the , Broquevilles.
BUT IT IS NOT OVER YET, it just started!!!!!
3 Out landings, 2 real , one by infringement and 1 pilot got ZERO points as he missed the start line.

What happened more on Monday;

—–Got some lovely pictures from Anthonies mum Faye. Anthony aka, Fal, aka Tugger, is a dad now. He was one of our tuggies in the past in the Sportavia-time,  flying as as an airline pilot in Australia from Sidney now.
—–Very wet in Europe today. Guess Germany and Holland got the full load with extreme down pours up to over 150 ml. at places . The 150 ml. was here in Alphen and yes it was really wet here.
Amsterdam was like little Venice at some places.
Flooding-damage-bill ONLY in Holland and only for the houses; 10 million Euro!
—–still troubles to go to the disaster area, to find the last bodies from flight MH 17. It’s a shame they continue fighting there so nobody can do any kind of investigation.
—–it rained at the German Women Nationals.

TUESDAY JULY 29 2014;

Starting again with the winners from the day before.

As shared by the organizers.Like the way they do this!!!!

Tasks for this Tuesday; 2.15 AAT for 15 m. and for both 18 m. and open a 2.00 AAT.
So another so-so-day, a look-alike from the day before with showers in the afternoon. Tricky but interesting …..an other day on which points can be very expensive, as there is no excuse for mistakes.
A misty morning with early low cloud which is slowly burning off. They expected again a tropical airmass with the convergence line to the north. Also Cirrus again…. expected coming from the south. Pressure had dropped and there was a chance of storms when the temperature reached 30 deg.C.
Gliders are put in the grid early again , as it is a bit cooler then.

On days like this with a short task and unpredictable  weather,  the start time/game is important and you should get as pilot ALL weather info , and on top of that you should look as  pilot EXTRA with your own eyes how this weather develops.

The first hour the clouds developed perfect and happy pilots send messages from good lift ; 2/3 m. average. In open class one of the trackers was given to Dick, so everybody could follow the CONCORDIA.
In the end,no thunderstorm in  the- end- of -day , so only 3 out-landings in total and one violation.

15 m.; The French had another good day and finished nearly at the dot with 247 km. Mac is still in winning mood and was 3d.Good to see Stefano more in the top now.
Points between 195 for the out-lander Olivier from Belgium and 708 for Christophe the daily winner.
Overall scores after 3 days; Sebastian [2429] , Mac [2389] and Leigh [2365].

18 m.; Tom Claffey flew 257 km in 2.11 [speed 117.7 km/h.] and won the day  [673 points]! Karol had 10 points less and Robert [Schroeder] from Germany was only ONE point behind Karol. 2 Out-landings in this class and overall it looks after 3 days like this;
Karol [2478] Lucasz [2430] and Peter [ 2371] The UK pilots Mike and Russell are following and then on 6 young Aku from Finland. Good on him!!!

Tom Claffey as shared by the Aussies.

And HIS story.
Mixed 18M day. The forecast was for a fairly late start with strong risk of storms. Only a two hour AAT was set for 18M, 2.15hr for 15M. Once launched we went along the first leg looking at conditions, very weak and improving slowly. It seemed from the sky that the storms may not happen so we played the start game, wanting to fly with company. Anyway, our gaggle finally left 1hr-18mins after the gate opened! Good first leg with the Germans and others, then when they started a large deviation to fly around a big blue hole I went straight, risky move and Ben [Loxton] did the conservative thing and went with the group. As it happens it worked for me and I spent the next half of the flight largely alone. Ben had dropped back a bit but we were opposite direction not long after I left the last sector. I was in a great climb when a large gaggle passed by above and below me without stopping, I must have been in a bubble. I was able to almost get to the front of the gaggle with a good final glide while Ben got stuck with the weakening conditions behind. Great confidence boost to get a day win but I really would like a 1000 points some day. (In Uvalde the two days were penalized then devalued.) – Tom

open class; Andy Davis won the day with 264 km in 2.15 gaining the most points ; 703. Killian missed out on only 3 points on him and Laurent, Laurens and Uli  followed.
Killian still on top overall with 2602 points, followed by Laurent 2577 and Laurens 2528. Dick was only on spot 30, so having a tracker did n’t do the CONCORDIA much good.
The very long wings need more long distances. Hope they will come.
The first EB 29’s from Uli and Michael [Sommer] are overall on spot 7 and 8. The first 6 places are for the JS 1-C’s  and the Quintus M’s.

The CONCORDIA with Dick.
Courtesy Studio LTV Jacek Lewinsky, what a great picture!!!!

What happened more on Tuesday?

—-really bad and wet weather in the Alps. Still pretty good in Scandinavia and nearly a miracle that they have tasks in Poland. They are about the only ones where the weather is reasonable , in the middle of Europe.
—- the morning  briefing at 10.15 was in the presence of  Susanne [Schoedel] the FAI Secretary General who visits Poland for a few days.She participated first in the Red Bull Air Races , visited the World Gliding Aerobatic Championships and was then in Leszno, to also say hello to the glider pilots. Last WGC in Uvalde she still flew herself !!! A ” good ” lady for our sport!
—-Lasham had a good day with Dave Masson flying 570 [484 k. FAI]  in the LS6 WL.
—the women in Germany “tried” , but it did not work out. Another scrubbed day!
As Natasja our Dutch participant mentioned:
” Another cancelled flying day; third in row. Thunderstorms are haunting the area for days now. On the airfield ánd campsite we are fighting of the mosquitoes which are with thousands and weaponed with little stings that even goes through textile! Bastards! So this morning I marinated myself with Autan, Bugspray, Flyswatter and all other chemical stuff I could find in the shop.”
But she still has the right spirit: “ Let’s kick some ass. @ German National Championships Gliding Woman.” 

WEDNESDAY July 30 2014;

Yesterday’s winners

Tasks for today are “small” again; 2 hour AAT’s for all classes.

CU next Wednesday with news from Poland as I will travel to Leszno on Friday. Be there 2 FULL days and go back on Monday again, hopefully with some nice stories for you ,though I go this time as a REAL visitor, no laptop just looking at a WGC as a guest.No jobs.
Only making pictures , listening, and catching up with a lot of mates.

Cheers Ritz

TODAY Wednesday July 23 is a day of NATIONAL PUBLIC MOURNING for the first MH 17 passengers who arrive this afternoon at 4 at Eindhoven Airport. One minute of silence at 4 in Holland where ever possible,[ planes will not start, busses/coaches will wait a minute, so do the trains]!!!!
Flags half-mast.
A Dutch Hercules and an Australian Boeing C-17 Globemaster will bring the first bodies to Eindhoven.
It will be a tough day!!!!A day of National Mourning has not been set in Holland since 1962.
Our Dutch royals, government officials and families of the passengers will be at the tarmac when the remains arrive. After a solemn ceremony, the bodies will be taken in more than 60 hearses, to a military facility for forensic testing in Hilversum.
The main road from Eindhoven to Hilversum will be closed at that time.The airfield at Eindhoven will be closed for all traffic between 15.45 and 18.00.
Words fail……..a nation in mourning! A world in mourning, as ALL bodies will be going back home via Holland!

All around 1200 wind mills in Holland will be in mourning-stand/state.
Picture shared by the Wind mill association.

BUT<…life continues and it is good to go away for a couple of days to clear the mind, so I managed to organize with help from Frans and my daughter Inge to get a ticket and a room for Leszno flying to POZNAN on Friday August 1 arriving in the evening at Leszno and departing again on Monday August 4 in the afternoon.
Looking forward to that!!!!!!

More comps are on , a few have finished again. A short retrospect and a look at what’s going on at the moment.

During the SUMMER COMPS at Malden in Holland, the pilots had after a no-or-nearly-no-points-day-1, a long task on their day 2.
Though to be honest the 137.1 km . from Nick Hanenburg on day 1 you can only call GOOD; he deserved more than the  54 points he got , as the runner up ” only”  flew 82.1 km.
306 km. was set for club class and the winner was,….Steven Huiskes , [St. Cirrus] who flew in the past JWGC and WGC [ Uvalde] . Patrick [LS1f ….was Dutch National Champion and flew JWGC as well ]  was now the runner up with 988 points. Mind you Steven is still a JUNIOR .
In open class 364 km. was set and Steven’s dad, Harry [ Ventus 2CX/18m.] put the 1000 points in this class in his pocket.
Next day had a 3 hour AAT won by Steven in club class with 266.5 km. and dad in open class with 341.4 km.
They tried hard to add 2 more days but though they flew 1 more with best distance 50 km. in club  and 86.9 km in open, it was over and out after 3 days.
Results; Steven wins the club class with and Harry the open class with 2000 points.
By the way the club class podium was filled with 3 JUNIORS, Steven, Sander and Nick. Good on them!
2 Of them , Steven and Sander flew the identical -twin-Cirrusses, with call sign  AU and AG. These gliders belong to the Foundation Soaring Events Holland and are fully equipped by the sponsors Glider Equipment and Glider Pilot Shop.

Our TOP juniors!!
Picture shared on their FB site.

The female Nationals in Poland were won by Joanna Biedermann. The ladies were flying on 8 days and day 6 even had a set 500 km. ; unfortunately no finishers but still 474.3 km. by the best pilot of the day.With 2 more over 300 km. days this was a good competition and Joanna had a total of  7201 points and runner up Judyta 6824.

The French club class Nationals are in full swing in Vinon. FULL is maybe too much said, as the first 2 days were cancelled. Day 1 was won by Didier Hauss [Cirrus] and runner up was Gilles Navas.[LS4]  Both fly/flew already in the top for ages.
From the 19 only 6 finished.
The 3 hour AAT yesterday was won with 278.4 km. in time 3.18, by Yvon Puyou in a Pegase and with that  45 points more were scored  on Gilles and 100 on Didier.

In the USA pilots are flying the Club and Modern Class Nationals from  Midlothian in Texas and have flown for 5 days till now, with 2 days to go.
After 5 days Francois Pin leads the club class  in the SILENT 2a, before Danny Sorenson and Boyd Willat, both flying a DISCUS.
In the Modern Class the CD from the WGC in  Uvalde, Ken Sorenson,  nearly won every day and leads with more than 600 points .He flies his Ventus 2 cxa.

HOT in TEXAS!!!
As shared by the SSA.

Yesterday started the official training from the WGC in Leszno. They had great weather!!
The Aussies were pleased with ” their weather”.

  

Great skies and an  (unintentional selfie) after installing the KANGAROO.
Pictures shared by Aussie Team

Fixed tasks from over 500 km. were set;
610 for open, 500 for 15 m and 522.4 for 18 m.That’s called GOOD PRACTICE!!!
In 15 m. it was PHIL JONES, [129 km./h. in Ventus 2cxa] ] this time not Howard or Steve but Phil got the 1000 practice-points.
In 18 m. Mike Young [140.8 km./h.in ASG 29] and Russell Cheetham ALSO from the UK, were the best and in open class , surprise surprise AGAIN the UK with Pete Harvey in his new JS 1 C  [138 km./h.] and Andy Davis.
Dick Butler in the CONCORDIA was 4th.
Not all pilots did fly on this first official practice/training day.
28 from 47 went up in the air in 15 m. class and 8 outlanded.
In 18 m. 21 pilots had other important things to do, 25 flew and the 2 Belgium pilots Jean Luc and Yves,  out landed [in real or virtual] after 20 km. Werner Meuser after 30 k. Better now then during the WGC.
In open class 18 pilots finished after 606 km.  ,6 ” out landed ” and 13 were otherwise busy.

Today tasks have not been set yet.It looks like 2.30 AAT’s in each class.

They all departed on Monday June 23 and arrived as a team or as sole pilot in 4 classes on different days and times.
HERE are the results of the 2014 EUROGLIDE.

The PURE gliders; 14 teams or gliders
Number 1 and arriving on June 27 at 13.36 UTC, was team Sikko Vermeer, Bart Renckens and Hans Makkee in the DUO DISCUS. The next team arrived one day later on June 28 at 8.05 UTC . They, 2 pilots from Eindhoven Thom and Jacques  flew the LS 6 /15m.

The low turbo’s; 14 teams or gliders
Dirk and Joost Wolf [father and son] and friends Eric Borgmann and Max Bloch arrived on the 26th at 13.10 UTC at Malden in the ARCUS. 2 Teams in a Duo Discus arrived one day later 7 other teams only on July 1.

The high turbo’s; 12 teams or gliders
They did well as 5 teams arrived at June 26 and 3 one day later.
Best team was from Limburg, Robert Werts, Bram Winters and Mathilde van Lieshout. They arrived at 15.34 whilst the other teams arrived at 15.55 and 16.39 and 17.04 and 17.34. That was a real race!!!

The self launchers; 24 teams or gliders
Also here a REAL RACE, as  11 gliders arrived on June 26 at different times. The best time , 12.03 was flown in the Nimbus 4DM by Max Leenders, Wolfert Voet and Marc Ruhe.
Belgium pilot Geert Van Duyse arrived in his ASH 26 E, only half an hour later. Good on him.
3 German teams arrived at 14.36.

Now it is 2 years of waiting before they can all go again. They love EUROGLIDE those pilots.

CU next week,
Ritz

 

Unfortunately I had no time to see my friends in Finland but I try to be in Leszno for a couple of days! Working hard to organize that. A few pilots have arrived already in Leszno, some are on their way, some are unpacking containers and others are happy and ready  to participate in their 2d 33d FAI WGC. Picture below courtesy Walter Mirasso.

In between several international pilots flew, better said ” visited ”  the annual open Issoudun comps ,as they had BAD weather.
Also the Females had to deal with this weather during their nationals also in Issoudun. They all had only 2 days of soaring, whilst the 18 m. Nationals in Husbos were flown with better weather, which is pretty weird as normally France has the good/better  weather.

The UK Nationals were interesting till the last day! When you have read my last blog in SoaringCafe you know all about it.
Except for the last day as THAT day was last Sunday . Another spectacular last day, with  some unpleasant results for some.
A pretty marginal day with a late start , around 4 o’ clock, to use a ” window”  to the NW. For some a real bad day with finishes up to a quarter after 7 !
Pete Harvey outlanded in this  championship flying an 18 m. class glider, a JS 1 instead of  his open class glider [ he is a real open class pilot!] and dropped from 2 to 5 in the final scores.
Andy Davis had a really good run,looking at the 7 days and finished as the new CHAMPION,  in the JS1.[5439 points]
Russell Cheetham was a good runner up, yes also in the JS 1 ,[ 5268]  but the number 3 ,Stephen Ell flew an ASG 29 . [5239]
The “oldies…. WITH respect” are still doing well.

The 7 th edition of the Tropheo Dello Oltrepo, we are in Italy now [Terme], was won by one of my many Italian mates, Manuele Molinari. He must have been very pleased!
The 14 pilots had 4 pretty difficult days out of 6, not one with the real Italian racing weather and on day 3 Manuele was the only pilot finishing a 2.30 AAT , flying 192 km in 2.48.
Parallel with this competition 8 pilots flew for the National Standard Class title.  Congratulations to Manuele, who won in the Discus and is the new National Champion in standard class.

  

Manuele in MM, as some of you know “our”  callsign at comps for years.
Pictures courtesy Manuele.

The Dutch SUMMER comps are on and flown from Malden .Normally seen as an upgrade  for the best pilots with enough points,to continue with the Dutch Nationals next year.
Always a great week of soaring over there.
Close to Malden is Nijmegen and the 4 days-of-walking, called the Nijmeegse 4Daagse, with around 43.000 national and international participants  is there this week as well.They started yesterday and the last glorious day for those who make it will be Friday. They will be cheered on by thousands of people.
They walk through Malden as well.
The first soaring-day , Sunday, was cancelled , but the rest of the week looks very promising.It’s going to be HOT!!!
Monday a short task to start with from 150 km. for club and open went for 195 km.
Though short ,…it was still TOO long. No finishers in both classes.

Yesterday was cancelled due to showers [ mixed here with great clouds] and today they are surely flying, no rain, maybe no clouds either , [ it is VERY blue here] but dry thermals can be good as well.However during the day clouds popped up and over 300 km. tasks were set for both classes.

Malden from above.

The 21st Female Nationals in Poland, flown from Ostrow, parallel with Ostrow Glide , had a very difficult day 2 for 10 of the 11 pilots , but not for Joanna [Biedermann]   who was the only pilot to finish the 308.4 km. in the BRAWO.
2 of this kind of glider in this competition , 1 LS 1 f and the rest are St. Jantars.
Ostrow Glide counts 64 participants in 3 classes.
Yesterday the ladies had a 2.30 AAT and both Brawo’s were on the daily top-spots.Joanna leads the pact after 4 days with over 300 points on Judyta who flies the other Brawo.[a Polish glider from the SZD manufacturers]

Another great flight from Mitch Polinsky from Ely in Nevada. He declared a 1257 km. TRIANGLE, but had to abort this task just 35 miles short of the second TP due to a blue hole to reach and fly back from this TP.
He then tried for a large free triangle, but as he said “ I got greedy and went too far north. Difficult return home from Elko, as the day died. Got withint 35 miles of Ely and had to start my engine to get the rest of the way home.”
He still flew 1218 km.

On th 14th of  July Fuentemilanos spoiled it’s guests with great soaring weather over the mountains. Frequent Fuente-pilot Guy Bechtold from Luxembourg flew straight away a 1000 in his Quintus M  to set the level for the Spanish summer. Other guests from the UK and Germany flew over 700 km.
Yesterday it was only Fuentemilanos in the top of the OLC. It ‘s that time of the year again for our Spanish friends and all their guests.
13 x 1000 km. NOT BAD, a good day!
Guy had his 2d Fuente flight and another 1000, this time 1.132 km.[873 FAI]
” Klasse flug”  an”  dia completo’ were some comments; a total of 24 flights from Fuente from 150 km. in an Astir via 300, 500, 600 and 937 in a St.LIBELLE by French guest Pierre Roumet. Good on him!
Pepe nearly flew a 1000 FAI triangle.[1.028 km…939 FAI triangle]
Also Ocana and Villacastin  had super flights .
Spain is hot as I heard from my grand son who is looking for snakes and foxes on a father/son wild-nature -holiday.

When you live IN Australia or are planning an overseas trip TO Australia , this might be of interest for you.
It’s only in November but it seems fun to participate as last year was a great success,:the Speed Week organized by top pilot Paul Mander [ flew the WGC in Rieti in 1985] and attended by other toppers as Ingo Renner, Brad Edwards, both former world champions and Tony Tabart [flew several WGC’s]
Last year Alland Barnes and Matt Gage practiced their pair-flying at West Wyalong. They used it in Rayskala this year.

From l. to r.; With Ingo, Tony,Paul, Brad, Tom and 2 others, in front of Brad’s jet.
Courtesy Paul Mander .

–—”Only 120 sleeps until SpeedWeek, and the good news is that we will again have both our world champions, INGO RENNER and BRAD EDWARDS, as our special guests. Participants will have a week of flying in Ingo’s company, and on our Meet the Stars evening in a casual environment have the opportunity to pick their brains on matters gliding. This is a repeat of the event of last year, which was a huge success thanks to these two legends of our sport. TONY TABART will be there too.

 If you meet the criteria and have an independent operators rating then you may like to consider furthering your cross country skills by participating in Speed Week.  This is run by Paul Mander in a relaxed and friendly environment. The aim is not to win but to improve your own performance.
The venue is West Wyalong, a glider pilot’s heaven. It has a marvellous airport with almost no traffic, a welcoming community and plenty of good accommodation, well priced.
The dates are November 9^th to 15^th inclusive.“—

You are up to date with the latest day-to-day-news, CU next Wednesday here, or earlier on Sunday on www.soaringcafe.com
Cheers Ritz

After the exciting 33d WGC in Finland we are looking ahead at Poland where in Leszno the “other”  33d WGC will be flown.
The official training starts on July 22 and the competition on July 27. Last day is August 9 and prize giving in the morning from August 10.
The opening ceremony is in the evening of July 26 and the farewell party at August 9.
President of the jury will be Peter Ryder and he forms the jury with Fred Gai and Angel Casado .
Robert Danewid is the chief steward and Jaroslav Vach the steward.

Only a few days to go and  Leszno is the place to keep an eye on. Preparations are mostly done and several pilots travel straight from Rayskala to Leszno to participate AGAIN.
Open class has 37 pilots, 18 m. has 45 and 15 m. a total of  48.

The contest Director of the 33rd World Gliding Championships in Leszno 2014 is Dariusz Cisek.

 

 

ONCE MORE BACK TO RAYSKALA!!!

Once again,…..Rayskala airport as seen bij Tijl Schmelzer.

Wrote 3 blogs on www.soaringcafe.com  about the last days on Rayskala and I loved doing that, as after the rain and waiting and more waiting, finally the great weather gave pilots crews and organizers a better much better feeling. Me too.
Great winners in each class ;strong teams from France, the UK and Belgium and with a bit more luck the German pilots in club class would have been in the top as well.

The prize for the best team went as expected to the UK [6494 points] .They really had a GOOD competition with high places in all classes.
The second best country was France and Sweden,Poland and Finland followed with the Dutch on spot 7 and the Germans on spot 9.

I did not write about the very last day’s winner so here we are.
The last competition day last Saturday and the best one looking at the weather, was won in 20 m. by the French team Marc and Jeremy [Arcus S]  with 6 points ahead on the ” every-day-winners”  Steve and Howard.
Overall the Jones brothers were TOO good and for the first time in history 2 pilots in one glider got a medal.
The newest 20 m. class in our FAI-WGC sport was welcomed by many and it was interesting for us to follow.

In club class the USA pilots had a great run on the last day and our Dutch glider NL1, flown by Sean won the day with Garret on his heels/tail.[12 points behind]
Aussie pilots Adam and Eric, both spending a lot of time, money ,effort and fun in this competition for them so far from home, had mixed results. Eric helped Adam after his outlandings in the beginning and he ended on spot 23, Eric on 35. It might be a bit disappointing for them those places, but I know they had the time of their lives.That’s worth a lot too and experience helps for the next WGC.

Team mates Adam and Eric.

Adam mentioned after arrival on day 1 from the comps;
” 4yrs ago I set the goal to be here competing for AUS in Club Class, I then did 2yrs of qualification competitions (being selected at 94%), followed by the pre-worlds last year, & preparation plus to be here on every available weekend & competition in the lead up.Feeling good, positive & ready! ” 

In standard class a great result for Bert jr. and his family. He did NOT win the last day but Mario Kiesling from Germany did. Bert was 5th, Tijl 10th and Sebastian 12th that last day.In the end the difference between spot 1 and 2 was 31 points. Sebastian knows already the feeling from winning so well, I am pleased Bert won this WGC,  not taking away any of Sebastian’s skills during this competition. He WON 3 days, whilst Bert did not win one but over the 7 days flew more consistent.
He not only flies well, but makes great pictures which you can see in his book ONE YEAR OF GLIDING , combined with interesting text.
By the way dad ,  Bert sr. , wrote some kind of encyclopedia-book over the history of Soaring in Flanders.

 

Bert en Tijl during the international party

  

2 Great pictures from brother Tijl this time, from his first landing after 5 years at Rayskala and during flight.

The Final party must have been a great success. I read on Eric’s site :
” I’m wondering just how many will be in fit state to attend considering the success of last night’s end-of-comp-party“.

In a thank you message Bert jr says THANK you and I share the message with you;
” Dear friends

I would like to thank every single one of you for your massive support during, and the uncountable congratulations after the World Gliding Championships in Räyskälä.

We had an amazing time in the “country of 1.000 lakes”: beginning with snow and antifreeze in the wings during the longest day of the year, many difficult flying days with lots of rain showers and unsuccessful fishing expeditions in the middle part of the comp, and finally we were rewarded with fantastic conditions and exhilarating final glides during the decisive tasks.

Without the help of my parents, Hilde and Bert Sr., and of course my girlfriend, Barbara, all of this would not have been possible. Thank you so much.
In particular I would like to thank my brother, Tijl: “Little brother, unfortunately, there can only be one person on the highest step of the podium, but this title belongs to the both of us !”

Bert

Bert jr. and Tijl and dad Bert sr. a combined effort even carrying the prizes !!!!
As shared by them.

Rayskala is back to normal and the local pilots fly from their own field again. Yesterday young Petri [tuggie and glider pilot] flew in an LS 6 500 km and another friend from Rayskala Hannu 488 in the ASG 29/18m. It looks like the weather is better now and that the real Finnish summer has started.
The day before German pilot Jan Rothhard flew a 1000 in Finland [508 FAI triangle] from Menkijarvi in the 16 m. Ventus BT.Good on him ! And a 976 km flight from Teisko was good too [Ventus 2C /18m]

The Norwegian Nationals are over and Arne Martin is the new National Champion in OPEN CLASS;

Here is his story:

” After having tried my luck in the sports class of the Norwegian Gliding Championship, this year I was going to try my luck with the big boys in open class. Both classes allow all gliders, and uses handicaps to try to compensate for performance difference between the gliders. The difference being that sports class is more targeted at more inexperienced pilots, with shorter tasks and no water ballast allowed. Open class is where the most experienced pilots are competing, so for the first time I would go up against those. This is the elite of Norwegian Gliding! I wasn’t the only first time competitor to the class, in addition to me, Per Morten Løvsland and Kristoffer Samuelsen were participating. Not only where we less experienced than the others, we were also flying the lowest performance gliders (15 m unflapped gliders, Discus for me and Kristoffer, LS 8 for Per Morten) against mostly flapped competitors with 18 m wingspan and more. All 3 of us have been flying a lot of Condor: The Competition Soaring Simulator, which somewhat makes up for our less experience. But no doubt it was going to be a challenge to go up against the big boys in their big planes!”
He has made a great story with pictures and here are a few already.

  

After 3 cancelled days the pilots were preparing their glider for the first flying day and,…flying over the many trees in beautiful Norway.

  

Not all went well, some had to out land, but others made it and finished.

The link to the full story AND 59 pictures;

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10152510244370605.1073741866.738460604&type=1&l=6f78d4f2fb

More Nationals or other interesting comps are flown at the moment, and for the scores you can go to www.soaringspot.com
Italy—- the Standard Class Nationals and 2 other comps from Terme
France —-the French Nationals for women
France—-the International Issoudun
Czech Rep —- 3 comps with a total of 76 participants
The UK —-with the 18 m. Nationals
Bosnie-Herzegovina—-with the LIVNO Adria Cup
And more.

The latest Gliding International, edition July-August, arrived from New Zealand on my doormat with lot’s of new news!
—Elke Fuglsang-Petersen shines her light over soaring in Germany and the USA looking at it from all angles.
—the tragic tale of Langley’s Aerodrome by veteran journalist and recreational glider pilot Rod Dew
—Aldo’s view on the ARCUS, specially on the ARCUS E over 8 pages including pictures
—the double spread picture in the middle is for another 2 seater; the ASG 32
—solving the problems for high costs in towing…the Beaufort Gliding Clubs [Australia] HORNET GLIDER TUG…
—AND  more news on tugs……the view from Bob Ward on alternatives for thirsty Pawnees

and much more as the SUNFLYER and SUNSEEKER…..the 13.5 m. Sparrow Hawk….a motor glider story about a brush with the law….and lot’s of world news and of course the quick 3-liners in  “things with wings”.
ENJOY!

And to finish this great picture from Eddy from Sportaviation in Tocumwal.His hangars and the rainbow!

CU next Wednesday, cheers Ritz

Hi all,back on track after a short but good and relaxing break.No laptop and NO idea what was going on! Only soccer was updated via our TV in the house. And we did and are still doing well in that sport.

USA pilot Sean Franke is flying Dutch glider NL1 at the 33d WGC in Rayskala.
courtesy Wings and Wheels via FB.

With over 100 messages I needed the weekend to read it all and to be honest I was still busy on Monday. Had a quick look and analysed the first week in Rayskala  in my blog on SoaringCafe.

On Monday I followed at home the live stream on the WGC site from the briefing and could see Heikki as CD and weatherman. The last function is how I met him and he is a REAL good meteo-guy. It looks he is doing a great job as CD too.
Amazing to be sitting at home and be able to follow the briefing. CRAZY!!! BUT GOOD!!!

The weather unfortunately is this year not Heikki’s  friend but it looks better for the rest of the week and he hoped for a total of 8 days of WGC flying.So another 4!!!
Anyhow Monday was cancelled and the message was …..” TOO MUCH MOIST from a slowly passing low pressure system moving to the East.”
A nap was recommended! I guess under a blanket with only 10 dgr.

Picture courtesy South African team.

Tuesday…July 1
After the rest , the visits to cultural places as castles , fun places as the GO kart,[by the way I raced there in the past as well!!]  and a City tour,or looking at the World comps soccer, it was time for SOARING again!!! There ” could” be a small window to the W, depending if they ” could ”  launch and stay up at Rayskala. A and B tasks were handed out at the briefing but they decided already then,  that it would be task B …a 2 hour AAT for all classes.

   

The Hameenlina Castle and the Go Cart race court was visited by the Aussie team
Pictures shared by Mike Codling.

   

City tour by Argentinian pilot Damian and his friends as shared by Marcelo Lanzinetti or looking at  SOCCER. Picture shared by the organizers.

What ever they wished and hoped for even the 2 hour AAT was not on. A pity. As they mentioned on their side this is the coldest summer since years!
” Past two weeks have been record breaking  cold in Finland – last time the end of June has been so cold is over 50 years ago.” 

Picture shared by the Aussie team.
“Today We have patches of sun and the satellite picture is improved, with some generous optimism we may see some flying.”
by Adam.

Wednesday….today! Let’s see if that’s going to happen!
They set 300 km. A-tasks , for this flying day 5 , so that ‘s a good beginning;
331 km. for the dual pilots, 253.4 for club and standard pilots go for 314.4 km!!!
Unfortunately light showers postponed the first launches, but  they still have B tasks if necessary.
Whilst writing they changed to the B tasks ; AAT’s. First start should be at 1.15.
You can have a look at the scores on www.soaringspot.com  or  at the WGC site.

As you can see the Finnish spirit is still OK.

The weather however was no so bad in other parts of Europe.
P.E Holland had superb weather and pilots had placed their gliders upfront in the hangar to be the first to be launched on Tuesday morning.OVER 800 km. FAI triangle was flown in Holland in the Nimbus 4Dm and over 700 in the Duo Discus.
HOWEVER as Max the pilot from the Nimbus 4DM mentioned it was not as good as it looked and we were pretty slow , but we did it. They were in the air for under 10 hours .
6 Times 1000 was flown from Germany in different gliders from  Discus 2T/18m., to ASH 25 E/26 m. [ 1000 km FAI triangle!] and once from Luxembourg by kilometer eater Guy Bechtold in the Quintus M.
Over 800 km. [750 FAI] in a Libelle and St Cirrus are just GOOD!!!

The Norwegian Championships in open class  have started but the pilots did not fly till today.After 3 cancelled days it looks , seeing this picture shared by Arne Martin, that they are going to fly .

EUROGLIDE. As said in my soaring cafe blog the fastest pilots were back in 4 days and flew over 2000km.. The prize giving is in a few weeks .
The last ” heroes of the long distance”  are still flying in at the airports of Malden. Here is the team from Eindhoven , Deelen and Rotterdam as seen by Frouwke Kuijpers .What I heard they are tired but VERY happy.
Still a few flying  over France and Belgium, but the weather forecast  is GOOD!!! They are going to make it in time  as the last day is July 5.

   

Finish with SOCCER again.Loved the match between Belgium and the USA last night, but also between Argentina and Switzerland.It only does n’t give me enough  sleep.The quality of the games is higher and higher and it means that Friday and specially Saturday when the Dutch Orange Lions play against Costa Rica  and the Belgian Red Devils against Argentina  millions will miss out on  a decent night of sleep.But who cares,…the World-championships are only once in 4 years!

CU next Sunday in Soaring CAFE, cheers Ritz
On Wednesday July 2 2014 , the day my 10 year old granddaughter Indya is send off by all children and teachers from the school she happily spend 7 years on ,  ready to continue on grammar school [ still at age 10]  AND the day before our son/brother would have turned 45.