Post 1.416 on SATURDAY April 29 2023.

FCC GLIDING 2023

Only 2 days to go, when I left you and these prizes above, were for the winners.
Here you are with the last 2 days.
April 26, a very cold, challenging and technical day.
Club; 271.68 km....with a very late start [ 13.49], in his SZD 55, Polish pilot Wojciech Kubiak won the day. A difficult day as the speed even for club was [s]low;79.65 km./h.
2 Romanian pilots even started later at 14.11. One of them Tudor was 3d , his mate Alin, 12th.
Ferenc in his LS 4 was runner up and with 1 day to go ,he is in the running for the highest spot.
18 started and 13 finished!
15 m; 315.04 km.…All” the fiddling around”by Adam to get his new shared toy in the best condition, bear fruit. HE WON THE DAY!!!!! Only 2 pilots flew over 100 km. /h and that was Adam and Sebastian. Sebastian moved through the week, slowly up to the best overall spot.
After task 5 he was on spot 1 overall and on the penultimate day again. Effective flying.
Adam; “Never have I been so cold in all my life, -2 to -5°c for 5hrs today – this was my motivation to get home fast I think: Day Winner ” full story on Adam Woolley’s Gliding Adventures
For the last day he got ski-leggings from his Polish mate, Lucasz .
28 Started and 16 finished!!! The Czech girls did well; spot 4 [Barbora] and 6[ Jana and Dana].
combi; 334.46 km....The first 6 daily places were for Poland and the Czech Rep. Marek Sawczuk in his ASG 29 won ; 118.43 km./h!!
34 started and 29 finished. Radek and Petr were on 3 and 4.

April 27; VERY LAST DAY!!!! 3 hour AAT’s for all 3 classes.
“temperature around 6° this morning was frozen water in the hoses to fill the water ballast! ???? Sailing is, in short, a typical summer sport! “the organizers.
A 1000 points-day!
Club; 318.70 km and a speed of 106.23 km./h was the best result and that was for FERENC! He was sure now of winning this FCC 2023! Good on him.
Alin was runner up; 312 km speed 103.36 km./h.
18 started and 1 was out.
15 m; French pilot Aurelien won the first day and the last day!!!!! He flew 351 km ; speed 116 km./h.
The French did well on this last day with a 4th and 5th spot by Max and Julien.
All 31 started and only 1 was out; Romanian pilot Norbert, who flew so well in this FCC.
He won task 4, 5 and 6. He topped the overall, scores on 3 days after task 6,7 and 8.
In the end he finished on spot 20. Such a pity!!!!!
Combi; Karol Staryszak won the day; 395 km with 131 km./h!!!Czech pilot David was runner up and sure after this flight of a top spot.
33 started and 1 was out!!.

So the final scores of this FCC 2023, after 7 out of 12 days.
Club class;
1. Ferenc Tamás From Hungary, in LS 3 WL with 5.876 points. Congratulations Ferenc.
2. Stanislaw Wujczak from Poland in Mini Nimbus B with 5.706 p.
3. Alin Simion from Romania in LS 4 WL with 5.680 p.

15 m class;
1. Sebastian Kawa from Poland in DIANA 2 with 5.749 points. Congrats Sebastian.
2. Maximilian SEIS from France in DISCUS 2A with 5.662 p.
3. Barbora Moravcova from Czech Rep in LS 8 with 5.602 p.
Great practice from the Czech-Ladies- team for the Spanish WWGC in 60 days.
Barbora won, Jana was 6th and Dana 9th.
In Club Petra was 8th.
They seem READY!!!!!.

Combi class;
1. David Mach from Czech Rep in JS 1 with 5.781 points. Congratulations David.
2. Karol Staryszak from Poland in ASG 29 with 5.736 p.
3. Andre Weidlich from Germany in Ventus 3M with 5.708 p.

Unfortunately NO PICTURES were shared from the prize giving, at least I could not find them. In the end I found 1 from the 15m class!!!

And later one from Club class

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KLIX …Germany
28 April 2023 – 6 May 2023

The 29th edition has , as always, lot’s of international guests again and is flown in 4 classes, with in total 107 pilots. A very well loved -early-in-the-season-competition like in Nitra and Prievidza.
Till now they had 2 practice days, 1 with no results and 1 with with up to 366 km in 18 m. won by Helge Liebertz this year flying a 26 m. ASH 25 .
Yesterday was the first TASK. NO TASK!

21 st Fatraglide from Martin in Slovakia starts today.
And in ORIENT in South Africa the 2023 Gauteng Regionals start today as well.
More on Wednesday!

Cheers Ritz

Post 1.415 on Wednesday April 26 2023.

FCC GLIDING 2023…..Prievidza, SLOVAKIA
16 April 2023 – 27 April 2023

It’s pretty cold here with that ENE wind. Sun yes , but no SPRING!!!!
Same in Slovakia, though they have rain, even worse.
Their daily message ;”OK… Today’s task for all classes is cancelled. So there is no point in doing a briefing either. For sure, you can spend this time more pleasantly ????”
So the Wednesday was cancelled , still 1 day of flying , but there is hope for 8 more days!!!
Last day and prize giving on April 27.
No worries for Adam, he spends his time and thoughts filled with gliding so a bit of fiddling around with the instruments fills a day!

Adam “fiddling” with his instruments.
Adam Woolley’s Gliding Adventures

2 Days with no task BUT,…..Then the better weather finally arrives. Organizers and pilots will be so HAPPY.
FCC- competition- life starts again at

Day 5 on April 20, flying day 2…..AND a 1000 -points-day!!!!
Club; 3 hour AAT.….won by Hungaryan pilot Attila in his ASW 20; 291 km.
19 started and 18 finished.
15 m; 3 hour AAT….2 Romanian pilots ,Norbert and Ionut, on top with Sebastian as 3d. Adam was 7th.
All 31 started and only one was out.
combi; 3 hour AAT…..Czech pilot David [Mach] was the daily winner in his JS1. Romanian pilot Andreas [Kessler] was runner up in the “mighty” ASH 32 MI.
37 started and 7 were out.

Day 6 on April 21 , flying day 3…..another good day with even longer AAT’s. ”  we had all gliders in the air in one hour and 5 minutes. …”
Club; 3.30....Ferenc Tamás in the LS 3 with winglets was the best; 373 km in time 3.32; 105.58 km./h. 3 More pilots flew over 100 km./h.
15 m; 3.15… Norbert [Scarlat] in the Discus 2A was just ahead of Sebastian . Note; Sebastian’s DIANA 2 FES has a high handicap; 117.5 for 112.6 for the Discus.
combi 3.15….AND….there is David again; 433 km in time 3.15; speed 132.98 km./h. for 1000 points. Father/son combination Radek [JS 1 TJ] and Petr [AS33es] from Czech Rep were 3d and 5th.

Day 7, on April 22 flying day 4 and racing tasks to go for with nice weather;

Club; 339.15 km.…a racing task in his Mini Nimbus with 127.58 km./h. is GOOD!!!! Yes it looks like Stan [Stanislaw Wujczak] is still as good as he was when we were both at the same comps. WELL DONE….but only 863 points.
20 Started and only one was out.
15m; 417.39 km...Norbert was even faster in his Discus 2A; 134.10 km./h and in this class for 1000 points. 3d Successive win for Norbert!!!!
3 Discus types in the top with the French Julien and Max on 2 and 3.
All 31 started , 2 were out.
Adam on his flight; “
Lukasz & I were at TP3, 10km & 1000′ above Barca, in our little groove. Earlier Barca [ Barbora Moravcova flying an LS 8 and member of the Czech women team ] & the CZ Women’s team got to within 300′ of us at TP2. So I really felt for her, we just took a different street to TP3.Then the magic happened for her! While Lucasz & I ran a direct line with good CU, Barca decided that the sun on the opposite side of the valley & with wind blowing up it was the better choice. Her calm thinking rewarded her with a 5m/s climb, then straight line cruising until she was 2000′ above us in the 2nd last climb area – outstanding!” more on Adam Woolley’s Gliding Adventures
combi; 447.02 km....good better best….for Radek in his AS 33es; he won the day with 151.59 km./h. for 980 points, with a late start at 13.14, the last to go on track, to be precise. Dad Petr was 19th. He started much earlier as Radek at 12.50.
39 started 2 were out , 2 by an airspace-infringement.

Sunday April 23; “Tomorrow looks like a cracker, bring it on” is what Adam said in his blog on Saturday.
Looking at the tasks they expect indeed a lot!!!!!
But also the message ;”Good morning. We expect the weather interval to end a little earlier today. Therefore, the first start is scheduled for 10:45“
club; 436.45 km…..Good old Stan [ Stanislaw Wujczak] and his Mini Nimbus seem unbeatable. Yes he won again!!!! Only 2 pilots just over 100 km./h and he was one of them. Ferenc the other one.
20 started and 14 were IN!!
Looking back in my books I found some 1993 WGC info; Stan was then a member of the Polish team in Borlange where I was TC from the Dutch team. Stan was then 43 years old, had 3200 hours and was an airline pilot. He flew the ASW 22B and won day 9 and 11 and was 5th overall after 11 days. His Polish mate Janusz Centka won that WGC in open class.
15m; 511.23 km…..2x a DUO DISCUS in the top; speed 111/112 km./h. 23 From 32 finished.
Ionut dropped from 4 overall after 5 tasks to 22 by entering forbidden airspace. You MOSTLY don’t do that on purpose, in a few cases it can happen, ……. but it hurts!!!!
Adam was out after 481 km but still positive; “Let’s talk about the positives first, I had a sensational flight in all reality, while I am disappointed that I’m in a field, I’m actually very happy how I flew today.”
More in Adam Woolley’s Gliding Adventures
combi; 558.26 km…..Andre Weidlich won day 1 and won again now; 135 km./h in his Ventus 3 M.
30 from 39 finished.

NO FLYING ON MONDAY…..but they had news about a 1000-points-day. I am NOT good with points so here you are you have to figure it out by yourself.
“Investigation of 1 000 point possibility.
Dear competitors,
According of new regulation for alternating scoring- SEE ALTERNATIVE SCORING 2023, chapter – racing task – 8.4.1.,b
Competitors score:
specially formula: S = Sp x min(1, 200/(Spo-Spm)).
Than,
Check out FCC Gliding2023 Soaring Spot.
Look at Spm Value.
MUST to be minimum 800.
F, and Fcr must to be value 1 as well. Than 1000 points is possible for winner.”

They had a small task in club class on Tuesday , yesterday, but it was not flown, to save the very wet airfield. Both other classes were cancelled.

TODAY; the penultimate day;
club class; 271.68 km…..
15 m; 315.04 km..…
combi; 334.46 km...
More about the last 2 days on Saturday.
Also about KLIX, they just started in the rain.

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——-It’s always great to see how young people from the Australian Airforce Cadets doing a military gliding training in their holiday , start to love soaring and go solo. We had those young boys and girls in the far past [2004] as well at Sportavia. And we tried to be always SPECIAL for them, so they would never forget their week and their first solo with us. Mostly Eddie and Don trained them within a week.
As you can see they were grateful and send us this nice memory award. It’ s in my study now.
I will never forget them either!

Nowadays they still teach young ones how to glide
The picture below is from the Gliding Training School AAFC shows the proud young man and his instructor. https://www.airforcecadets.gov.au/what-we-do/training/aviation-experiences/gliding

And one day earlier Patrick and Claire went solo as well. A good day for the Bathurst cadets and their instructors.

Tom and Jane Gilbert from Temora, were till now the agents for DG and LS in Australia. After 20 years of delivering gliders ,also the DG 1000 for the air cadets, they stop and hand over to Scott Lennon, who will work from Temora too.

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Last weekend we had nice sunny mornings but wet afternoons here in the Netherlands. NO WORRIES for the pilots flying from Terlet they had fun till it was over.

Yesterday was such an awesome day again for the pilots with this time.1.485 km flown over land and WATER ….not just water but the Ligurian sea…..by Baptiste Innocent from Fayence. A long , long sit; 14 hours and 26 minutes!!!! He flew the 21 m span ASH 31 and it was an FAI TRIANGLE from 1.407 km as well. A great pilot and a great glider make the difference!!!! Amazing!

Some more great flights on April 25 ;
From Lasham in the UK; Andy Aveling and Garry Coppin flew 861 km. and Pete Harvey 754.9 km. THE FIRST 750 for the UK season and a triangle too!!!!! They “pushed” each other to their best performance for the day;
“10 days of rain, then polar air from south coast to Scotland. Cheshire gap was washed out by the sea air and very soft around Mind until Gloucester. Great day trying to stay in front of Garry and Andy in their Arcus.”
From Calcinate Dutch pilots Maurits and Joep flew 1.047 km.
From Aosta, Swiss pilot Yves Gerster flew 1.031 km .

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Eddie Madden was for years the CFI for Sportavia in Tocumwal. When it was sold on an auction Eddie started his own business on the South of the airfield with the old hangar from George Piszkors [R.I.P] and a new build hangar. With his wife Cheryll, a lovely lady [R.I.P] he built a new business ,”SPORTAVIATION” and the most wonderful camping area full of native plants and trees. It’s another end of an era of soaring and later more power-flying at Toc. BUT,…it’s for sale and hopeful new young people will take over and make it BIG again.

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And to finish this lovely spring picture from Germany by top photographer Tobias Barth who creates those beautiful calendars and” since 2015 my focus lies on the air-to-air photography of sailplanes .”

Post 1.414 on Wednesday April 19, the day my daughter Inge celebrates her jubilee of 25 years flying for TRANSAVIA.
CONGRATULATIONS dear Inge!!!

PRIBINA CUP.…NITRA
7 April 2023 – 15 April 2023

I left you last Wednesday with good tasks for all 4 classes and the organization was happy with their decision and mentioned at 1 PM ;
“All gliders are in the air. The sky is blue with many Cu clouds. Weather conditions are improving. Thermals are getting stronger and the cloud base is raising.” What do you want more????
So hopefully a good /strong day for the pilots with confirmed first launches at 11.30.

Day 6 task 3, flying day 2; What happened???Still a marginal day with ONLY 3 pilots flying over 100 km./h. That says enough and……… they flew in 18m/open.
Club class; 252.08 km…… 5 German pilots in the top 5 ,one of them the German coach Wolli Beyer in a Discus. [5th] Also one of the girls; Eva Senne in an LS 4 [runner up]
Daily winner in LS1f with winglets; Etienne Dollhausen 75.95 km./h and 1000 points!!!
from 21 starting, 5 were out.
15m;  324.20 km….with 88 km./h Czech pilot Jan Pavlik was the daily winner from the 25 who started the day. 11 Pilots were OUT.
An expensive day for Robbie who won day 1 but was punished now for entering forbidden airspace.
Open/18 m; 360.16 km….As said the only 3 pilots flying over 100 km./h were in this class.
Matthias Sturm flew around with 107 km./h in his JS 3TJ, team Dierscke/Schwenk in the ETA with 105 km./h and Simon Briel in the EB 28 edition 28.3m with 103 km./h . So you needed long wings or a fancy glider to get over 100 km./h.
From the 32 starting pilots ,5 were out.
20 m; 320.02 km…..also 1000 points in this class for daily winners Sibanc/Knez in the ARCUS T; speed 86 km./h. The TWINSHARK from German team Dawert & Novatscheck was runner up .Interesting to see that they went as the last in this class on track, at 13.33. The first start was just under an hour earlier.
From 13 starters , 5 were out!

The daily summery of the organizers; “ First cumulus clouds appeared quite early so launching procedure was confirmed to 11.30. It looked optimistic at the beginning however the clouds started to disappear from the southern part. Low cloud bases were a big challenge for the pilots. Northern part of the tasks was much pleasant for flying, some pilots were upset that their task did not reach to Martinske hole, where it looked amazing. It was not an easy day, but luckily many pilots made it home so we have another valid contest day.”

Day 7; RAIN….no flying.

Day 8; Great “Soaring-skies” here in the Netherlands, hopefully in Nitra too.
BUT,….NO it was NOT!!!!
Their early morning news was sad:
“Due to the unpleasant weather forecast we have come to the decision to end the competition. We are very grateful you started the flying season with Pribina cup and we hope to see you next year. Good luck on your flying days, stay safe and enjoy gliding. The FAREWELL PARTY starts at 4 pm. PRICEGIVING ceremony is scheduled for 5 pm.“

So after only 2 days luck is a factor as well in the scores. In my opinion scores do not really represent the capability of the pilots. But still,…..well done to the winners.
So when you want to see the scores please look at; www.soaringspot.com
57 great ELFO pictures to be seen at
Photos » Day7 2023-04-13
Still a lot of smiling faces. THE WEATHER!!!!!! Yes we all know! Next year Easter is a bit later!

The FCC [Flight Challenge Cup ] 2023 in Prievidza is waiting now ; 16 to 27 April 2023 with 32 pilots in 15 m class, 28 in club class, 41 in the combi class .[ 18 m ,open and 20 m]

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The FCC Cup Gliding 2023
16.04. – 27.04.2023 
Prievidza – Slovakia

With 100 participating pilots this FCC is always a busy competition. Aussie blogger, Adam flew after a few weeks working for the Airline Company he flies for in Japan, to Europe to be part of it.
In Adam Woolley’s Gliding Adventures you can follow him at this competition.
‘Just met my new toy, a syndicate of three with two other great lads “
He flies a Discus with call sign GX. ND,…he started well.

Task 1 on Sunday April 16;
A BIT OF A DIFFICULT DAY ACCORDING TO THE ORGANIZERS, BUT THEY SOLVED ALL PROBLEMS;
“The first day of competition is always tough. Today we were unpleasantly surprised by the grass part of the track, which was wetter and more soft than we expected. Some of the heavier planes from the 15m class didn’t want to get off the ground and had to restart. This of course caused multiple aborted launches as we had to wait for the runway to clear. Thanks to the turbo “Čmelák” and also the turbo dynamic we got all the competitors safely in the air at the end.“
Club class; 2.15 AAT…..19 pilots started in this class ,9 were punished and 3 out.
Winners of course too; Alin Simion from Rumania in his LS 4 A with winglets; 233 km with 95.70 km./h. Runner up was Hungarian pilot Frenc Tamas in an LS 3 /15m with winglets; 236 km with 96.19 km./h.
Good old Stan Wujczak, he flew already in “my” time was 3d in a Mini Nimbus B.
One pilot had “no valid start”.
15 m; 2 hour AAT….. Aurelien Doriat from Poitiers was the best! In the LS 8 he flew 242 km with a speed of 114.83 km./h. Aurelien was in 2019 ,3d at the French National junior comps.
Maros Divok [Slovakia] was runner up and….in a DUO DISCUS XT; speed 113.43 km./h 3d Was Adam [Australia] in his new Discus 2A; 242 km with 113.40 km/h …… pfffff close!!!!!
Max Seiss was 4th, Kevin Faur 7th, Milos Cink 8th and Sebastian Kawa 10th.
All 31 started, one had an invalid start[ 100 m above start altitude] and 4 were out.
Adam;” What an awesome little day, though the start & finish was pretty sketchie! Very pleased to have achieved my goals today, felt really great” and “Big shout out to Lukasz Blaszczyk who team flew with me today, our combined strategy at the start really helped get the result.” “Unfortunately for Lukasz, he missed a climb that I managed to get behind him, a communication barrier saw him decide to not come back.”
Much more in Adam Woolley’s Gliding Adventures
Combi class; 2 hour AAT….German pilot Andre Weidlich was the best in his Ventus 3 M; 252 km with 118 .84 km./h.
Czech pilot Ivan Novak was runner up; 237 km with 118.37 km./h and another Czech pilot Petr Krejcirik , dad from Radek was 3d in the JS 3 TJ 249 km with 118.63 km./h. So all 3 nearly as fast for 517,515 and 510 points. Radek was 27th in an AS 33es; 260 km but no finish.

Task 2 on April 17; WEIRD DAY!!!! No more news by the organizers. So NO NEWS IS GOOD NEWS.
“Gridding has been suspended, there has been a bomb threat on the airfield As I drove out, all gliders have been left where they were at the time of the notice, on the runway, in the ballast area, etc – airfield now deserted, very strange! Awaiting more info from the Police now..” by Adam.
Club class; 2.30 AAT…...CANCELLED
15 m; NO TASK
Combi class; 2.30 AAT…..CANCELLED.
Later news from Adam; “Bomb threat now cleared at the Prievidza airfield: Super interesting experience, gliders literally left in the spot, & moment in time that the owners learnt of the threat. Covers half taken off, gliders half rigged, cobra trailer lids left up, etc – felt like I was in a popular series on Netflix which portray history events..!”

Day 3, April 18… with new hope! But,…only for 15 m pilots.
The organizers; “IN the morning we were almost 100% convinced that we would not fly today. But in the end we managed to find a short interval in the weather forecast models which should allow a competition for at least one class. We chose to go with the 15m class because there are significantly fewer competitors than the combi class“
So 15 m got a task; 1.30 AAT, but the first launch time was rescheduled to 13.30 as the “window did not open earlier”.
Adam was optimistic though ;”15m class only to grid today, 1.5hr AAT. I’m at 460kg again today, I think the optimum window is between 1330 & 1400. If we’re fortunate, we can fly on the convergence on three legs”
Unfortunately the day was cancelled. They tried HARD!!!!
AND,…there is MORE hope for Wednesday!!!

Day 4; today…..Short news yet.” Good morning. The weather is keeping us in check so far. Although it doesn’t seem like it, several models show that there is still a chance for a short discipline. We have no choice but to wait for actual data.“
More next week .
Only 1 flying-day till now but weather, as you know , can change in a flash, so I hope that happens now.

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—–Juniors!
Some news about the planning of the UK juniors;
“Last weekend the Junior Development Squad travelled to Lasham for the first training camp of 2023. 10 squad members were joined by a few pilots from the Women’s team to take advantage of the favourable forecast. Coach Jake Brattle led the weekend with daily briefings and post-flight analysis sessions in the evenings, showing the juniors where they could improve their flights.
Everyone enjoyed 3 days of racing, giving a small taste of what’s to come this year.
The squad will travel next to Issoudun, France as part of the annual overseas coaching week. They will then fly the 46e International Issoudun, where the coaching can be put into practice in a competition setting. Plenty to look forward to!”

——-Top flights, photos and reports – Peter Millenaar in a very nice interview OLC – onlinecontest.org
Dutch pilot Peter is a top pilot, 4x Dutch champion and Junior World Champion [Leszno 2013] and great photographer. He is introduced in their magazine.
I shared already some news and pictures from St Auban a few weeks ago.
Have a look at https://www.onlinecontest.org/…/segelfl…/cmsnews.html…

–—-Last Friday was a top day here in The Netherlands, but also in other countries in Europe. The sky looked fabulous and I was eager to see how many flights we had here. We had 53!!!And,…ALL over Holland from N to S from W to E..
Best flight was in the ARCUS M from Soesterberg;708 km.
8 Flights over 600 km. and lots of pictures with happy messages.
Germany had 133 pilots up and best result; 861 km. in ASH 31/21 m.
Best flight for the day was in Romania with great wave up to nearly 7000 m. MSL in an ARCUS M., from the airport of Ghimbav Brasov. 1.127 km. and 164 km./h.

One of the Dutch juniors , Maurits Hebels, flew from Calcinate in Italy and managed to fly 859 km in an LS4 with call sign AG, one of the Dutch gliders specially for the juniors. Good on him. Last Monday he flew in ARCUS T another 762 km with Joep Heesakkers. Yesterday; 853 km.
Quite a few Dutch pilots over there in Calcinate. 26 Flights from there last Monday, with Italian, Swiss , UK and Dutch pilots.
Another former junior, Davide Giovanelli flew in a DISCUS 2, 1.205,67 km , last Sunday from Locarno in Switzerland. Great effort. Wave up to 5661 MSL.
Best flight last week in Calcinate on April 18; Jon Gatfield with an Alpine 1000 km flight;1.024.52 km …speed 113 .83km./h ….https://weglide.org/flight/246863

2 VERY long and impressive flights again in the USA and both with “huge ” speed.
Gordon Boettger flew in an ARCUS J…… 2.099 km with 191.37 km./h., together with Bruce Campbell, sitting with him for nearly 11 hours in the “cold”.
James Lee flew in the JS 1 a distance of 1. 829,83 km with 162 km./h.
MINDEN was the place to be!!!!
Gordon; “Takeoff a little late but wasn’t expecting it to be that great early in the morning.“
And” The clouds were simply amazing today. I feel really lucky to experience this. What a RIPPER!!!”
More on; https://www.onlinecontest.org/…/gliding/flightinfo.html… with many great pictures , here is one of them.

Kiripotib Soaring announced their fleet for “our” winter…..
Gliders; The glider fleet for the upcoming season has been finalized: We are pleased to announce 5 Ventus3M and 9 AcrusM for charter – on top: two of them will be ArcusM20 book now:
https://bit.ly/3KOID1G

Enough news again, more about the FCC next week.
Cheers Ritz

Post 1.413 on April 12 2023.
Hope you had a wonderful, Happy Easter period!!!
We had fog in the morning of Easter Saturday ,then it was dry and sunny and over the weekend up to 17 dgr. C…….. FINALLY. Though to be honest,..it was less good here than forecasted. Hope the rest of the countries around us will have improving weather as well. For sure after next Monday it will be between 17 and 20 dgr.C.

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Italian 18 m NATIONALS / 50thiest Trophy of Torino.
 31 March 2023 – 10 April 2023

After 4 days of rest, [they only fly 3 days in the 2 weekends] they continued in Torino-Aeritalia, their 18 m comps which is included in the Torino Trofeo, with together 18 pilots.
Aldo [Cernezzi] is the very experienced CD !
With a midweek-rest, the pilots gathered again for the 18 m Nationals included in the 50thiest Trophy in Torino.
Friday had a 1.45 AAT, but the day was cancelled in the end. One more or less extra rest day. So also there the weather was not good YET!!!
Easter-Saturday the weather improved dramatically and a racing task from 337 km. was set.
Nice to see that Andrea Florence, who flew on Saturday with Alberto in the back of the ARCUS T , reached 10.000 followers on his enthusiastic posts, in which he shares his passion for soaring. Congratulations Andrea.
Task 4; 337 km..…in 18 m. class. 13 pilots started all between 2.06PM and 2.19. They all arrived between 5.05 and 5.30 PM. All flew over 100 km./h and the daily winner Stefano in his Ventus 3 T, was the fastest with 117 km./h . That was 1 km/h faster than Andrea Ferrero in the AS 33es.
Looking at the not-18m-pilots, Alberto in the ARCUS T was the best; 3d from 18 in total.
Task 5; 220 AAT…. Very last day……Vittorio Squarciafico in his ASG 29 won the day with 224 km and a speed of 95.85 km./u. Alberto Pozzi was a tiny bit slower and missed out on 2 points to win the day; 95.66 km./h.
The winners in 18 m.
1. Stefano Ghiorzo in VENTUS 3T with 3,155 points and ITALIAN 18m. CHAMPION.
2. Giancarlo Grinza in Ventus 3FES with 3,085 p.
3. Andrea Ferrero in AS 33e with 3,074 p.
4. Alberto Pozzi in JS 1 with 3,052 p….pretty close…..

the “fight” for the Torino CUP was as follows;
1. Stefano Ghiorzo with 3,274 points.
2. Alberto Pozzi with 3,238 p.
3. Giancarlo Grinza with 3,214 p.

CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL pilots flying this early in the season competition.

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PRIBINA CUP NITRA. [Slovakia]
April 7-April 15 2023

With 102 pilots in 4 different classes, this is the biggest -International- early-in-the-season-competition , from the year.; The Pribina Cup edition 21.
26 pilots in Club class, 27 in 15 m, 14 teams in the 2-seater class [20 m] and 35 in open class/18 m. .
Specially the open/18 m. class shows some top pilots.
I hope ELFO is there to make his fabulous pictures!!!
On April 7 Good Friday, no task was set for the 4 classes.
On Easter Saturday the message board showed early news; “Good morning everyone!- No grid for today- Briefing at 10AM”
The weather did not want to co-operate;” We woke up to the over casted morning and the weather stayed pretty much the same for whole day with some light rain showers. In the airport we had a relaxed atmosphere and after the morning briefing most of pilots went to explore Nitra city or some other tourist attractions in the area. We hope you all enjoyed some free time. Weather forecast is getting more promising for next competition days and all of us are having fingers crossed to have a first competition day in the following couple of days.”
Patience at an airport, we all know about it…no worries!!!
Easter Sunday the expectations were high, so a 2d briefing was set for 12 PM.
Indeed Tasks WERE SET;
Day 3 task 1; in the 4 classes Club, 15m., open and 2-seaters a 2 hour AAT was set. With first launches at 1PM. BUT,……”
“Unfortunately, the weather conditions did not allow us to race today. Therefore today is cancelled for all classes.”

New hope for day 4 with task 2 flying day 1.
In Club 205.52 km. was set. 20 Pilots started in this class from several countries.
10 finished and 10 were out! Daily winner ; Jelle from Belgium, in an ASW 24 WL,…..good on him.
In 15 m. 267.10 km…..Best for the day and flying an LS 8; Robbie[Seton] from the Netherlands but flying a lot at Keiheuvel in Belgium.
23 Pilots started and ONLY 3 finished!!!!Robbies speed was 66.77 km./h. Runner up Marin [Jurovic] in the VENTUS CT was a tad faster, but just finished a tad to low.[67.46 km./h] Hana [Ventus 2ax] and Jana Treslova [LS 8] were on spot 6 and 9.
in open/18 m. 301 km…...32 started and only 3 finished without a penalty. 2 finished but ended on 9 and 11 after penalty points.
Proud on Dennis [Huybreckx] who won the day for Belgium in his VENTUS 3 ; 75.25 km./h. Runner up was Nicolas Bernhard [Ventus 3] from France ;73.78 km./h.
Marius Pluscauskas was the fastest in his ASG 29E; 89.38 km./h, but,…a too low finish.
Some pilots REALLY were close ;297 km. Such a pity, 7 just started and were already out after less than 50 k.
in 20 m 261.03 km…..4 from 13 finished!! Daily winners team Schwan/Hudler from Austria in an ARCUS T. The number 4 finisher was after 2 more Arcus types a German DUO DISCUS X70.55 km./h. ; !!!
The “LOW” countries Belgium and The Netherlands did well….with Jelle, Robbie and Dennis as first-day-winners.
Daily summery from day 4 by the organizers;
“THE FOURTH DAY!
Finally we had a nice sunny morning so every pilot was excited to race today. We settled a grid on runway 33, with first expected launch at 11:30. The weather prediction looked quite promising and therefore we declared a racing task for all classes in a range of 205 – 301 KM. First launch was postponed to 12:15 and 90 sailplanes went to compete in the air. By pilots references it was a challenging day with different weather conditions on every turnpoint. In every class we had pilots who finished their tasks so a big congratulations from our side to them. Tomorrow there is a occluded front coming to our direction and we have only small chance to fly but we will see in the morning.”

No task yesterday,…too much wind. Easter is early in the year and that shows!

tasks today; Task 3 ,flying day 2. …….more next week.
club; 252.08 km
15m; 324.20 km
open;360.16 km
20m;320.02 km
a racing day,…good!!!!!

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ARNBORG EASTER CUP.
 6 April 2023 – 10 April 2023

More EASTER SOARING this time in Denmark from Svæveflyvecenter Arnborg!!!
A Multi class competition with 16 participating pilots flying between LS1f[handicap 100] and ASH 31.MI /21 m.[ handicap 121]
Task 1 ; 2 hour AAT……was straight on the first day with Filip Bojanowski in the Duo Discus XLT as daily winner; 209 km with a speed of 104 km./h. They started at 13.41 and finished at 15.42.
The other Discus, a T, flown by team Asger/Miles flew further,[217 km] started nearly an hour later [14.30] and finished an hour later [16.41] ; speed 99.62 km./h.
Task 2 ; racing task from 132 km……the Duo Discus T did well again …THEY WON the day with 90 km./h , nearly 10 k faster than runner up Lasse in an LS 8.[82 km./h.]
Only 14 starters and from them 4 were out.
Task 3; 128.70 km.…pretty marginal day with speed around 70 km./h which says enough. Late start between 3.30 and 4 PM , not all started and from those 10 who did, 3 were out.
Task 4;121 km…..12 pilots choose to fly on this last pretty tricky day, 7 were out and 5 finished.
Michael Mix in the LS3a won the day; speed 88 km./h.
Mathias Valentin ,who topped the overall list ,in his LS 8 was out after 78 km and was in the end on spot 3!
Filip in the Duo Discus XLT, was 3d on the last day and moved up to SPOT ONE and…..WINNER of the CUP.
Lasse Edslev had a less good day as well, he was 3d overall but moved on this last day to spot 5by being , after an out-landing after 78 km..
All final scores pretty close;
1. Filip in Duo Discus XLT with 1.378 points.
2. Team Asger/Miles in Duo Discus T with 1.371 p.
3. Mathias Valentin in LS 8 with 1.348 p.
Their last comment;
“Rigtig god stemning og måske bliver Arnborg Påskecup også en ting næste år.”
I presume the translation means “the atmosphere was really great and till next year.”

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Last Wednesday , after that beautiful Monday April 3, [ 5x a 1000 plus] full of cloud street over parts of Europe, 2 pilots still managed to fly a 1000 from Grabenstetten in Germany in an 18 m ASG 29 E and from Grenoble in France in an ASH 31/21 m.
A DUO-DISCUS even flow 866 km [ 738 FAI triangle]!!!!! They reached 1744 AGL / 2106 MSL and started from Weinheim in Germany.
One day later on April 6, still good thermals but also wave over the Alps up to nearly 4000 m MSL ; 2 wave flights over several European countries, both in a Nimbus 3/4 DM and just over 1000 km. starting at Lienz Nikolsdorf in Austria . Also from Trieben in Austria a 1000 in an ASH 31 /21 m.
From Germany several “nearly” 1000 km flights.[3 over 900 km in Ventus 3 M and 1 in EB 29]
The EASTER-weekend was good for many. See below!

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VINTAGE flying!
From Lasham ,this Easter weekend a recently restored 1942 Schweizer TG3a by Gary Pullen, became airborne, behind a tug…..the first flight ever of the type in the UK .
Gary flew the TG3a for 25 minutes .”the glider needs two hands to bank, which makes some sense given the Waco glider that the pilots were due to fly after training on the TG-3.
The glider will now undertake a flight test program at the hands of Richard Moyse before becoming a part of the GHC flying fleet” [Gliding Heritage Center]

The UK started with the nice weather, on Good Friday and the rest of Europe was still waiting for their clear CU skies , to remove the overcast from West to East. Look at this;

What an Easter weekend we are having! Nearly 300 glider launches across the past two days and several thousand kilometres flown by the cross country pilots from the grid pictured on the runway here by Roy P.
Whilst the forecast is slightly trickier on Easter Sunday, we expect yet another busy flying day!

The weather here in The Netherlands over Easter was not as sunny as expected, though some areas enjoyed SUN.
Easter Saturday showed only 2 flights , but Easter Sunday had 53 pilots who were willing to fly; The ARCUS M from Soesterberg flew 602 km [ 500 FAI triangle]. Germany still had some cloud streets, so most Soesterberg pilots flew direction East into Germany.
SO…..PRETTY GOOD EASTER SUNDAY!

Enough news more next Wednesday, specially about the prestigious PRIBINA CUP.

Cheers Ritz

Post 1.412 on Wednesday April 5 2023.

—–News from WeGlide:
After 26 weekends of flying, the Australian league came to an end last Sunday. Here are this year’s winners:
—–Kingaroy Soaring Club – 314 Points
—–Gliding Club of Victoria – 261 Points
—–Lake Keepit Soaring Club – 212 Points.
And, the fastest :
Individual; Matthew Scutter had 132.82 speed-points.
Team rating: Kingaroy Soaring Club, 384.28 speed-points.
Here is the overall ranking for the 22/23 league season:
https://www.weglide.org/league/AU?type=total&round=25…

I shared already the African season with world wide OLC updates and now we start here no, have started here, the European season.
Looking at the OLC figures for the down-under-season on the last day of March, these are the results;
OLC -plus CHAMPION; Mac Ichikawa with 5357,05 points, followed by Toby Geiger with 5328,62 p.
Best flight; Norm Bloch with 1.116,90 points.
Distance record since 2011;Mac Ichikawa with a flight from Tocumwal on December 27 in 2018; 1.389,85p.
Stats from all flights; Mark Bland from Mount Beauty with 25.306,20 points [87 flights/ 18.565,94 km]
Busiest airport ; Beverley with 118.752,26 p. [106.779,42 km in 363 flights by 43 pilots.]
Busiest club; Beverly Soaring Society; 134.966,36 points [120.754,76 km in 412 flights by 40 pilots]
Note on distance record by Mac; 1.193,14 km. in an LS 8.
Note on busiest airport; runner up Benalla with 91.018,14 points [ 78.775,45 km in 233 flights by 30 pilots and 3d Tocumwal 82.260,31 points [ 73.170,28 km. in 197 flights by 25 pilots.]

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The Perlan Project had news; Very interesting reading…..
“Einar inspired us to dream more and do more. . . On a recent afternoon, a group of family, friends and colleagues gathered at the University of California Botanical Garden to celebrate the life of Einar Enevoldson, whose vision inspired The Perlan Project. He was truly an incredible pilot, dreamer and statesman. More in our latest blog“
https://bit.ly/EinarCelebration
Einar passed away already, after a long fight against cancer ,on April 14 2021 but the celebration of his life was now in March 2023. Covid delayed easy access to visit.
R.I.P. Einar.

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50 thiest TROFEO CITTA DI TORINA /18 m NATIONALS
31 March 2023 – 10 April 2023

On March 31 2 parallel comps started in Italy; The 50thiest Trofeo Citta di Torina including the 18m class Nationals with some well known pilots. Though I missed a few as Giorgio, Vittorio, Alberto and Tomas.
They might fly different comps now. Indeed Alberto flies in Torino but as team in an ARCUS T.
Anyhow 13 pilots in the 18 m Nationals.
They missed out on day 1 but started with
Task 1 on April 1 with a 2.20 AAT; a strong day with 8m./s …not bad.
331 km in time 2.33,46 [speed 129.15 km./h] was the winning combination for 18 m pilot Alberto Pozzi in the JS 1. On spot 3 and 4 the Ventus 3 FES from Giancarlo Grinza and The Ventus 3T/18m from Stefano Ghiorzo.[318 km/ 126.81 km./h] and [306 km /126.62 km./h]
Later these preliminary scores changed due to “penalty points; the new scores were; Giancarlo won , Stefano was runner up and Andrea Ferrero in an AS 33ES was 3d with 292 km with 125 km./h.
Task 2 had a set racing task from 342 km…..Another pretty good day with a 2800 m cloud base and lift up to 6 m/s
With 124.94 km./h Stefano was just a tad faster than Ciancarlo; 124.63 km./h. and won the day.
AND,…Alberto [Pozzi] was IN as well, with about the same speed ; 124.55.
All 3 started together at 2 .04/5 PM and landed before 5 PM at 4.49/50 PM and all 3 are close overall; 1.668, 1.664 and 1.633.
But only 2 days yet! For the Torino Cup those 3 are in the lead too, On spot 5 is the ARCUS from Alberto Sironi.
Now they wait again till Friday to continue with another 3 flights.

More next week..3 more days to go …nice picture, very nice!
Volo a Vela Torino – Competizioni & Performance Sportive

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It was busy last Sunday at the Glider place Terlet. Cold yes but still pleasant. A beautiful spot where I spend MANY hours in awesome nature. When my kids Dennis and Inge were at the field, long time ago, I walked, read books , visited friends , had numerous drinks and conversations together or cooked for all those who came back with my kids , to our caravan.
The VELUWE belongs to one of the most beautiful areas in The Netherlands.

Cold but nice opening of the season though in the beginning of March we had already a few very good CC days.
DOWNUNDER, they continue with nice flights in their autumn; 607 km in the JS 3 by Lumpy from Tocumwal [yesterday 615 km and 578 FAI triangle] and 461 by Gerrit in the EB 29 R from McCaffery field.
At McCaffery they fly the Easter Regatta 2023, but unfortunately only the practice days had flyable weather, till now. They continue till the 9th.
GREAT WAVE FLIGHTS;
Even better was the Sunday in the USA ,Spain and in France.
Let’s start with a WOW flight from 2000 km in the ANTARES 20 by Klaus Ohlmann, from Serres La Batie. He tried a triangle but, as he commented” The triangle was not possible. First turnpoint under rain and clouds. So, plan B was to make a 3 TP flight. The Pyrenees were excellent. Great thanks for all the controllers, essential to fly in all these airspaces.” He used the Alps and the Pyrenees . 12 hours and 47 minutes!!!!

From La Cerdanya in Spain, Czech pilot Milos Pajr, left in a HP304 MS [18 m SHARK] for a 1.542 flight . Speed 161. 68 km./h. Good on him…… 9 hours and 32 minutes of sitting! Pfff….
Even faster were the flights from James Lee in the JS 1 and Gordon Boettgher in the ARCUS J from Minden in Nevada in the USA; 185 km./h over 1.517 km and 194.23 km./h over 1.315 km.
“Only” 6 hours and 46 minutes for Gordon and his mate and 8 hours 12 for James.
Great wave , not all was working as expected but “Minden area had the strongest lift all day.”
great comment with lot’s of pictures on OLC and WeGlide.

Talking about speed…one day earlier on Saturday April 1 Jim Payne flew his wave flight from 1.020 km. with a speed of 211 km./h. A fast run in 4 hours and 50 minutes in an 18 m Ventus 3M.
Talking more about speed. The Andes in Argentina gave Juan Pablo Verdura a fabulous day; 1.679 km free distance with 187.17 km./h in a Ventus 2CM/18m.from San Martin
WeGlide added” Absolutely breathtaking images from Argentina Juan Pablo Verdura once again surfed the waves of the Andes yesterday, and what a spectacle it was! After enduring mostly blue conditions for much of his flight, he was rewarded with spectacular lentis in the south. From there, the sprint scoring started, rocketing 457 km to the north in just 2 hours With a speed of 228.56 km/h, Juan Pablo earns 198.75 sprint points, solidifying his position at the top of the current worldwide sprint ranking. Congratulations “ https://www.weglide.org/ranking/free?season=2023… for the current speed ranking

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Yesterday the first long thermal flights already in Germany 905 km [533 FAI]. Philipp Keller flew “around” Munich in his Ventus 3M /18m. Looks amazing. Good on him.
Also from Hahnweide a nice 863 km-flight by Max Maslak in his Ventus 3T/18m.
He does n’t want to know what could have happened when he would have started earlier. The air was crisp, clear and cold with mega -cloud-streets. I saw them at the weather news on TV.
Before 10 the clouds had popped up already. Not bad!!!!
His first European flight again after he flew 4x a 1000 in Bitterwasser in Nov/Dec. 2022. He was 1 of the young German pilots invited for the 1000 km-camp.

More about the Torino Cup and Italian 18 m Nationals next week….and more interesting “stuff”
AND,…what a great F1 race we saw in Melbourne, drama, hectic, red flags, 3 starts and a less first start from Max and an unexpected finish behind the safety car for him,….but HE WON!!!!

Wishing you all VERY HAPPY, SUNNY, EASTER DAYS!!!!!

Cu then,
Ritz