Back from a lovely autumn-break in the beautiful South of Holland [Brabant]
Of course after arriving home I straight away checked, what had happened in Kingaroy, as I found it an interesting competition and was eager to see who had won.
Thank you to Mandy and the GFA site for keeping us informed over the 10 out of 11 days, with some long days with nice long tasks just over 500 km.
On the one-and-only-non- flying-day!
After some rain it was cold even in Australia. With Ben and Adam and Matthew and more.
courtesy Arne Boye Moller.
“The warmth of the stove was a welcome treat after getting soaked in the rain. Nothing in the Australia Travel Brochure had prepared me for cold and wet in this country – but there it is”
I left you on Wednesday so here is the winner and champion from Standard Class and the last 3 days in this class;
WINNER and with such a marge [755 points] that you can call him the TRUE CHAMPION; Greg Beecroft from Western Australia in his LS 8 with 8783 points.
Runner up Matt Gage from Victoria with 8028 points also in LS 8. The last days they had to fly in soarable windows with a 2.30 AAT on day 8 and 9 and a 269 km. task on day 10 ,the last day and won by ……Greg with a speed of 128 km./h.!
courtesy Arne, with his text:
“Band of pilots enjoying the companionship on the walk back from landing to their vehicles after a long day in the cockpit. Refreshments, long tales and easy banter awaits in the bar”
Very pleased to see that Matthew [Scutter] won the very strong 15 m. class and is 15 m. CHAMPION from Australia. He had to work for it, it was not so easy as for Greg in his class, but he did well, very well. Mac Ichikawa, [winning the last day 269 km. with a speed of 146. 3 km./h.] Pete Temple [ winning day 8 2.30 AAT] and Peter Trotter [ winning day 8 a 2.30 AAT] were in the race as well and they are all WGC pilots.
Matthew fought himself after 5 days to spot 1 overall and stayed there till day 10. Now he is not a real kilometre-eater, but also a great and still young NATIONAL CHAMPION. Like that!
Matthew [Discus 2] had 8084 points , Mac [ LS 8] 7943 and Peter Trotter [ LS 8] 7925 whilst Pete Temple had 7824 and finished on spot 5 behind Don Woodward.[ASW 20 C]
With Matthew to the left and Adam to the right.
Text and picture from Arne:
“The courageous and intrepid explorer team get caught out in heavy rain in the….right, rain forest”
Would Arne from Denmark be the winner in Australia?
No it did not happen in this combined open/18m. class. He was on 7 days the over all leader, but in the end during the AAT’s, he lost points and the Aussie mates passed him. CHAMPION is Tom Claffey, [8566 points] who started on day 1 with this top position and finished with it as well.
Butch [John Buchanan ] won the 2.30 AAT from day 8, Arne was on spot 10.On day 9 with a 2.15 AAT, Arne was so unlucky to out land, but you have to have that experience in Australia as well when you fly there, such nice big paddocks [sorry Arne, that experience would have been better during practise ] but it cost him nearly 400 points and he dropped from 1 overall to 3.
On the last day they flew over 339 km. and look at the speed: 159 km. /h!!!! for Tom . Some pilots started at 11.32 the winner from the day Tom started at 12.45!!
Good “old” Butch, who already flew our glider in the 1985 Worlds in Rieti, was the runner up with 8430 points and Arne was on spot 3 with 8253 points.
Text from Arne;
“Nice big solid field with stubble. Lots of peanuts to be found among the roots.”
AND
“The Young family who welcomed me”
Congratulations to ALL pilots , specially the CHAMPIONS! As said a great competition even following it from home!
To finish some words from Mandy:
“The Queensland drought produced excellent soaring conditions and I think every pilot spent more time in the cockpit than driving to the event, which is not always the case. The competition featured 10 days of fast flying with conditions ranging from low and blue to wave and fast Cu days. The tasks were well set to make the best use of the conditions and to challenge the pilots. Scores came out very quickly, and the fleet was launched in 75 mins with efficient use of only 4 tugs.
The competition ran very smoothly thanks to Neil’s planning and delegation and I didn’t hear a single complaint. Thank you Kingaroy”
What do you want more!?
Arne has a lot of pictures on his FB site about his Aussie experience; Here is the link he allowed me to use to show you those pictures as well to those who have not seen them yet;
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10202302586750374&set=a.10202286228661432.1073741836.1362547645&type=3&theater
What happened more?
Good old Ingo flew in his Discus 681 km. last Friday from Tocumwal and topped the OLC list that day. I liked the ” Ingo jokes” during briefing in Kingaroy , he surely appreciates them as well and not participating in comps anymore ,he is “still a bit there” on Nationals, he nearly always won.
“Ingo Renner can rig a Blanik in 5 minutes”.
“Ingo Renner doesn’t fly Standard Class, he flies Awesome Class”
“Ingo Renner did a form 2 on a K6, it is called a Quintus.”
Ingo is still very much involved with gliding in Tocumwal and is the CFI from the Southern Riverina Gliding Club.
Last night we changed from 3 AM into 2 AM , so wintertime is back with huge showers and a rough wind changing into a real autumn-storm tomorrow. [bft.10 on the coastal areas]. Not looking forward to that, as you know I do not like too much wind!
Cu on Wednesday, a bit later in the day,
Cheers Ritz
On Sunday October 27 2013. For more news today, you can also read www.soaringcafe.com