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.