Kings-day in Holland, also for glider pilots! Orient; 177.8 km. /h. during regional’s!

zzzzKingsday by Theo

Great picture of ORANGE AMSTERDAM, courtesy Theo Hagenberg.

My goodness me, what a lovely KINGS-day we had last Monday. New Style ,…as we have a king now instead of queen Beatrix, , but it was all perfect .Even the weather, —-predicted was cold and rain, —-helped as it was sunny all day with fabulous clouds , but indeed pretty COLD.For those celebrating till mid night in the East of Holland it was extra cold; the ground temperature was MINUS 9 there. April has it’s own ideas about weather.
The glider pilots had a fab day too. A day off,  for starters, but those cloud streets and clouds!!!??? Only the wind was a bit of a spoilsport.
In the evening I looked straight at the OLC .
My friends Ake from Sweden and Dave from the UK “spoiled ” the Dutch OLC party a bit with a spot 1 for Ake   [652 km.in his Ventus2/350 FAI triangle] and a spot 10 for Dave. [496 in his LS 6 with winglets/428 FAI triangle]
The rest of the top 19 was for Dutch pilots ;31 from the 48 page-one-flights were Dutch.Pretty UNIQUE!!!!!!

zzzzUK by Peter

Great gliding weather in the UK, as shared by Peter Millenaar, at work!
Peter flies a 737-800 for Ryan Air and is based in Karlsruhe Baden Baden, but,..moves soon [June1] closer to Holland Niederrhein Weeze. Better for him as soaring is close by there [NIJAC] and he runs his own business in Holland ; Millen Air Glider Supplies  (www.MillenAir.eu)

AND YES,..Holland did well!!!!2 x a 700 by 2 mates who just bought their-selves an ASG 29e / 18m. and try it out now to the fullest; Mark [Leeuwenburgh] and Alfred Paul[Alfers] .By the way, 10 days earlier they both flew  888 km. on the other perfect day in Holland.
Bart[Berendesen] one of “my” former juniors tried out his new DG 300;570 and getting to know each other better in Corowa last winter, Bart [Renckens] and Max [Dolphin] flew the ARCUS M again together ;678 km.
A lot of flights from Soesterberg.
One day later , so yesterday,another good day in some parts with a max of 591 in an ASG 29 , from the South West of Holland flying far into Belgium. Of course some people had to work again.
In the UK, Roy Pentecost was lucky as he had a day off and flew 622 km. in his ASG 29.Both Lasham and Dunstable [756 km. in the ASH 25 EB 28 by Robin May]  showed long distance flights .

From Belgium , St Hubert, where in May the BENELUX comps will be flown, a nice 746 km. flight in the ASG 29/18 m.
From France [Serres] Klaus [Ohlmann] had, as he called it an  “ higly interesting flight between wave, ridge and thermal soaring.”
1.182,39 km. was the distance ,750 FAI triangle in the Stemme.

Ridge Soaring,in the USA,  still has great ridge soaring , but thermals were broken and the LAK FES 17/21m. made quite some kilometers over the last couple of days; one over 1000 and 2 over 700.

Also the Scandinavian countries had some “proper”  weather over the last couple of days. Rayskala [ Finland] with 669 in the ARCUS,Sweden with the good flight from Ake and Norway with 516 in an ASW 20 and Arne Martin [Guettler] mentioned about his 466 km. flight in the Discus bt;
My first proper cross country flight of the year. There were some great conditions with awesome cloud streets in places, making this a high speed run eventually.
What a day, and after the initial difficulty it was the fastest flying I’ve ever done in thermal conditions! Should have carried water ballast to go even faster.[127 km./h.]

Flight track: www.skylines.aero/flights/45355/

Arne Martin always makes great pictures and here are 2. The rest with the story you can find on;
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?

zzzzArne Martin 1

“Flying along the north side of lake Seljord I was able to maintain height, but not climb.”
Courtesy Arne Martin.

zzzzArne Martin 2

Passing by TT above Seljord.
Courtesy Arne Martin

———–

In Orient in South Africa the Gauteng Regionals started on April 26 continuing till May 2, with 23 participants in 2 classes, 15 m and open.
In 15 m. a 216 racing task was set , but the racing was so fast that not a lot of points were earned; 345  points for Richard Glennie in the ASW 20 with a speed of 139.4 km./h. Even faster was the runner up Wayne Schmidt in the ASW 27; 155.4 km./h.
Day 2 for them was a bit further 374 km.and Wayne was in a hurry again; 160 km./h. Richard was 2d and only 5 from 11 finished.
Day 3 , yesterday had 213.9 km as task and the glorious winner with a speed of 161 km./h on the clock was Wayne.
Day 4 today;336.2 km.

Open class;on day 1 they had 404.7 km and by now half KIWI half South African, John [Coutts] won the 840 points with a speed of 161.3 km./h. in the JS1. Runner up Oscar [Goudriaan] was even faster in his JS 1 ;167.1 km./h.
Day 2…. Martin [Lessle], who was 1 of the 3 “out-landers”  on day 1, took revenge and won in his Ventus CM/17.6m. with Oscar and John behind him. ALL 3 about 177 km./h.!!!!! Thermals up to 6.7 m./sec
Day 3 ;459.7 km.And,….John did it again!!!Speed this time 167.1 km. Four Pilots flew their selves in the 800 points-range and 900 points was the top for John.
Day 4 today;355.9 km.

———–

The Club class Nationals in Italy have started with a 312 racing- task, in Alzate Brianza on April 24. Stefano Ghiorzo “got” the first 1000 points just ahead of Alberto Sironi , both flying the SILENT 2 TARGA. Unfortunately a bad first day for Nicola Vergnani; only 26 points for him.His sister Elena is not flying this year I noticed.
Davide [Schiavotto] was 3d and Ricardo [Brigliadori] 9th.They normally fly only in the weekends , so I guess this year as well, as nothing has happened after. More in my next blog.

———-

On May 2 there is a one-day- competition at Terlet here in Holland and the weather is looking good.
Fatraglide starts on May 1 with 27 competitors in 2 classes.
Also on May 2 the Qualifying Sailplane Grand Prix 18 m. [ Frydlant ] starts in the Czech Rep. with 16 pilots and several names we saw during the last comps in the East of Europe. Will look at all of them next Wednesday.

 ———–

The Women Pilots Association has invited also via the social media [FB] women to visit Minden for their seminar.

 The organization of our upcoming Seminar at Minden to be held from June 15-19 2015 is in full swing! In addition to world-class soaring conditions which you should not miss, WSPA Seminar Organizers are also planning a lot of interesting events in addition to flying. If you wish to read more about the Seminar and about Minden, please visit our website http://www.womensoaring.org/?p=seminar.
And if you would like to register: http://www.womensoaring.org/index.php?p=seminarform

We are looking forward to seeing you at Minden!

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That’s it for today CU next Wednesday
Cheers Ritz

One thought on “Kings-day in Holland, also for glider pilots! Orient; 177.8 km. /h. during regional’s!

  1. Hi Ritz – the Lak 17B FES at Ridge Soaring was 21m, not 18m; there isn’t a 21m option in OLC yet. Andre, who flies it, says it is quite startling how much the wings flex on a strong ridge day – “After 10 minutes I just tried not to look”.

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