Alphen aan den Rijn Sunday January 29 2012
ritzdeluy@hotmail.com www.glidinginternational.com www.soaringcafe.com
AUSTRALIA. Courtesy Jörgen Thomsen .
Hope you don’t mind that I am still “full” of Australia, after living there for 10 years and spending another 10 winters over there , I feel , as said before, still a bit of an Aussie girl even more maybe a…….. Tocumwal girl.
Running a soaring center is a tough job, certainly in years when the weather does not co-operate, but it remains very special , is a great life style and you “bond” with so many people. The good thing is that I am still in contact with a lot of them.
For that reason it pleases me that , now the top- soaring-season is over in Africa, though Gariep Dam has a very nice long season as well, Australia tops the list of the OLC nearly every day.
Great flights again this week; What about the 952 km in the 18m. LS 10 from Jörgen Thomsen from Denmark in Corowa. His wife Brigitte, who flew several new Danish records this season, had to leave him and Australia, due to illness in the family at home and Jörgen puts all sorrow away and tries to forget it in some good gliding.
No doubt about the qualities of Stephan Soll; 819 km. in LS 4!!!
Nice to see Vincent from Holland back in Corowa, young, enthusiastic and a good and keen pilot. Dad Max has flown for a while and now Vincent flies the glider and started his season with an 810 km flight in the DG 800/18m.
Also very nice to see good old Shad from the USA back in Corowa. I liked him as a guest, not only because he was from the USA and we did not have too many guests from there in the past, but more as he could tell great stories .Lovely fellow!!
On Australia Day, January 26, Australia was divided in very bad and wet weather more to the East [ Queensland and part of NSW , Narromine had 25 mm in a day —really hope the weather improves there quickly for the multi-class-nationals,….it CAN BE SO GOOD] and still super weather more in the S. and W. Sorry for the floodings dampening the parties and cancellation of BBQ’s and other festivities.
Heard the Narromine weather is still not good and they hope for soaring-weather to have the first multi-national-class -day on Wednesday.
LAST NEWS FROM THIS MORNING!!!!!
—“Narromine nationals have moved to Tocumwal because of weather – decision made today at 12.30pm.Practice days are now Tuesday and Wednesday.—”
Means that a lot are driving to the W. for about 6 hours to move from Narromine to Tocumwal . Guess tuggies and tugs and organisation moves as well”.
Tocumwal has a lot of motels [14] because of the pokie machines at the golf club and the huge golf club itself. Also great food in Kelley’s , Antiqueshop and Chrissies book shop.
The Sportaviation-caravan -park AT the airfield is Hilton-like-style!!! I mean high quality!
This is the news from Narromine and I feel sorry for them as I had several comps there and they were always nice and good and well organised.
—“Well I’ve just announced the most difficult decision of my gliding life – to move the 50th Multiclass Nationals away from Narromine due to poor weather, especially as Narromine was the site for the inaugural nationals. After a long look at the next two weeks there is a very real risk of not getting a nationals championship. This soaring season has not been kind. This morning four options were put to the pilots already at Narromine: cancel the championships; postpone them; stay at Narromine and hope for better weather; or relocate to a site likely to have better weather. Timing and costs were important considerations. The general view was to relocate. Consequently the organising committee set about considering options. Weather, organisational challenges, safety, task area, watering points, tugs, and distance from Narromine were key items. To cut a long and painful story short, after consultation with the SC, NCC and CTO the 50th Multiclass Championships will be relocated to Tocumwal. Ingo and Judy Renner, and Eddy Madden have offered their generous assistance. In effect the organisation will move from Narromine to Tocumwal. Finally my heart felt thanks to those at Narromine for their unstinting help and enthusiasm over the past year. A special thanks to the SAAA for allowing access to their significant Narromine Airfield facilities. Afraid it has rained on our parade. CS CD.–”
Signed by Chris Stephens the CD who was in Tocumwal several years and indeed a tragic decision, but hopefully it turns out well for everybody!!!!
Life goes on, so pleased , on the other hand, to see Kari from Finland back in Tocumwal. He flies the JJ , [LS 6] , where the glider is stationated already for many years. Also good to see a great female pilot back in Toc; Pam. They get some more “mates”now to talk to and fly with.
Still the perfect soaring weather in Corowa too, and topper Lubor from Slovakia managed, nicely late in the season a 1000 km. flight a 945 triangle with some added kilometers in his ASG 29 E/18m. Good on him. They have packed the Prievidza container now , as the pilots want to fly their gliders at Nitra, the first BIG event in soaring for our European 2012 season.
Great flight again in the LS 4 for Stephan, this time, 775 km. from Tocumwal and also from this field,a great flight from Lothar [ 631km. in ASW 28]
Great flight also from Beverley; 899km. Last news from Beverley last year was bad as their hangar went with the wind and damaged a lot, including gliders. I showed you the pictures then !It nearly made me cry!! This is much better news!!!
I know that in the past a 1000 has been flown in mid February , so a lot is still possible. And…the first one in mid October, as you see the season can be long in Australia , but….not always is.
Gariep Dam is the place where a Dutch pilot tries and succeeds to set new Dutch records. Max shipped his Nimbus 4 DM and chases with Bart for records. Yesterday it was an 800 km. out and return which was a prey; from 133 km. ph/speed up to 145 km.ph. Not too bad!!!!
The day before; a declared 600 out and return with 141 km/h. Also a new record!!! It was 147 km before till 18 km before the finish but a “bad” cloud made them loose some speed.
Swiss pilot, Jean- Marc Perrin “found” a good day again to fly with speed over the Andes and 1.383, 58 km. was the result with a speed of 144 km./h!!!! And that in a 15m. conversion DG 808.
From 5 flights he flew one under 1000 ; 998.78 km. and 4 far above 1000 with still as best flight the 1.708.51 km from the field of Esquel. He “used” 3 different airfields to start from. Perito Moreno is far S. from Esquel and the other field where he flew this last flight from was Los Antiguos.
Norwegian Price fighter, Norwegian Air Shuttle, flying 16 million passengers in 2011 with 60 planes, has ordered as I read in the papers another 222 planes with Boeing and Airbus and an option on an other 150 planes!!!!
They want to be the biggest in Europe as market leader for city-trips and trips to the holiday destinations in the South of Europe. Let’s wait and see how this works out.
Keep an eye when you have time on Soaringcafe. Every day there will be a picture about the CONCORDIA!!!!! The owner Dick Butler wants to fly this prestigious glider during the WGC in Uvalde. Still “a few things to do ” , but for sure he will be flying it during the comps. The whole history is to be found at www.soaringcafe.com and I find it fascinating. One of the first things I do after arriving in Uvalde is see Dick again as it is a real long time ago we met. George has bought his very special ASW17 . This glider lives now in Australia and is still stationated in Tocumwal, but has n’t flown this season as it get’s some upgrades .
Only oh’s and ah’s during the match between Federer and Nadal!!! What a GREAT MATCH!!! Luckily the temperature had dropped to around 14 dgr at 11 pm. Better for the players but it did not help Federer.And maybe the match between Djokovic and Murray was even better!!!!
Busy!! Cu you next week, Ritz