Post 1.448 on Wednesday September27 2023.

5th Edition of the Experimental E5 GLIDE
Château-Arnoux-Saint-Auban, France
17 September 2023 – 23 September 2023

Matthew on day 1;
“A very difficult first day at E5Glide.
Recapping for those playing along at home, EGlide is a competition held at the end or after the soaring season, where you are allowed to use a small amount of electric power (enough to climb ~600m) in order to finish tasks in conditions that are often otherwise unsoarable.
Today was only 160km but with not enough wind for the ridges to really work and not enough sun for the thermals to pop. I managed to marginally ridge soar the second leg on a ~200m tall ‘ridge’, actually the edge of a small plateau which gave me a bit of a jump on most, but Tilo pulled not one but two brilliant climbs out of the murk to get a large lead on us all.” Matthew Scutter’s Gliding Worse conditions tomorrow and indeed
Day 2 was cancelled.
And here is Matthew again on;“Day 2(3?) of EGlide was likely the best conditions of the event, but we had a challenging first 100km in the flats to the south taking 0.5m/s climbs to 900m AGL. Finally we staggered past Puimoisson and into the mountains where it improved but was broken with light winds and still damp surfaces.
There was a massive 3m/s climb on the Blayeul mountain to a lone cloud with a base 500m above the surrounding area, which I used on the leg going north, then south, then west, each time timing my arrival to just above the peaks. This turned out to be the key to the day, and those who went direct had much weaker climbs. We all had trouble on the final leg but I had just enough reserve to scrape in for a solid 1st.”
Matthew Scutter’s Gliding also for more news on this comps.
Task 4 was cancelled but “Despite capricious weather and the cancellation of the 4 event,2 FES still flew that afternoon!”

Till now it was 1 day flying 1 day “free”, so on September 21
Task 5 was set on comps day 3…..123.54 km....
Slovenian team Lukas Znidarsic and Nina Lokovšek in the good old Duo Discus XL FES, won the day with Tilo as runner up and Matthew on spot 3. All started at 4PM.
“The top 3 pilots are only 21 seconds apart! After 3 races and hundreds of kilometers under tricky weather conditions! EGlide competitions are really the best to conclude the season with fun, fast and entertaining races even with marginal weather.
A very exciting rice. Perfect Task for FES.
It was a FEStival!”CNVV Saint-Auban
And Matthew said about the day:
“No thermals today, only wave pre-start and then a bit of engine to connect to the ridges – except the ridges were not really working and everything got a bit squeaky! Some very very low ridge-declining and a bit of rotor got me home with only a few penalties.” Matthew Scutter’s Gliding

Task 6 comps day 4 with 247.19 km . …and the by far youngest pilot, 19 years old, won the day. He made the best strategic choices at start, remained up front and won the day. Congratulations to TheNapoleon [that name for sure sounds familiar] o flying an 18m. Discus 2C FES…..Good on him.
Theo started at age 13 and has already 3000 hours!!!This is his first experience with E gliders and he really likes it.
They started at 2.40 PM and Theo was 10 km./h faster than Matthew in his 15m LS 8 e.
Matthew;”Yesterday was a strong thermal day and we had our longest task of the event. I was able to capitalize on an efficient first leg and get a jump on Tilo and Luka who struggled a bit behind me. Theo exploited a moment’s indecision to get five minutes ahead of me part way around which I wasn’t able to reel back, but still leaves me going into the last day 11 minutes ahead of Tilo and Luka.
Moderate ridge task today, 220km. A very challenging long leg into the wind is going to cause problems. Hoping to keep my energy for this bit.”

Task 7 on flying day 5 with 219.20 km…..VERY last day and very last possibilities to win this 5th edition! Matthew leads with 11.07 on Luka and 11.42 min. on Tilo. The “rest” is a bit far back.
Well,…Tilo won and Matthew and Theo were close, whilst Luka was 4th.
“On the last day itself Luka and Tilo flew completely different tracks making them impossible to cover, so I was forced to pick my own route and miraculously the three of us ended up on final glide together anyway, just seconds apart.” Matthew….and more about the comps on Matthew Scutter’s Gliding
So the final scores remain the same;
1. Matthew Scutter in LS 8e 15m [handicap 109] 0
2. Tilo Holighaus in Discus 2c FES 18m [handicap 114] -11.17
3.  Luka Žnidaršič in Duo Discus XL FES [handicap113] -12.74

Matthew really is a multi talent!!!!!! When he was very young I got to know him and friends said “keep an eye on him”, which I did. He is multi talented with soaring, has his own business SKYSIGHT where he is the CEO, so knows all about weather and was invited to help out with the last flights in Argentina with the Perlan Project. He travels the world with his Diana 2 and flies lot’s of comps.
In France at the WGC the Diana was on spot 1-2 and 3.

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——-Glider Forever reflected on the beginning of the season Down Under:
“Season is on in Australia and what a start it is. Recently David Jansen & Kevin White head of for a flight in the ASG 32 Mi and landed back to Kingaroy with 4 national records in their hands, awesome performance”
850km @ 120km/h …….this was on September 12.
AND
“Ray Stewart commented under his 700k flight one day before: “Hopefully this is the start of what promises to be a great season.” Fingers crossed our Australian friends, we wish every Pilot a great start into the season 23/24“.

On September 21 an OUT and RETURN was on the menu and David flew another record; 500km out and return at 145kph, with Kevin.
Great start of the Down Under season.
My friend Gerrit flew in his new EB 29 a distance of 613.29 km.last Saturday from McCaffery Airfield .
Lumpy Paterson from Tocumwal was in Kingaroy and flew TODAY, 665 km in his JS 3.

Europe has still good autumn flights as well Austria had also on September 21 an 827 km flight from Wiener Neustadt in an 18m Ventus 2CM….wave and ridge.
Also in the Netherlands…..Look at Terlet on Sunday September 24,” after-summer” conditions in the end of the season. 200km CC was still possible ,whilst last Sunday in Germany over 500k-CC was flown.
on the other hand several final-of-the -season-BBQ’s and parties are on at the moment.

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Jonker Sailplanes had some very interesting news;
“First up, check out the feature in Engineering News that highlights our groundbreaking projects – the @jonker_sailplanes JS5 glider and the near-vibrationless engine.”
https://www.engineeringnews.co.za/…/two-aerospace…
AND
the @csirsouthafrica article, delving deeper into our journey of innovation and the support we provide to young talent in the aerospace sector.
https://www.csir.co.za/development-youth-ontrack-technologies-aisi-supported-projects

As said after summer in The Netherlands. Up to 25 dgr. C Weird weather.

——Last but not least a very inspiring story written by Matthias Arnold for WeGlide about Eva Senne, daughter from WWGC champion Katrin Senne; A succesful newcomer.
Eva has 800 hours and 40 were flown in 2023 and between Eva’s first 500km and her first 1000km flight, there is not even a year.!!!!!!!!!!! AMAZING!!!!

https://magazine.weglide.org/eva-senne-successful…/
https://magazine.weglide.org/eva-senne-successful-newcomer-in-gliding/

That’s all for now. Comps on this side of the world are more or less over. Africa, NZ and Australia start soon.
The OLC has changed to 2024 [next week more about the stats] and the first ’24- flights worldwide were on September 26 from Australia; 300k in an ASH 31/21m from Benalla and 20 in an ASK 21 MI from Mount Beauty.
By the way, the Dutch Nationals will be flown between Mai 9 and 18 in 2024.

Cheers Ritz