Post 1.524 on August 11 2024

22 nd EGC in Tabor.
3 August 2024 – 17 August 2024

Could n’t help myself! Extra blog on Sunday.

When I left you last Wednesday, the weather was again the most difficult part of the day. Thunderstorms were forecasted for later in the day ,so starting early could have been the solution, but the weather early was not strong.
Michaela wrote;
“Our third Competition Day is over with a shared 3h AAT task for all classes. Our weatherman was very successful in his forecast and so no significant storms influenced the task, and the approaching cold front turned the originally blue day into a pretty unstable gliding weather with thermals up to 4 m/s and best pilots flying up to 370 km.“
What did the pilots do with their day?
Wednesday August 7 , day 4 task 3;
15 m; 3 hour AAT….the first 5 in this class were all from the Eastern countries. Vladimir Foltin [Slovenia] in the JS 3 jet won the day with 363 km with 118.82 km./h. Followed by Karel from Czechia , Tamas from Hungary and Lucasz and Pawel from Poland. Forgot to tell you that in this class Takeshi Maruyama is also an HC pilot. His name is enough to tell you he is from Japan.
He was 1 of the 5 out -landers who started early [between 14.04 and 14.12] ,whilst Vladimir held his nerves and went over the start line at 14.29.

standard; 3 hour AAT… 6x a Discus type in the top 5 and also here the Eastern countries were the best , but not as overpowering as in 15 m; Maciej Kowalski from Poland in Discus 2A won the day with 368 km and 118.16 km./h. His mate Lukasz, one of the many Lucaszes in Poland [ this time Blaszczyk] followed, before Norbert from Romania.
33 started and 31 finished.

Club; 3 hour AAT….the LS7 is popular in this class and our Finish mates Tapio Tourula, daily winner and Mikko Ylihärsilä who was runner up, did well!!!! 325 km and a speed of 106.62 km./h.
39 started and 38 finished. Start times between 13.46 [team UK] and 14.56. [Roelof from the Netherlands’] Roelof finished on spot 28 with 269 km and 89.73 km/h in LS7WL. As I read he was tormented by hail and 2 hours later at the finish again , so twice hit by one and the same system!!!!!

Thursday August 8 was a rest day!!!!!
Short note about the overall scores after 3 tasks;
15m; 1. Riccardo Brigliadori [Italy] in JS3jet, 2. Karel Novak [Czechia] in Ventus 2ax, 3. Owen McCormack [UK] in Ventus 2a.
Standard; 1. Norbert Scarlat [Romenia] in Discus a, 2. Henry Inigo-Jones [UK] in LS 8 [yes the junior who flew in Ostrow lately to spot 6 ] 3. Jan-Ola Nordh [Sweden] in Discus 2t.
Club; 1. Hugo Corbille [France] in LS7 neo, 2. Jacek Flis [ Poland] in LS3 WL, 3. Tomas Suchanek [Czechia] in ASW 20.

Friday August 9 day 6 task 4;
15m; 417.74 km…….changed in a B task from 335.57 km….after a very foggy morning. When only 5 from 27 finish , you cannot say anything else, than that it was a difficult day. Not so much for Dutch pilot Stephan Grunder in his Ventus 2 ,as he won the day with a speed of 82.56 km./h. That says enough too about the day. His Dutch mate Sikko finished too, as well as 2 Polish pilots [Lucasz and Pawel] and 1 Hungarian.[Tamas] Patience was the key-word.
9 Pilots nearly were back home/just out after around 330 km. Only loosing around 100 points.

Standard; 400.83 km…..also a B task for them 335.66 km.... BUT,……..Only 3 from 33 managed to finish.2 From Slovakia and 1 from Czech Rep.  Maros Divok in LS 8 won with 68.92 km./h. The other 2 were equally on spot 2 with both 669 points.
So a rather busy day for the crews, though 16 were close by with around and over 300 km.
It’s great to see that a UK junior, Henry and a former Belgian junior Jeroen are on 2 and 3 overall at this stage.

Club; 391.61 km….4 from 49 FINISHED and that is not much!!! Finishing pilots were from Poland and Germany and each team flew together.
Mikolaj Zdun [LS3 WL] AND Marcus Dawert [DG 300WL] were equal on spot 1with 723 points the other 2 , Uwe [ LS4WL] and Jacek [LS3WL] had 721 and 719 points.
Michaela’s words on this day;
“the competitors were given a very optimistic racing task .The day started with a heavy fog that lasted until half past eight, therefore, everyone was gridding IFR. 
The biggest skills test appeared at the very end of the task, when the cloud cover coming from west came sooner than expected and weakened the conditions on the final 50 km home. The lucky and patient ones were able to find some weak lift and with headwind reached Tábor“

Saturday August 10, day 7 , task 5;

15 m.; 333.77 km…with 133 and 132 km./h the Lithuanian pilots , Marius Pluscauskas and Vladas flew to daily success!!!! They started early at 13.07 The 2 Danish pilots Filip and Rasmus started half an hour later and flew only a bit slower; 127 and 125 km./h.
Except for 1, all pilots flew over 100 km./h.
26 started from 27 as George from Luxembourg was forced to take a day off , to work on the huge problems with his instruments.

Standard; 340.29 km….3 Czech pilots in 3 LS 8 gliders had a good day. Lukas Kriz , who won day 1 already now won again, with 122 km./h and his mates Jan and Miloslav were a tad slower ;121 and 120 km/h. Our Belgian mate Jeroen holds on with a nice spot 4. He and 2 Polish pilots , Lucasz and Maciej, started 1 minute earlier.
33 started and 2 were out.

Club; 340.74 km…..a mix from different nations in this top 5; Daily winner; Jacek Flis from Poland, followed by UK pilot James, then Gyorgy from Hungary [ I know him already from the WGC in Sweden in Eskilstuna in 2006 ] Toby from the UK and Uffe from Denmark.
39 started and 31 finished, they were hit by overcast.
As Michaela mentioned; “The weather turned out even bit better than expected; high ceilings, good strong thermals, and especially some nice cloud streets. We hope that everyone enjoyed the racing tasks.“

Tasks today ……races in each class;
15 m; 341.45 km
standard; 325.41 km
club; 314.18 km

More on Wednesday.

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CIM in RIETI in ITALY
28 July 2024 – 8 August 2024

I owe you the last 2 days of this always TOP competition.
Wednesday August 7 last- but- one- day with task 9.
Mixed class; 3 hour AAT….won by team  Flewett for 1000 points; 465 km with 146.89 km./h. in the ARCUS M. Team Sironi holds on with 975 points.
Open; 2.50 AAT….Lucio Bordin in his JS3 was in a real hurry!!!!453.66 km with a speed of 157.16 km./h!!!!
Dane was runner up .
23 started and 21 finished. Bernard, the Austrian on 1 overall , was on spot 9 behind Alvaro.

Thursday August 8; very last day! Task 10.
Mixed class; race from 414.09 km…. 1000 points for Spanish pilot Francisco Ortega in his ASW 27B….speed 135.10 km./h. Even team Flewett in the ARCUS m was “slower”; 134.66 km./h.
Team Sironi in the Arcus T as well; 133.51 km./h. But it was all very close and then you know that the overall toppers from the day before are still the toppers and with that the WINNERS;
1. Team Flewett in Arcus M from the UK with 9,255 points , so VERY CLEAR WINNERS. Congratulations!!
2. Team Alberto Sironi & Consolini in ARCUS T from Italy with 8,869 points.
3. Team Prodorutti & Montemaggi in the ARCUS M20 from Italy with 8,592 points.
4. Werner Danz from Switzerland in ANTARES 18T with 8,409 points as the first single seater.
Francisco passed with his good last day, Austrian pilot Thomas; 5 and 6 with 8.198 and 8.149 points.

Open class; race from 433.43 km… and kilometre-eater Matthias Sturm won the day in the JS3 with 160.13 km./h. Even faster was the runner up in the mighty EB 29R Markus; 164.82 km./h.
Dane in the Ventus -2cxa FES 18m was a bit slower; 149.51 km./h but sill very fast.
The top 3, did not change but Matthias passed Dane; 4 and 5 and good 6th place for Katrin between all these strong male pilots!!!!!
1. Markus Frank in EB 29R from Germany with 8,419 points.
2. Bernhard Leitner in AS33es from Austria with 8.312 points.
3.  Steffen Schwarzer in JS 3 from Germany with 8,225 points.
Giorgio was on spot 7 and Alvaro on 9.

One of the pilots mentioned in streckenflug.at
“Rieti, again a day where you fly an average of 145km/h despite a “bad decision”, but only end up in the middle of the field because of this decision, the winner has an average of over 160km/h … I feel soooooooo slow!”
INDEED THAT IS RIETI,” fast and “furious” , but you ALWAYS have to be careful!
Great Place for pilots and their crews.

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On August 14 till August 31 in 2024 the WGC for the big birds will be flown from Uvalde in Texas. Most of my friends have arrived already and several are keeping a blog ,so we will be totally informed with in’s and out’s . Paul Remde will do interviews with pilots and sailplane manufacturers and that will be good too. I met him in 2012.
He is from Cumulus Soaring Inc, sells books and all other soaring related stuff;
“I plan to bring Bowlus Maxi Gap Seal Tape, LXNAV flight recorders, variometers, FlarmLink, and PowerMouse+ FCC units, Naviter Oudie N IGC units, ICOM handheld radios, Bioenno batteries, PowerFLARM Fusion, esa-systems probes, tie-down kits, SoaringXX wing stands and WingWalkers, Becker and Air Avionics panel-mount radios, ACD-57 digital altimeters, and many other items. “
From August 14 in the evening he is there.
Paul shared this picture from 2012 when Dick Butler flew his CONCORDIA

I wonder if there will be people in Uvalde who have been there in 1991, 2012 and now.
I remember we had a lovely evening with the guests from 1991, when we were there in 2012.
Beryl Hartley and I both attended then.
A lot of pilots are looking forward to “see” the JS 5 and of course it’s performance.

The official training starts today [August 14] the opening ceremony is on the 17th , and the 2 openings I attended were pretty spectacular , they fly between August 18 and 30 , then there is on August 30 in the evening the farewell party and the prize giving during the closing ceremony is on August 31.

16 Teams fly in the 2-seater class, 17 in Open , among them Oscar Goudriaan in the brand new JS5 and 33 in 18 m. My goodness me ,..they nearly, can ALL win!
Many champions and world champions sometime multiple WGC champions, so exciting to follow.

It can be REALLY hot in Uvalde. My shoes one day, were stuck in the melted tar from the runway.
For me ,1991 was special, as Baer Selen won and I had the honour as TC, of helping him to feel so GOOD, that he only had to fly AND WIN.
This year he is back as TC/coach from the Dutch team.

South African Gliding Team:”The adventure is beginning as our team slowly assembles here in Uvalde, Texas, under the blazing 40°C (104°F) sun. We’re pulling our gliders out of our containers and putting them together, piece by piece, in preparation for the challenges ahead. The rest of our team will be arriving tomorrow, and we’re all excited to get into the cumulus filled skies!We’re 7 hours behind South Africa (UTC -5), so we are slowly getting over the jet lag as we gear up to represent our country on the world stage.”
Of course their HOT ITEM is the 5!!!!!! Yes the Jonker JS 5.
Adam had a look at it and took a picture;
“I’ve just seen the JS5 for the first time, what a magnificent looking glider it is. My first words were wow, followed by, I can’t believe how small it looks!For sure JS will sell many of these, seems very manageable on the ground & I can easily see it’ll be a joy to fly in the skies! Still can’t believe it’s 24m though!”

—–-Great to see that 2 European records from German pilot Benjamin Bachmaier [ in my time a junior at JWGC’s and blogger] have been ratified;
15 m; Distance using up to 3 TP’s….1.275.7 km from Koenigsdorf in a Ventus 2BX on March 30 2024.
15m; FREE distance using up to 3TP’s …1.295.3 km from Koenigsdorf in a Ventus 2BX on March 30 2024
Both records were before in hands of Mathias Schunk.
Congratulations Benjamin.

——–Of course, as a “sport freak” I looked at different TV stations in French, German, English and Dutch /Flemish to the Olympic Games!!!!
Our small country achieved 34 medals from which 15 were gold , 7 silver and 12 bronze and with that we reached a never ever before spot on the medal list ;spot 6!!!!!!!!!
3x GOLD for cyclist Harrie Lavreysen , very special.
And what about Femke Bol and Sifan Hassan ,…..by now you ALL know their names.
Our sport culture is GOOD, VERY GOOD, now I hope that the new government keeps investing in sport!!!!!

CU on Wednesday
cheers Ritz