The Formula 1 , car race, in The Netherlands was ONE BIG PARTY. 3 Day’s in a row and on Every day 105.000 ecstatic people in orange!!!!A pleasure to look at. Gives a proud feeling.
They all arrived by train or on the bike!!!! So a green feeling as well.
The fact that Max won was the cherry on he Dutch- GP -weekend- cake.
It’s unbelievable, how they got the logistics right in a small town ,Zandvoort ,with 17. 000 inhabitants.
They did!!!!!

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FAI SAILPLANE GRAND PRIX in VINON.
September 4-10

The 11th series of FAI GP’s settled this weekend in Vinon, and for mountain specialists this is party time.
When I looked at the entries, I thought,……OH,…. only TOPPERS!!!
20 Pilots entered from 7 different countries. Not bad!!!
Among them 3 ladies Ayala Truelove in JS 3 from the UK , Aude Grangeray in JS 1 [ 2x WWGC champion] and Katrin Senne from Germany [2x WWGC Champion] also in JS 3. Both just flew the Hus Bos WWGC.

3 Pilots, Jon Gatfield, Ayala and Mike Young, represent the UK
Belgium and the Netherlands each have one pilot; Dennis Huybreckx and Erik Borgmann. Both live in France.
From South Africa Uys Jonker and from Lithuania Gintas Zube. From Switzerland Yves Gerster.
7 Pilots from France; Didier Hauss, JD Barrois, Louis Bouderlique and Aude , Max Seiss and Gilles Navas and Adrien Henry.
5 Pilots from Germany; Michael Streit, Christoph Limpert, Tilo Holighaus, Katrin and Toni Kittler.

Last Saturday was the last practice day; 150 km…..won by JD Barrois.
And on Sunday the races started.
Race 1; flown on a good soarable day , 30 dgr. C and clouds. Task 320 km. Start time 13.50.
Uys Jonker on his JS3 “UJ” was the winner of day 1 .He flew the task in 2:34 with average speed 124kph. He did a lot of training in St Auban with the French team, that shows now!
Runner up was Erik Borgmann on JS3, +14 seconds and Jean-Denis Barrois on AS33, +33 seconds. Didier Hauss is 4th with +4:59 on his JS1 and Mike Young 5th with +8:33 on his Ventus-3.

Race 2; 260 km….“due to stormy conditions forecasted, organisation had to design a bit shorter race going first to North-West (again in the Die area, Drôme Valley), then to North-West close to the “Parcours” before heading “home” to Vinon.”
and,…Mike Young was the best. They all started at 2 PM and he flew around with a speed of 115.8 km./h. That was 3 km./h faster than Adrian Henry in his JS 3.
Race 3; 193 km; The 3rd race of the qualifying #SGP of Vinon has started with a very fun 2 laps track. “Due to unpredictable stormy conditions (forecast was even telling “stay home, no distance possible today”), race designer chose the safe way to keep all competitors away from the highest mountains to avoid the “sorrry guys, locally too much energy” effect well known in South Alps.“
So they HAD a day , did the task twice and the 10 daily points were for Yves …speed 112.9 km./h and 8 points for Gilles…speed 112.8 km./h In fact 8 pilots arrived with 112.6/5/4/3/2/1 km./h!!!!
“Because task was rather short with its 193 kms all participants arrived almost at the same time.
Due to rather conditions and possible thunderstorms, Régis [Kuntz CD] decided on small branches to stay local of well known airfields : Saint Auban and Puimoisson.” by the organizers.

Still 4 days to go. Race 4 today [ 211 km.] and race 5,6 and 7. In my next blog.
After 3 race days the scores are; 19 points for JD Barrois,[AS 33] 17 for Uys [JS 3] 15 for Gilles Navas[ ASG 29] and 14 for Mike Young in Ventus 3T.

You remember the Jonker- brothers helping out at the WGC??????
This time Tilo from Schempp-Hirth helped out at the FAI SGP;
“Gliding Manufacturers helping each other continues! This time the CEO Tilo Holighaus from Schempp-Hirth Flugzeugbau is returning the favor! He helps Uys Jonker to fix a belly landed JS3 at the FAI Qualifying Sailplane Grand Prix in Vinon – France. This is what our gliding community is all about! Helping each other and enjoying our beautiful sport.”
I could n’t agree more!!!!

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UK Mountain Soaring Championship in Aboyne
September 4-10

27 Pilots try out distances and height in the UK mecca for wave flying!
This is their 25th edition.
“cross-country and height gain competitions” will be on al week.
As always the Deeside Gliding club is the host for all guests, with a nice BBQ last Saturday evening.
Day 1 message was ;”Our first briefing was at 09:00 this morning and the 25th UK Mountain Soaring Championship is open.  Its currently raining cats and dogs, and has been raining all night.”
A new briefing was held and a 1.30 AAT was set and the sun even came out!
In the end the CC flying was scrubbed, but the height gain was on.
Best “gain” was 3.078 ft.
Unfortunately the weather was not friendly and day 2 was scrubbed , but 2 “heroes” gained 515 ft..
After a night of rain they wait to see what happens today, no cross country till now but 2 days with height gain.

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Till September 8 the CLUB CLASS NATIONALS in the USA are flown from Moriarty [NM]
I know more or less, 4 from the 24 pilots flying there; Tony Condon, who I met in Uvalde in 2012 and Kathy Forsha and Sylvia Grandstaff , who I met at the WWGC in Lake Keepit.
Kathy flies a Discus B, Sylvia an ASW 24b and Tony a St. Cirrus.
And Gary Ittner, one of the long-time-USA-WGC pilots ,who I met in Uvalde 2012 as well. Gary flies a Discus 2A.
Tony shares his comment on the OLC
Club Class Nationals Day 1. Crazy Day. Landed at Patterson Ranch. Very friendly folks there.
Won by Gary, the only finisher for the day with Sylvia as runner up.

Club Class Nationals Day 2. No storms to dodge. Some streets. Worked the wind line. Only one low point that got my blood pressure up. All in all a good day.
Gary won for the 3d time and Tony was runner up . Sylvia 10th.

Club Class Nationals Day 3. A “Classic” Day (in quotes). I remember reading in the textbook that staying upwind and in the sunshine is probably a better plan… Won by Gary. Sylvia was 4th and Tony 12th.
Club Class National Contest Day 4 Task B is open at 12:47pm. Winner is 6T! Congratulations Sylvia!
1.45 AAT as thunderstorms were predicted in the afternoon. They used the “small window” very good.
Gary was 4th. Tony 11th.

Club class National Contest day 5; Gary won another day and leads with more than 300 points. The A task from 350 km was changed in 311 as the weather was pretty tricky. Only 4 finished the task.
Tony mentioned; “Another crazy day. Once I was ready to start it was pretty late, needed to do decent speed. Became apparent on first leg that wasn’t going to happen. Struggled at first on the mountains then had a good run. Stayed out of the ABQ Class C where the cloudstreet went. Another long glide across the Valley of Nothing. Didn’t land at Patterson Ranch this time but I watched two others. Found a weak climb, couldn’t get high enough to improve my position so came back to Moriarty. No where to land on task past Patterson ranch.“
Club Class National Contest day 6; A pretty good day with ” a very fun run across the valley. Awesome cloudstreet on middle leg’.
An “odd-day” for Gary who was “only” 20thiest. BUT,..he still leads with 200 points. Mike Westbrook won the day. He is 4th overall.
Club Class Nationals Contest day 7; a racing task with blue skies but good lift as well.
“It was going really great until the wheels fell off the bus at Ortiz. Fun run with UN. At least it was fun for me. Major suffer fest just staying airborne, getting back to the higher ground, and finally found a good climb and a good line to bump home on“. Tony.
Gary was 8th.
Overall scores till now: Gary Ittner with 3.762 points, 2. Tom Holloran in LS 8 with 3.601 p and Christopher Gough with 3.474 p.[ 15m Ventus B]

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The STEMME GRAND PRIX in St Auban
 6 September 2022 – 9 September 2022

With 4 STEMME S12 and 1 STEMME 10, they started yesterday a grand prix in St Auban only for Stemme’s. There are not that many, but 5 pilots are trying out this GP….3 from Belgium, 1 from South Africa and from France.
Yesterday race 1 was good for 253 km and though it was SLOW, it must have been a good feeling for Pierre [de Brouqueville] to win this first race. It started at 2.05 PM and only 4 started.
No task yet for today.

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Checking quickly the OLC;
Last Thursday pilots still flew over 600 km in The Netherlands, with the much shorter days a real good effort.
The French and German pilots enjoyed even flights from over 800 km. So did the USA pilots flying in the wave from Minden, Boulder and Ely.
Last Monday Keith Essex flew 1.142.91 km in an ASG 32 MI, from Salida Harriet, never heard of the place but it is SE of Boulder.
Yesterday that whole area had good weather again with up to 1.100 km flights.[Salida Harriet] and 1.069 km from Minden.

That’s it for now.
CU next Wednesday

Cheers Ritz