Alphen aan den Rijn Wednesday April 11 2012
ritzdeluy@hotmail.com www.glidinginternational.com www.soaringcafe.com
Cold and rainy here on Easter Monday , but a pretty nice Easter Sunday!Lot’s of pilots must have gone straight after their Easter breakfast to the gliding-field, as 1749 registered their flight on the OLC.
Unfortunately not the very best weather in Nitra either. Easter was early this year.
After the organizers had to cancel day 1 , day 2 still had not the best weather [showers and strong wind ] and a lot of pilots had to make an outlanding. But…anyway a valid day !
Open class was “lucky”, with only 3 out of 33 pilots going “au vache”. 2 Laks’ [17 and 19 in 18 m. conversion] up front on this day with 311 km., gained 1000 and 972 points.
In the 2 seater class, 6 from 10 finished. In this class 6 duo discus’, 2 Arcus’and 1 DG 1000T.
In 15 m. 12 pilots from 26 , gained points with a finish , the rest got distance points over their racing task ; 308 km.
Club class “struggled” most with their task of 259 km. as only 12 from 34 finished. 1000 points for Roman Mracek and 950 for Tim Milner [UK] who worked in the past 2 seasons at Sportavia.
Day 2 at Nitra was much better and started early as the first start was planned for 11. The weather looked great and the smallest task was still over 300km. The “big ones ” had 505 km.
No problems for Wolfgang Janowitsch [Ventus 2C./18m] who won the day followed by 3 Austrian mates! Still 11 outlandings virtual or real in open class.
In “club”, Roman Mracek won for the 2d time and in 15 m. our Dutch pilot Sjaak Selen , younger brother from double World Champion Baer Selen, was 2d.
Also in the 2 seater class a pilot who won 2 days in a row; Danish pilot Felipe Cvitanich.He was one from the 5 who managed to finish the 407 km task.
WO with Wolfgang was also in Sweden in 2006
Courtesy ; Kai Monkkonen
Yesterday small 2.30 h. AAT ‘s were written out, as high and middle layer clouds complicated the situation . Expected cloud base of 1200m. Sunny conditions but again a tough wind and …tough circumstances but also some good flights.
In the 2 seater class Scandinavia is TOP! After 3 days Denmark is on spot 1 in the overall scores and Finland on spot 2 and 3 . Good on them!
In open class Austria is after 3 days on the 4 first spots with Wolfgang leading “the gang”!He flew 231 km.
Behind him his mates in ASW 22BL and 2 Antares 18 and 20 m.
In club class Roman flew 171 km and was the best for the 3d time, of course he is 1 in the overall scores as well.
In 15 m. the best distance was 170 km. but on handicap the discus won from the Ventus [380 points] with 159 km. earning 427 points.
In Torino, the same struggle with the weather. The pilots had to fly on their first day , but the best distance was “only” 63 km. ,so the day was not valid.
A small task on day 2 with 239 km. but better circumstances as 2 gliders finished in the same time with the same speed ;130 km./ h.! The Ventus with Luca de Marchi gained 408 points as well as the ARCUS with Alberto Sironi and Davide Schiavotti. Davide flew several junior WGC’s and Alberto is going to be a a good “trump” in Uvalde this year, where he flies the Quintus M.
On day 2 Davide/Alberto won the task of 198 km and ALL pilots finished!
Due to the weather no soaring yesterday!
Chinchilla, is the host of 43 pilots in 2 classes flying the last big competition down under and under them a few “toppers” and….. 2 married couples in the combined class; the Trotters and the Claffey’s. Both families will be in Uvalde, where Peter and Lisa Trotter will compete as well as Tom Claffey.
How did they do after 4 days of flying and one cancelled day ?
In club class pilots had every day an AAT. 2 Kingaroy pilots Mark Dalton and Adam Woolley, flying a St. Libelle and Cirrus 75 are on top here; 3637 points and 3579.
In the mixed class the scores from today are not yet on, [ www.soaringspot.com ] but after 3 days Tom has 2833 points, Lisa 2743 and Brad 2742.
Great to see Bob Ward totally back in competition soaring [spot 6 at this stage] after a nasty accident a few years ago!!!!
There he was again with a very nice flight; Klaus Ohlmann.Flying from Serres La Batie in the Stemme he did not eat Easter eggs on Sunday but flew on a great wave, ridge and thermal day 1.427 km.
A great day for a lot of pilots as page 1 from the OLC was covered with flights between 1.427 and 660 in a Discus from Benden Barge, SW from Oerlinghausen.
Also from Holland flights from 722 [LS8-Alfred Paul] ,711 [Ventus BT-Sicco] and 626 km.[Discus 2A-Peter] , and instead of Easter eggs, these pilots had cold [minus 10 at 1700 m] but great circumstances till the front arrived earlier then expected. Some [Alfred-Paul and Sicco] just could not make it home , but whataday for spring!!!! More then 60 OLC flights in Holland , not bad!
The 626 km was the 2d flight from this season by Peter Millenaar. After a 514, [he topped the OLC worldwide with this flight on March 19!] he declared a 750 FAI triangle, for last Sunday from Hoogeveen to Lüneberg in Germany, but due to overdevelopment direction Hannover he had to quit this task. Peter still topped the the Dutch OLC list with another TOP flight.
More flights in the cold , this time in Finland, so you expect it is cold. Aku Jaakkola , one of those young and very enthusiast pilots, flew during his 2d flight of the new season 540 km. in MINUS 16 dgr.C.
As he writes on FB.
—“This was typical spring weather in finland, strong lifts, clear air and high cloudbases. Had to avoid airways and airspaces quite much and that together with limited weather area made flying bit slower. I also wanted to fly bit more points to Olc and didn’fly the fastest route. Flying was better than I thought it would be after long winter. Looking good for the qualifications of worlds 2014.”—
Nice to see also the enthusiasm from his Australian mates all meeting in Finland during the JWGC .That’s what it is all about ; world -wide- friendship !!!!!
courtesy ;Aku , flying over Finland!
The WGC 2012 for Chaves is available too , but for my laptop it gives some problems. It is slow and sometimes it does n’t react. Surely will be better in the future! www.wgc2012.com.ar
Have fun the rest of this week, CU on Sunday
cheers Ritz