So,…the year 2015 started with some great soaring and I tried to bring it more or less to you , IN your house.One QSGP [South Africa, by the way Sven Olivier flew a good 972 km. distance with a speed of  150 km./h. from Worcester on the 18th!]]  , 3 National Competitions [Australia, New Zealand …fabulous picture above with Alex Mc Caw and picture courtesy to his dad John….and Argentina] and the Andes Open in Chile,[ they run from Sunday till tomorrow a club class competition with 9 pilots flying 5 x a Mini Nimbus [handicap 107 ]and  a Pilatus B4…[handicap 88]]  .
It was just great fun to follow it.
We can look ahead at several comps in Mai one of them, the Open French Nationals in Buno for 18 m. and open class , with pilots from Holland, Belgium , Germany and Italy as well.
Nice to see that the USA [Iona County Airport in the state Michigan] waits for approval on their bid for the QSGP in 2016.That will be the first ever QSGP in the US.

Now it is a bit more quiet again, and I can focus on other soaring news or soaring related.

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I have written a full story on MILVUS,in my soaringcafe blog [www.soaringcafe.com] a while ago and it is good to see that pilots straight away bought the functional clothes/pants and even more …love them. Here is a story from one of our Aussie mates/ users.

By the way on the 31st they are promoting their soaring clothes here in Holland at the Millen Air -LX Navigation OPEN DAY at  Teuge.

” I have flown with the BRAVO pants twice now in the week since they arrived, one flight being almost 8 hours and I can say they are very very good. They met all my expectations, are comfortable, fit perfectly, and all your good design ideas work great.

 was taking notes during the flight and the window-pockets worked very well too. perfect size, being A6.

I spent a fair amount of time thinking of what else you could add to the BRAVO to make them even better, and I could not come up with a single thing. The attention to detail is first class. Like the little zipper levers that don’t get in the way when your hand rests across them. The little tags that cannot catch in anything…Pen pockets on both sides in just the right position.

The long center main zip works brilliantly, I did test it, it’s even better than expected. Releasing ballast has never been so easy.

In the 40°C heat and high humidity, they were still comfortable. The grey color did not get hot and also did not create glare or reflections. Just right ! They breathed pretty well too. I rolled the pants up to just under my knees, in the shade of the instrument panel and they were comfortable and not tight. 

The velcro strap and clip at the foot end are excellent for keeping the grass seeds out of your socks too, when walking around before take-off. Nice to see the elastic shoe loops are removable. I probably won’t need to use these. The side pockets worked great, are the right size and in just the correct position.

I like everything about them ! 10/10 !”

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Last Sunday I wrote a bit about the preparations from the Juniore teams on their way to the JWGC in Narromine. Here is the latest on the UK team.GREAT news!!!!
“We are delighted to welcome on board one of our first sponsors of the year, Lasham Gliding Society, who are sponsoring the Junior Team through the 2015 season.

This generous sponsorship will allow Matt, Mike, Sam and Tom to train together at Lasham throughout the season, alongside some of the country’s top glider pilots.

A huge thank you to Lasham – we’re looking forward to joining the club and seeing plenty more finishes like this through the season!”

Picture from – Junior- Gliding-Site.

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Lot’s of kilometer-eaters in Africa and yesterday was an excellent day in both Namibia and South Africa.
Some love record chasing as I mentioned before and Max [Leenders] flew a few again, on a day he said that everything came together; Cloud base up to  5000 m. , lift with 5 m. per sec,  speed up to 300 km./h. on legs and just in time  to avoid the thunderstorms.
” Totally insane! 03:35 op 600 km is 167.76km/h.”
So a declared 600 km together with Jeppe, who one year ran the Dutch Nationals.
Before Max flew another Dutch record over 800 km. with 144 km./h.also with Jeppe. Both are airline pilots.
Max lost track on how many he has now,….. sounds good!

Nearly 1250 for Janus Centka  in the ARCUS M from Kiripotib, and 1.214 for Bernd Dolba and Wolfgang Janowitsch [1000 FAI triangle in ARCUS M] as well as for Reinhard [Schramme …1000 FAI triangle] in EB 28, from Bitterwasser.It’s a nice long season.All with a speed betwen 145 and 1540 km./h. Still 8x a 1000 , pretty late in their season.GOOD!!!!

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Last but not least.We can give a boost to Bert Schmelzer jr. to win an AWARD.
Would n’t it be great to see a glider pilot win the AWARD.Here is what it is all about!

Dear friends,

To the ones I haven’t seen or heard in the new year, I wish you first of all a very happy new year !

Due to last years success at the World Gliding Championships I recently got nominated for a sports award which is called the Säuliämtler Sports Awards.

CU next week
Cheers Ritz