ALPHEN AAN DEN RIJN Sunday March 17 2013
ritzdeluy@hotmail.com www.soaringcafe.com www.glidinginternational.com
What a lovely video produced by Finnish TV about the EGC in 1988!!!It brings back so many good/sweet moments and nostalgic ones, as running around with camera’s and barographs.
Familiar faces from Klaus Holighaus , Ernst Gernot Peter , Karin Lysakowski and her dad Ted, Alf Schubert, Pierro Morelli, Gerd Huybreckx , Tapio Savolainen, Smilian Sibic and Markku Kuittinen all there, but sadly not amongst us any more.
A young Kiki,[Jacky Clerbaux] Patrick Stouffs, Fred Gai [German TC] Werner Meuser, Jarislav Vach, Eddie Huybreckx, Paul Bourgard ,Jan Andersen, Reinhard Schramme, Giorgio Galetto and crew Robert , Luigi Bertoncini, Ralph Jones, Holger Back…..and Jaques Aboulin . Written in my book: “His last comps , he has enough of it, starts aerobatics now”!And of course many more pilots.
In the video “a lazy looking me , sipping wine!!!!” but also a hard working one “doing”the radio.
I was Team Captain, that year with in “my” team, Daan Pare,[9] Gerrit Kurstjens,[6] Sikko Vermeer [5], Onno Blankenzee [18] and George Schuit.[10]
According to my brother in law Ad, the Finnish TV crew wanted us to show what we did during the day, while the pilots were up in the air.
So I did, as if I was very busy talking to my pilots by radio and Ad looked on the map, it shows in the video. Had all forgotten about it.
But,…..I was on my radio post as well when Sikko arrived home in a thunderstorm, not letting the radio ” go” sitting in the rain while lightning hit besides me, giving him my best advise.
Stupid , yes now I do see that, but it was pure duty then!!
The biggest job was the organization of the trip by ferry with the cars and trailers. I had to find my photo book , to remember what all happened. The way up from Travemunde to Helsinki with Silja Line and back via Turku and driving through Sweden.
We swapped t- shirts with Russian pilot Alexander Silvanovitch in exchange for “moon/space-food” , it all comes back, a landing from George in a too small field -ground-looping before the lake and all OK, dinners together with 20 in ONE tent and cointreau to sleep well in the evening!!
Umbrellas to hide for the rain, a paper-airplane-competition, sitting on a Finnish ” polisi-motorbike”,….
With all the rain “we “still had 11 days .In standard class Janusz Trzeciak won from 28 participants , in 15 m. class 10 days with Gerard Lherm as winner, from 30 and in open Klaus Holighaus from 13 and also 10 days.
Also days that pilots started 3 times, some could depart , others not; result they all got stuck where the rain hit both.
My pictures say it all! A pity I can’t scan a few! That was like all comps I visited in Finland, a real pleasure to be part of .Like the JWGC and most special the EGC ,where we started with a 1000 k. on day 1 and more than 50 % flew that 1000.
As Antti said on FB, where he shared this video;
—“A nice video of 1988 EGC in Räyskälä, made by finnish TV. Many familiar faces…—”
Indeed worthwhile to look at, certainly when you have never flown or been in Räyskälä and you will be part of the next 33d WGC in 2014 !!!
http://www.youtube.com/
Good flight this week and one of my Uvalde- 2012 -friends ,Werner had a very nice one in his ASW 27 on Wednesday with 770 km. ridge soaring from Marion County-Brown in Tennessee;Also called Brown Field, close to the town with the nice name JASPER. He was on top of the OLC list that day.
Sarah, you remember her name as tuggie in Uvalde, pilot in Chaves and future pilot in the Issoudun WWGC and important as well, Chilhowie Glider port owner, was the organiser of a 10 days ridge camp from Brown Field.
As Werner said; “We had two (2 ½) great ridge days with lots of exceptional flights!”
He will write a bit more about it , so you get that when I have it.
Sarah mentioned already early during the camp; —-“A nice day on the Sequatchie ridge. The count so far: six diamond legs, one silver, three gold, and a state record.”—
One of the young soaring-bloggers Benjamin Bachmeier flies from Serres at the moment ; 723 km. and high up to 5858 MSL/4517 AGL, with a nice Northerly and topping Fridays OLC list! Good on him. His blogs , in German, are on ;
www.flugfieber.net
As shared by Benjamin on FB.
And in Holland the first flights on OLC appeared as well. 3 Flights from Terlet , best distance 187 km in ASW 28E/18m. But this weekend is freezing cold again with showers with in it rain or snow, depending where you are.Yesterday evening one of the clubs at Terlet the GEZC , opened their season with a real openings-party. Always great fun, but too far for me!
A not too bad looking sky as seen by Rens North of Schiphol.
Helli Lasch Challenge 2013.
Pictures from Sebastian Kawa shared by Sven Olivier; Have look at the beauty of Sout Africa. ENJOY!!!!!
The last day on March 14 of this event , was fun, fast and high. Thunderstorms as well, but they could not stop the pleasure.
About 5 minutes past 7, last Wednesday evening, the world got pretty excited by white smoke in Rome. And after one more hour ,….. HABEMUS PAPAM, …..we have a pope and,…we could see the new 76 year old Pope Francis 1, before called Jorge Bergoglio and Arch bishop from Buenos Aires in Argentina on the balcony.
For the first time in history a Jesuit, for the very first time a South American pope, so since 1272 years a non-European !
Let’s wait and see how he is going to do it. By just saying “good evening ” he started well.
Cheers Ritz