Unbelievable weather in the UK last Sunday on the day of the first tasks!!!! Sooooo pleased with finally a real good day again in this part of Europe for soaring !!!The open, 18 m. and 15 m. will have fun!!!
I had to laugh about Erazem’s remark that Sunday:
“EGC2017, Lasham all competition gliders launched. Now only 93 local gliders left on grid.”

And look what happened when the JWGC was over,….they got the “normal”-Lithuanian- summer -weather. Such a pity!!!

    

Benjamin from France on his way home and Tony from The USA as well. Both are more or less nostalgic about leaving.
That’s a great sign that the weather has not spoiled anything.
Tony;”See you next time Lithuania, it was great.”
Benjamin:”as usual good weather is now here. Thank all Lithuanian people I met there. It was a real experience . See you on the grid and go fly !”
As shared by them.

BUT the next big event has already started so quickly to the UK.

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19 th EGC in LASHAM !

MANY gliders ready to go, 61 ,  from the comps [18 in 15 m., 25 in 18 m. and 18 in open]   and the rest from the club.
As shared by the organizers.

AUGUST 13 !!

August 13…day 1…task 1 ;fabulous weather till later in the day, when spread out and cirrus “killed”  some ambitions.
15 m; 503.44 km.!!!!!Great day for the German team; 2 pilots with 1000 points, Freddy Hein and Uli Schwenk; 109 km./h. Good day as well for Belgium pilot Daan Spruyt who , together with Czech pilot Ondrej Bordovsky gained 991 points.And good old Russian pilot Dmitriy Timoshenko had 990 points.
Adam Woolley from Australia who flies HC, keeps his blog and I copy and paste it for those who can’t find it.He also shares his opinion about the start.
Adam Woolley’s Gliding Adventures

“Today was a really nice start to the comp, weather wise. 503km! I had my game plan to make the 2nd gate start (using thr GP 10min intervals here), which turns out to be the optimum I think for the day.
I flew with the crowd for the first 30km while the airspace was a little tricky. Once out in the open I did my own thing, even got out in front.
I made my mistake on the 3rd leg when I went South of track. I knew it & radioed into my team mate to take the north leg – he caught up so it was the faster option. I think this is where I lost the day. Still 850 points to start off the comp, not too bad, not the end of the world, but not so good either..

18 m.; 4 hour AAT with a speed 0f 118 km./h. Mike Young [Ventus 3T] received the first 1000 points and daily prize for 485 km. in time 4.06.
Also in this class good flying German pilots as Sebastian Huhmann and Michael Streit, both in ASG 29 E. They were the runner’s up with Wolfgang Janowitch from Austria in VENTUS 3 T on number 4.”Our” Peter Millenaar [ASG 29 E] was on spot 5 all these pilots flew around 116 km./h.

open; 625 km. !!!!! Their start line opened at 12 for a long , for sure 5 hour flight in the “fancy machines”.  I hope they all knew how to deal with the new start rules.Then the “hammerweather” get’s a hick-up” later in the day ; Cirrus. Dutch pilot Ronald [JS 1C] started relatively  early at 12.20 and was back early. He won the day; 1000 points for him…..Speed 115.45 km./h.
3 Km./h. faster than Michael [Sommer] in the EB 29 R.who was the runner up.[964]
Till TP 3 some flew with an average speed of 140 km./h. with a base of 1800 m. and up to 4 m. lift.
5 Pilots did not finish but still flew between 583 and 511 km.
The Swiss pilots in an ASH 25 flew 7 hours and 25 minutes!!! But they made it home.
The French pilots Sylvain Gerbaud and Eric Bernard, both toppers, had to use the engine to get home. The way the French say that is so much more friendly;vache moteur!!!

 

AUGUST 14!!

August 14…day 2…task 2;

the weather first had to sort it self out was the early-morning- remark on the official site. So a later start and 15 m. upfront with 18 m. and open. A and B tasks and first launch not before 12.45 and a drop of rain at the grid. In the end the first launch was at 14.15. So long waiting for some. NO finishers and virtual and real outlandings along the road.
In the end the windows to fly in were not big enough.
15 m.; 150.96 km….changed in 104.27 km.
Nobody finished. Best distance 103 km. for Uli. Only one over 100 km. so not a valid day.  Uli was nearly “in”.He still flies so well!!!!
Adam; ”
“Funny day, hindsight is a wonderful thing, but ultimately I’m not sure what would’ve come of the other option too – ie, launch 2hrs earlier on task A. Who knows, but it was very weak pre-start.
I started with the Germans, easing down the first leg with Owen too. Our first climb was 0.8kts, Owen & I called ready to move to the next cloud – the Germans read our mind & rolled out 180* later. 2km down the road, 3kts on the 15kt tailwind leg. This gave me confidence & from here I lead out to do my own thing, only to meet up, above & high after a low point we shared. It was possible to find our final glide from this area with some searching, so 77 & I used up our 1000′ advantage to join with Uli & Freddy again. Safety in numbers right?
From here we all flew home together in empty gliders, only to land at Popham airfield – in great company, we missed you not being there though Uli!!

18 m.; 179 km….later changed to 134 km.No finishers but 19 over 100 km. so a valid day. Christophe Cousseau flew 121.85 km. and for that he received 359 points. Dutch pilots Jeroen and Peter were runners up.
FB works in case of “help” too. Tijl out landed on a military base . “If someone knows the 4 digit gate code of Brimpton Airforcebase, or knows someone who knows the digits, it would be of much help. Quite quiet here today.”
The problem was solved quickly.

      

A few Belgium team members;  Bert sr. crew, Bert jr [Ventus 3] and Tijl [ASG 29 e] as pilots and the THE Broquevilles Arnaud with uncle Pierre, both in the EB 29DR.
As shared by the Belgium team.

open ;2 hour AAT….later changed in 1.30 AAT. No finishers but a valid day. UK pilots Russell and Pete [Harvey] flew 168 km. good for 493 and 494 points. The 2 Polish pilots Lucasz and Adam “got” 489 and 490 points.

Day 2 wrap up;”Rainfall has inundated the tasks areas, so a mass landback/landout has occurred. Gliders turbo’d back to the field ” Though several had to drive with car and trailer.More typical UK weather!

 

AUGUST 15 !!

August 15..day 3…task 2/3; After the rain in the morning,…no, no drizzle but real UK-rain, the organizers set long and good tasks again as the weather was just good again. Still a bit “lost”  after the total-out-land from the day before, the pilots left for their tasks.
15 m; 4 hour AAT….A UK-day today!!! Gary [Stingmore] and Tim [ Scott] flew  after a “late”  start at 13.15, 420 and 417 km,.in time 4.17 and 4.18 ,so another long ” day in the office”. Lucasz [Grabowski] in the Diana 2 was 3d he flew 398 km. in time 4.07. Most started around 13.02.

A happy smiling Lucasz in the Diana 2.
As shared by the organizers.

9 VENTUS variations in this class, 5 ASG 29-variations and 2 ASW 27, a DIANA 2 and a LAK 17. 3 From 18 out-landed.

18 m.; 501 km,…..5 toppers in this class; Roman [Mracek] on a daily spot 1 with a speed of 107.94 km./h. On number 2 and 3 Dutchies Jeroen and Peter with 107.24 and 107.14 km./h. and Bert jr from Belgium and Andy Lutz from Austria with 106.90 and 106.70 km./h.
3 Outlandings one by entering a forbidden zone.
25 gliders in this class; 4x a JS 1 variation, 14x an ASG 29 variation and  7x a VENTUS variation .

Arrival of the Dutchies. With Jeroen, Ronald and Peter.
Both pictures shared by the organizers.

 

open ;522 km….7 different nationalities in the top 7. Lucasz [Wojcik] from Poland got the 1000 points for a speed of 116.58 km./h .Sylvain Gerbaud from France was runner up, Pete Harvey [UK] on spot 3 , Pierre and Arnaud de Broqueville from Belgium on spot 4.
On 5 Petr Krejcirik from Czech Rep and on 6 Holger Karow from Germany with Ronald Termaat from Holland on spot 7. A nice international mix!!! In this class 3 out-landers so another good and long day.Longest flight in this class ;5 hours and 50 minutes.

This day the sea-breeze spoiled for some the end of the flying-day.

 

AUGUST 16… TODAY !!

the weather.

August 16…Day 4…task 3/4. Shorter tasks. But again a flying day. Who still doubts the UK weather??? I never did!!!
Nice news from team Belgium about the evening before:
“Competition day 4: after the very nicely organized beer and music fest of yesterday, this morning the FAI flag is missing and has been replaced by a bottle of wine overnight. 😁 
Today, the day starts cloudy, but tasks have been prepared for all classes. 

The weather improved during the day into a very nice window. First they thought the day would be scrubbed due to the cirrus but the sun burnt them out. Not too many cu’s were expected and there was quite some wind. BUT,…..They were ALL launched and start games were played, as some waited long to pass the start line.

15 m.: 203 km…. B task….146 km,….difference in start times; 13.54 and 14. 34. Uli and Freddy had another good day. They started at 13.54 ;number 1 and 2 for the day, with 95 km.h.

18 m.; 2 hour AAT…. changed in 1.30 AAT…start times between 14.12 and 14.32. The Czech pilots Roman and Petr [Tichy] flew 166 km. in time 1.37. That was the best result for the day. They started at 14.26.
Not a lot of points , but Roman tops the 18 m. list overall now, just 7 points on Jeroen, who leads on his mate Peter with 14 points!!!!

open ; 245.39 km….later changed in a B task from 195 km. The difference in start time in open class was HUGE; between 13.28 and 14.39. So ONE hour and 11 minutes. Well which choice was the  best!!!
UK’s Russell and Pete ,were the last to leave for this short task.Pretty clear, the late starters had the better day. Michael, Russell and Pete started late and won the day; Michael flew with a speed of 110.39km./h., Russell, 104.06 and Pete 102 km.p/h!!!

All results preliminary. I published a bit later today, to write about day 3/4 as well.

As shared by Baldrick and the UK team.

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And I got news from the Perlan Project Inc.

The Perlan 2 is in Argentina – Follow our flights

The Airbus Perlan Mission II is flying periodically over the Andes. Our goals are to expand our flight envelope to higher and higher altitudes, gather data on the world’s largest stratospheric waves and to inspire young people to seek careers in science and engineering.

We expect to fly next on Wednesday, August 16th.  Join us for the flight.  You can follow our flights on our Virtual Cockpit:  http://perlanproject.cloud/VirtualCockpit.html

For Airbus Perlan Mission II updates including notifications of when our Virtual Cockpit will be live, follow us on Facebook and Twitter @PerlanProject.

When you read this today you can go to the link to join the flight.

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Latest news from Schempp-Hirth.

“On Thursday last week, we proudly delivered the 250th Arcus. New owner is Mr. Michael Boik from Great Britain, who is looking forward to hopefully many memorable flights.

Michael’s glider is an Arcus-T and equipped with the proven, simple to use Schempp-Hirth Turbo sustainer engine system.”

AND

“Last Thursday, we had our traditional Schempp-Hirth Staff Summer Barbecue at our premises in Kirchheim/Teck. Unfortunately, the weather this year wasn’t quite what you’d expect in early August, but that didn’t keep us from having a nice evening with several guests – and with the bosses traditionally at the barbecue.

Apart from it being a tradition, we celebrated the deliveries of both the 700th Duo Discus, the 250 Arcus (see below) and, in a few weeks, the upcoming deliveries of the 200th Discus-2c and the very last produced Ventus-2.”

As shared by Schempp-Hirth.

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Cheers Ritz,…. till Sunday….I hope..VERY BUSY!!!!