Rayskala Masters….Italian SGP…..

Back on track ;
After a lovely week with my high-school- friends,with lot’s of walking ,talking and biking [poor me …with bft 5 a distance of 17 km.through open fields close to the sea against the wind…..BUT I arrived home safely PURE on willpower.], it’s time to look back at what is happening in our world and what has happened in short.
Miss a bit out on time, as I was in terrible pain the last day’s, due to an attack of kidney-stones. Never had them before but knowing ALL about gall-colic’s/ stones, I knew straight away the verdict from my doctor; so I will do my best to inform you as much as possible.

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Rayskala MASTERS in Finland;

a “typical Rayskala ” finish 12- picture , this time from Boerje in the VENTUS 3 over the lake
Courtesy Katja [Soikkeli] .

Always loved and still love Rayskala with the lovely people, fabulous over-the-lake-finishes and not to forget the camping in the wood and the sauna with the ice cold lake afterwards to dive in.

On the last day [6 out of 8] the PR message for the 45 pilots in 3 classes ,was;
Saturday 16th June 2018
“Last briefing, the weather is looking really good and giving us 2000m cloudbase. Towings at 11:15. Racing tasks for all classes (Club 300 km, Racing 500 km, Open 530 km)”

They then had already 5 out of 7 day’s so Rayskala “performed” again on high level with tasks up to over 500 km.
Club class; On day 1 only 2 pilots finished the 2.30 AAT and some nearly did so.
Sakari Pyörre was one of the finishers in his LS 7 , did well on day 2 too, but “missed” out on day 3 with an out-landing.He won day 5 again with 1000 points so that helps, AND the last day 302 km with a speed of 115 km./h., which was 15 km. faster than the runner up that day, but in the end he was 3d with 4.704 points.
Winner;Kimmo Pulkki in LS 1-f with 4.907 and runner up Juha Vainikka in St Jantar 3 with 4.885 points.
9 pilots in this class!!!!3 Finnish winners and NATIONAL champions!!!!!
By the way,…last Sunday Sakari flew from Rayskala 762 km. in an 18m/LS 8. Good on him he was not yet ready with gliding after 6 good day’s of competition.That’s the spirit!!!

Racing class ; 7 from 13 finished on day 1 and the winner was Aku Jaakkola. I met Jaku at several comps,… a real nice young man. On the last day he won the 499. 96 km task with a speed of 126 km./h.
Jan Ola Nordt was a tad faster but flies HC as he and his mate …both in Discus 2 T… Richard Swanson are from Sweden.
After 6 day’s the top scores were CLOSE; Richard 5.694 and Juha Sorri as Finnish winner 5.679.Jan Ola was 3d but HC with 5.618.
The Finnish National titles;
1.Juha Sorri in Discus and on spot 2 Harri Hirvola in Ventus 2A and Aku was 3d

open class; had 3 HC winners Wolfgang Janowitsch,[Ventus 3] Borje Eriksson [Ventus 3] and Peter Johansson [ASG 29 E] ; 5.745…5.451 and 5.305.
Wolfgang won 2 day’s and was runner up on 2.
Task 4 a a 3.30 AAT was won by Olli Teronen; 477 km in time 3.34 so a speed of 133 km./h. Wolfgang was runner up with 486 km. in time 3.35[speed 135.18 km./h.]
The 530 km task on the last day was won by Swedish pilot Markus Ganev in the ARCUS M;131.96 km./h. AND, with
equal 1000 points by Olli, who flew the ARCUS E around with 130.77 km./h.
The Finnish Nationals;
1.Antti Lehto in Ventus-2cxaFES. 2.Olli Teronen in ARCUS E 3.Martti Koivula in LS 10st.

Picture shared by Teemu.

Congratulations for the winners from the MASTERS and the Finnish Nationals.
Katja made some great pictures from the winners in the 3 classes, but with the new privacy- law I am not sure if I can share them without asking permission from all AT the picture. Try to find out how it works for blog writers. If somebody knows, please let me know!!!
I presume that when ORGANIZERS share pictures on FB I can share them too for those without FB .

Courtesy Pekka Ylipaavalaniemi and shared by the FAI World Air Sports Federation with the message
“Yesterday at the Räyskälä Masters the pilots got to experience the legendary finish 12 over the lake, to the delight of the competitors and the spectators alike .”

ONE MORE……because they are so beautiful……because they bring back good memories…. because of Katja who takes great pictures.

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Italian SGP from VARESE;

ready to go on Sunday for race 1.
As shared by the organizers

With only 3 day’s,the French SGP was very unlucky with the weather. Louis Bouderlique from France won day 1 and Dutch mate Peter Millenaar won day 3; both had 17 points and were the winners.Max Seis [France] had only ONE point less.
Straight after,…… the “circus” went to Italy for the Italian SGP at Varese from Aero Club Adele Orsi Acao.
Last Saturday they started with 15 pilots, some of the REAL toppers with a practice day [231 km.] won by French pilot Didier Hauss,with 107 km./h. [JS 1C] followed by Thomas Gostner[ Italy..Ventus 3] and Peter Hartmann [ Austria JS 1/18m.] and Luciano Avanzini,[ Ventus 3,Mike Young, [UK] Tilo Holighaus [Ventus 3] and Alberto Sironi [ASG 29 E/18m]
RACE 1; “High clouds coverage forecasted: let’s see if at the take off time (13:00) the task that has been set will be confirmed .” was the message for the first race.
298.9 km. was set for the pilots and Austrian topper Peter won the first 9 points. He knows the Italian skies and mountains as the best. Mike was runner up followed by Thomas, Tilo ,Gilles and Alberto. Didier got 2 points and Ugo ]Pavesi] 1.

RACE 1 winners.
Shared by the organizers.

Race 2;” The sun is shining this morning after the thunderstorm of last night.”
290 km. was set for the pilots.
Thomas in the Ventus 3 was the fastest, though the speed was “only” 85.5 km./h. [10 points] A tad slower was Peter for 8 points.

The final stage of the race was exciting with 3 gliders finishing very close.” Exciting as never, “, was what Thomas had to say. He, Didier and Peter were at the same altitude and more or less to his astonishment Thomas won the day. He was the best “chaser” is what Peter mentioned with a laugh.
The weather was pretty difficult .

Thomas ,Peter and Didier….finishing in about the same time!!!!
As shared by the organizers!!

Race 3 had”gorgeous weather” and 169 km. was set. I told you already that Austrian pilot Peter Hartmann feels at home in Italy. He won AGAIN; 10 points . He was followed by Tilo and Thomas both racers and from Tilo I knbow that he loves SGP-soaring. 27 points now for Peter and 23 for Thomas whilst Tilo has 13 now.

race 3 winners
Shared by the organizers.

4 Races to go.
Today ;”Good morning from a cloudy Varese this morning.
Pilots are preparing their gliders !
The forecast is for the sky to clear up in the next hours.”

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——–Slovenian Nationals.
David Tansek shared some great pictures on FB last week, from the Slovenian national comps in Lesce partly flown over the Slovenian Alps.
“Flying in hills in substandard weather at that time, shows a lot of brave and enthusiastic competitors to dare the rocks.
Magnificent photos under such adverse weather conditions.” I totally agree.

Thanks to David for sharing these pictures.

The Benalla Junior World Champion Matthew Scutter from Australia flew these comps and after being runner up on the last day he dropped to 4 due to an out landing on the last day. You can read his full story on
Matthew Scutter’s Gliding

I share his last day with you;
“Slovenian Nationals finished – 4th place down from 2nd after my outlanding on the penultimate day. Turns out club class gliders shot the glide from below where I decided I needed to deviate to climb towards my eventual outlanding – I’ve picked up ridge flying and mountain thermal flying without any problems, but anabatic lift flying, in particular relying on it to pickup glide through difficult valleys still eludes me.
Final day was challenging with thick mid-level cloud covering the first and last quarters of the task, suffocating convection. It caused me real difficulty without long wings to glide through it, and I ended up waiting on a ridge in a valley breeze for an hour at 300m until some sunlight broke through to get me home just in time for the final dinner (without finishing the task, not that many others did…)
Hope to return again in the future, it’s a great place to fly with very diverse conditions.
Time for 2 weeks of glider tuning before WGC PL.”

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—–South Africa in winter!!
Great and interesting flight from Sven [Olivier] ….603 km. in winter from Worcester in his JS 1B. With a take-off at dawn he shared a picture impression.
“Thank you to Cape Town ATC, they were most accommodating .”
“Launched shortly after dawn – immediately had a battery problem ATC was most accommodating – a large portion of the flight was spent in the TMA! Fell out of the sky twice – scraped away in the Hex river valley the first time, and climbed rotor in the second time – averager was at 10.2 m/s for a while (down when I fell down and up – climbing the rotor)
Landed with 3h30 daylight remaining and improving conditions (low battery and running out or turnpoints)”