ALPHEN AAN DEN RIJN WEDNESDAY NOVEMBER 28 2012
ritzdeluy@hotmail.com www.glidinginternational.com www.soaringcafe.com
After the very hot and booming weather a southerly change passed by in the evening with rain and storm, pretty typical for Narromine as they say and normally the day after is good again and the weather building up to very good. Terry Bellair managed to fly 517 km. during the day, before the approaching storm and of course turned back in time . Today he flew over 700 km, as you see it is building up!
To get back on that ” beaut” very first 1000 FAI km. triangle, for the season from Allan Barnes on Sunday in the LS 8, it was NOT that sure he was going to fly that 1000, as he got low in the beginning and even choose himself a good paddock already for the outlanding, than….the day improved but he still was not happy and wanted to abort the flight, but “couldn’t glide back to Narromine so deviated left (NE) to the only cloud in the sky.”
In the end he just made it back before sunset and must have been excited, tired and worn out but making the evening on adrenaline! Great DECLARED flight!!!!!
Also Temora had some storm after their great and hot weather as you can see on the picture from my friends the Gilberts.
Talking about adrenaline enough from that also for Sebastian Vettel. What a nailbiting last race of the season 2012!!! I was ready to sit and look, but when my favourite was pushed by young Senna and drove after a spin against all racing competitors in the first round, I could not look anymore. Vettel was out in my head! But no ,…when I looked half an hour later he was on spot 15 and then on round 69 from 71 I kept looking and saw how he still managed to be world champion by finishing on spot 6. What a character that 25 year old boy has and now he is a triple world champion the youngest ever and winning the 3 in succesion. Admire Alonso as well !!!Loosing with 3 points only , in the way he did shows class!!!
YESTERDAY, the weather was top in Namibia and SA and the first 33 places on the OLC were for Africa.
4 x 1000 km., from Bitterwasser and once form Kuruman, where HW flew over 900 km. in total and over 850 as an FAI triangle.
From Narromine one of my friends , Gerrit, flew TODAY for the 2d time in his new Quintus M with 700 km and a speed of 121 km./h. on the clocks, good to see Andy back in Corowa and also Peter shipped his glider to Corowa and had his first flight for his so maniest Australia -year.
And with the forecasted 40 dgr. for tomorrow more long x-country flights in the Tocumwal/Corowa region are to be expected.
It is good to see how many people have been touched by the death of Gill Van den Broeck from Belgium.
To all I have written already, I have translated a comment from JC and add that here;
” Gill was one of the first female pilots who flew the European Championships and since then visited nearly every world championship even when she was not flying anymore.I don’t know how she flew but, her enthusiasm was overwhelming. She ” invented” the ritual of “the hexen” at ladies comps. You can call her the MOTHER of international gliding comps. There she worked on her books and 2 have been published. In these books she comments on comps , the flying and the results with black humor…with criticism.”
So far the comment as a onther tribute to Gill. AND…..THANK YOU, Jutta!
Last Sunday I had lunch with Natasja who is going to fly as the first Dutch lady in a WWGC. Gill visited her during the comps as she wanted to meet the first Dutch girl in such a competition. Natasja straight away got her 2 books with a nice message in it and Gill hoped to be there next year to see her flying.
A pity she can’t do this anymore.
Natasja came over for lunch last Sunday.And with her crew Hans and Hobbit , last year [and in 2013.]
Today starts the trial against Argentinian [ but living in Holland ] pilot Julio Poch, who was arrested on his final flight in Spain before retirement with Transavia. Hope with many more, it will be a fair case.It might take 2 years before it is over as 67 are on trial with him.
Talking about Argentina, here is some news from Bruce [Cooper ]:
–“Last year we blamed the bad weather in Argentina on La Nina, this year we have El Nino and its still poor so far. Almost 1/4 of the way through the 3 month expedition with only 3 gliding days. Some good weather on the long term forecast for Saturday onwards .–”
In the past Bruce flew with us in Tocumwal where I long ago , got to know him. Later he flew from Corowa and he is happy for his friends in Australia that they had such a good day.
–“Nice to see the guys in Australia having a good season though.—”
Atleast on one of those 3 days 2 long flights have been made , one on November 21 with USA pilots Jim Payne and Dennis Tito in the DG 1001M 1.110km. and one on November 18 by Swiss pilot Jean Marc Perrin in a 15m DG 808; 1.366,77 km.
And as the news from Uppsala is coming in every day send on FB by enthusiastic organisers, I share it with you, maybe you get excited too and want to fly the MASTERS in May 2013.
—“We welcome former silver world-champion Åke Pettersson. Åke is a flying legend with several championships medals. Åke will fly his Ventus 2 in the racing class. – Welcome—“
—“One more pilot from the Swedish Uvalde team will attend – Ulf Ringertz in his Ventus 2 Cxt try to challenge the big gliders in Open class.”
—“First edition of Local Procedures
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B5W5xndPpQYAaTVTSm4wOW9WSXM
—Tonny Olsson med ASG 29E i sin hemmaterräng kommer att utmana i Open klassen. Välkommen”–
—“Eskilstuna new chairman with old chairman will attend in racing class in a two seater. They have probably a lot to talk about….–” [Peter Wlassiks and Mattias Hemborg]
That’ s it see you on Sunday,
Cheers Ritz