In several countries the European juniors are performing very well at the moment. GREAT to see!!!
I continue with the UK and Swiss juniors flying regional or national comps in France and Switzerland.

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41st INTERNATIONAL ISSOUDUN.

As you could read in my last blog the UK juniors have settled down to gather more [International] experience in Issoudun in France, at the 41st International Issoudun.
Last Wednesday they all had to work for their points.
Open got 369 km. and 5 from 10 finished on this “ hot and sweaty day“. Daily winner was Mike Gatfield , his second victory and this time for the full 1000 points. Only half [5 from 10 ] finished.
On Thursday a 250 k., was set and NOBODY finished but some flew far enough to make it a day; 212 km. by French pilot Ludwin De Roest [ not a real French name by the way] , gave him 722 points.
Friday ;342 km.and a tough day for Mike as he just was 21 km. OUT in a paddock. A pity, as 6 from 9 finished! He dropped from 1 overall to 4.
Saturday;  Mike was straight back and won the 3 hour AAT-day.
With 7 out of 8 days the overall scores look as follows;
1. Ludovic Hirtz…4.645 [France]
2. Thierry Nortier…4.594 [France]
3. Mike Gatfield…4.585 [ UK]

In Club, the task was 303 km. and all 8 pilots finished!!!!William Blackburn in the St Cirrus got the 1000 points for his effort. All started before 2 PM.
” A lot of the locals abandoned the open task allowing Mike and Will to claim the top spots in each class.”
Club had a 250 distance as well. AND,…….. ONE FISHER in a LIBELLE!!!!! Good.
Local French pilot Jean Philippe finished and his speed was 52.68 km./h. The UK boys flew between 70 k and 157.70 km.
Friday; 304 km. was a good day for UK pilot Jake . He was, in the DG 101,  the ONLY FINISHER !!! Good on him!He climbed from 2 to 1 overall. Jean Philippe missed out on 59 km. but still was runner up.
Saturday; a 3 hour AAT for the last day. The UK boys won with 236 and 231 km in time 3.10 and 3.07.
Final scores;
1.Jake Brattle…5.120 [UK]
2. Jean Philippe Rogier…4.922 [France]
3. William Blackburn…4.319 [UK]

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Swiss Nationals in Schaenis.

On Wednesday , when I left you, the pilots in Club got 218 km. and in open 336.
18 m. 298 and the combi’s went for 243 km.
In club, the fight for the ” honors” continued between David and Davide. David [LS4] started early and was back early [2.51] and won the day with 595 points behind his name. Davide [St. Cirrus] left 19 minutes later and it took him a bit longer 3.12 but he was runner up with 551 points.
On Thursday a different scenario and another winner;Edi in the Discus. During the 2.15 AAT he flew 150 km. that’s 12 km. more than Davide and 11 than David.
On Friday with one day to go, a 2.45 AAT. It turned out to be GIRLS-DAY. The German ladies Maria [LS1f] and Lisa[Hornet WL] flew both over 100 km to make it a valid day. Not too many points but still ; 120 and 114.
Saturday was cancelled so no time anymore to catch up.

Final club class scores and Swiss champion , runner up and 3d place ;
1. David Leemann …2.806 clear champion.
2. Davide Giovanelli…2.496
3. Maria Schneider…2.063

18 m. same story, same fight for honors other names; Juerg and Rolf. Still departing together and arriving together 1000 points for 999. I guess they want to be equal number 1 in the end. Now the separation is 3 points in favor of Rolf.
On Thursday a 3.15 AAT for the pilots and this time it was Rolf with 1000 points and Juerg with 996.7 Points difference overall in favor of Rolf.
On Friday a set 352 km. on the menu and a total different story.Only Rolf and Fredy Zulliger finished. Juerg was “out” after 117 km. 1000 and 946 points for the best, Juerg had only 293 and dropped to spot 3 whilst Fredy was runner up. It turned out to be their last day as on Saturday it was cancelled.

Final 18 m. scores;
1. Rolf Friedli….5.140  clear CHAMPION
2. Fredy Zulliger…4.652
3. Juerg Haas…4.426

Open; On Wednesday the 3d daily win for Gabriel Rossier what a pity about the loss of points earlier in the comps, but rules are rules. 8 From 9 finished.
Thursday the Rossiers were 1 and 2 on a daily base and 2 and 3 overall now. Splendid racers!During the 3.30 AAT, Gabriel flew 376 km in time in 4.06 and Daniel 412 km. in time 4.32 !!!One finishing pilot flew 5 hours and 13 min over 310 km.BUT,….he made it!!!!
On Friday a 386 set task, still a difficult day,  as MarkusVon Der Krone won the day in the JS 1 with a speed of under 100 km. /h. ; 97.26 km./h.
Gabriel was 5th and Daniel out landed after 235 km. With one day to go Markus remained on spot 1 , Markus Gauman now was on spot 2 and Gabriel on 3 with Daniel on 4.
For open there was another day to put “things straight”!!!!
311 km. was set on Saturday and that’s enough to play last-day-games. Early starters between 1.40 and 1.53 PM, did well the Rossiers started at 2.30 and on the last day they had a daily score of 912 and 869 whilst Markus Gauman [Nimbus 4 M] had the full 1000. Not a lot of difference but I guess they wanted to improve. At least they tried.
Worst day for the other Markus with a 7th spot , but no worries he was far ahead of the rest.

So after 7 days in this class, not bad in by rain troubled Europe, the final scores;
1. Markus Von Der Krone …5.535 clear Swiss CHAMPION.
2. Markus Gaumann…5.146
3. Gabriel Rossier…5.004

Combi; Well known pilot Rainer Cronjaeger won the day with 647 points and moves up from 5 to 2. Not bad. Tizian [ Discus 2] still leads with 0ver 300 points. Tizian was the 2015 Junior Champion in Switzerland.
On Thursday a 3.15 AAT and Rainer won again in the ARCUS T ;237 km. in 3.10. Tizian out-landed after 62 km. He lost more than 300 points, but still leads with 12 points.
On Friday a 2.45 AAT. NO FINISHERS but a valid day and daily winner Rainer, his 3d win in a row.
NO 7 th day for them either so the final scores;
1. Rainer Cronjaeger …2.563 and Swiss Champion.
2. Tizian Steiger…2.477
3. Martin Buhlmann…2.404.

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CLUB class A
Częstochowa-Rudniki, Poland

50 Pilots flew for the CLUB class -A title in Poland and to make it difficult, there are again many ” performing”with the same name  Jakub, Lukasz,Piotr [x6] ,  but also Stanislaw, Jaroslaw and Miroslaw.
They had between July 2 and 9 ,a total of 5 valid days out of 8 ,  with 2 x a-1000 -points-day.
The last 2 days were cancelled.
In the end Jakub Barszcz won with 3.344 points. Not far behind was runner up, Lucasz Grabowski with 3.300 and on spot 3 Lucasz Kornacki with 3.238.

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French Championships for women, 18m. and open.

Great picture shared by the organizers on day 2 when the day had to be cancelled.

In La Roche-sur-Yon les Ajoncs, in France these championship started on July 9 with 78 pilots. They continue till July 16
Women;
22 of them… GOOD!!!!
Day 1 had a 2.30 AAT won by Magali de Cachard in Pegase. Aude Untersee was runner up in a Pegase as well.
Several Pegases in this class, a “real French” glider, a total of 15 !!!!! In total around 300 were built till 1988 when the production stopped.
I remember the first ones built by Centrair in 1981. The fuselage of the German ASW 20,  with a new wing. I even remember Marc Ranjon the owner of Centrair and the fact that he at that time,as agent for Schleicher built this new type;
“ Schleichers were not happy that their agent was in competition with them using their fuselage design, but the dispute was settled.”
Well you see they still happily fly and belong to the easy-to-handle-standard-club-gliders.

I missed one French pilot on the list, normally she is always there, JC [Jutta Sturm]  but only later I found out that she is recovering from a very nasty car accident in Germany in 2015. She cannot fly alone yet , but flies now with her husband in open class in an ASH 25/26 m. Good to see her flying in a 2-seater for the time being.

    

Girl power as seen by Juliette Charlie.[Jutta Sturm]  She flies this time not in the female class but in the open class.

Task 2 a set 115 km task.but was cancelled.
Task 3 was on Monday with a 106 km. task. Not much,  but with this weather at least a possibility to fly.And they did. Amelie Audier won the day in a St Cirrus with a speed of 86 km./h. about 20 km./h faster than the runner up in LS 4.
12 “girls” finished!
Task 4 yesterday showed a very small task; 1 hour AAT, but the day for the ladies was cancelled in the end.

18 m;
Also 22 participants in 18 m. class and 6 of them fly HC [Hors Concours] one of them Peter Eriksen  from Denmark and it was just he who won day 1; 999 points. Arne Boye Moller is an HC pilot as well. Spot 1 however was for French pilot Denis Guerin.
Task 2; 171 km. but cancelled in the end.
Task 3; had a “very small ” task as well, just over 100 km.[109] The 2 Danish pilots did well though flying HC they fly for the points and both were the best today. Arne with a start at 4.04 PM [201 points] and Erik at 6 .05 PM [ 209] !!!!!!! They were the only 2 to fly above 100 km./h.Jean -Denis Barrois was the number 1 with 99.9 km./h. [191]
Task 4 was a ONE hour AAT. 5 HEROES  finished  and a total of 6 pilots flew over 100 km. gaining between 120 and 162 points for their efforts.
Some pilots started at 4.15 PM others nearly at 6 PM!!!!
Denis Geurin had his 2d victory in the ASG 29 .Gilles Navas was runner up. They all flew over 2 hours.

Open;
Interesting class with many top pilots. Also 22 in this class and also HC pilots not competing officially, a total of 4. They are from Belgium[2] , UK  and Germany and cannot be French champion, but it is great to fly with and between the French pilots, always good at EGC’s and WGC’s and compare your own skills.
Task 1;Jean Marc Deycard won the 2.30 AAT, with  243 km in 2.35 . Eric Napoleon and his mate flew 284 km,  but needed more time [3.06]  still was runner up.

Day 1 picture shared by Juliette Charlie. [ Jutta flies with her husband in the ASH 25 and was on spot 10.
So keep an eye on the Sturm family.
and another great picture taken during flight, that’s the beauty of flying together.

Task 2 ; was cancelled.
Then on Monday no task in this class.
Task 3 was yesterday with for open class a nearly ridiculous task , but at least they could fly;ONE hour AAT and ONE pilot finished. Jean Marc Caillard [ASH30 MI with call sign RC] won the day with 186.90 km. and “received”  86 points.
Amazingly many kilometers, certainly when you look at the runner up Jean Marc Deycard [JS 1C with call sign DY] ] who flew 129 km. The rest [24] was under 100 km.
RC started at 3.47 ,whilst DY left at 6.10 PM.

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Interesting OLC flights!

On Wednesday July 6 Holland had great weather and several pilots used it for a nice long flight. Peter Millenaar [ASG 29E /18m] was one of them with a  750 all the way up from Malden, direction N to Friesland , then East into Germany, to past Porta Westfalica and back . Great stuff!! Spot 12 for the day WORLD WIDE!!!
July 9 was another EXCELLENT day in the USA. Top-pilots as Jim and Tom Payne and recent open class champion Keith Essex with Gavin Wills from NZ flew in teams and what do you want more with such WAVE-weather in Minden and each an ARCUS to fly in????
” A much better than expected rarity…good Minden wave in July. Mostly blue south of Minden.” was the comment from Jim on the OLC. The Payne’s flew  2.308 km.with a speed of 196.8 km./h.!!!!
Keith and Gavin, top wave pilot from Omarama, flew 1.905 km. with a speed of 196 km. /h. They flew a “yo yo in the wave and to keep it interesting they jumped around wave bars to the north.”
It’s worthwhile to have a look at their “fun- fan” -trace on the OLC on July 9.
Boulder had good soaring conditions as well with several 1000 km. flights in Ventus 2 ax /15 m. and Ventus 2CT /18m. and DG 800 b/18m.
Spain is awakening and the popular places as Fuentemilanos,[ 958 in in ASH 31/21 m]  Ocana [ 901 km in ASG 29.] and nowadays Cuenca Sotos have great flights. It’s just waiting for the 1000 km. day over there.

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News from the QSGP in Australia.

Hi all,

Entries for the Australian leg of the 8th Series of the Sailplane Grand Prix are now open.  The event will run at Horsham in western Victoria from 14th to 20th December 2016.

The website is at http://www.sgp.aero/australia2016.aspx?contestID=27849

This will be the first leg of the 8th series, which will conclude with a final at Vitacura in Chile late in 2017.  Assuming we have a full field at Horsham, the first two places will be selected for the final.

This event will be run in the 18m class.  No handicaps apply, although we may introduce a wing loading limit if the entry list warrants it.  Only 20 entries are allowed, and seeding via the IGC list will apply if it is necessary.

As the Contest Director for the SGP I and the organising committee would like to invite you to enter this contest.  It is a simple format, and the emphasis will be on fast racing around fixed tasks rather than endurance tasks, where the first pilot home will win.  Typical tasks will be 2.5 to 3 hours.

We do expect that several members of the Aussie team for the Worlds at Benalla will enter, and there has already been interest from overseas WGC contenders as well.
This promises to be a significant and spectacular event in this year’s gliding calendar.  Don’t miss it!
If you have any questions please contact the organizing committee at horshamsgp@glidingaustralia.org, or you can ring me at the phone number below.

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NO Holland did , rather amazingly, NOT qualify for the European Championship Soccer, Portugal won last Sunday  from France BUT………..
We still had a TOP SPORT WEEKEND;
the Dutch 100 m-relay ladies [with Dafne Schippers] won European GOLD,
Young [23] Anouk Vetter won unexpected with a new Dutch record [6626 points] the heptathlon
Max Verstappen drove his Formula 1 car to a 3d spot, to be later corrected to P 2
AND
Tom Dumoulin won the most important mountain stage during the Tour De France arriving on the top of the mountain in infernal rain and hail like marbles,… but with a glorious ‘winners-‘smile!!!

On top of that, as Murray fan, Andy won the Wimbledon final.

CU next week
Cheers Ritz