good flying

We hit 43 degrees yesterday and the cloudbase reached 14000 ft. It wasn't all straight forward though and some pilots were struggling big time once they got too low. Ziggy had a great 350 km run in the dry SZD-55 averaging 100 km/h.

I was running wings, then shifting cars to the landing runway and then ... got unwell. I think I'm not used to the extreme heat as yet.

I came good in the afternoon and managed to get few landing shots:

Keith in his PW-5

Rolf in his LS8-18

Zigster

Hugh, who's flying very big planes on a daily basis and just started flying gliders, had a good one yesterday. Two days ago he flew his very first solo XC flight, then he landed out in a remote area with no phone coverage and flew his gold distance (300 km triangle) and gold height (3000 m altitude gain) yesterday. He had to ring the bell last night. Congrats Hugh!

Today the temperature is down to 20 degrees and the sky is full of grey, low stuff. It looks like a winery lunch to me :)

hot hot hot

9:30 this morning we had 35 degC, around 2 pm during launching the thermometer was showing 42 and it was still rising, but ... there is clouds! And they are ridiculously high. I'm following the race on the computer and it's crazy how fast the boys are moving around the task. Some will say it was under-set. The thing was that it was either gonna be great or crap - nothing in between.

Here are some photos from the last two days:

Yesterday was a very funny and tricky day. There were some thermals and also shear wave. Great lift but also huge patches of horrible sink. I managed to contact a wavelet and got up to 9000 ft. As soon as I left it I got down to 3000 ft in no time. Whole day was like this. Very annoying when you were down low and someone on the radio shouted that they just got up to 11.000 ft. It was fun though.

If someone tells you that carbon doesn't crack - tell them it's not the case:

Pawnee tires not just a car crap

we made it into the newspaper again

doughnut this morning

it's 42 degrees out there with 7% humidity

Zig getting serious

the winch-Pawnee

Colin in the EXPERIMENTAL ;)

no performance decrease with temperature ...

Orange Week day 3

Another blue day but at least the temperature is going up and we hit 30 degC today. This will give the boys higher climbs. Winds have dropped off so that thermals should be more organised and smooth.

Ziggy is flying today and they have a 3 hours AAT with a minimum distance of about 240 km and max 450 km.

beautiful Galahs

follow the leader

getting ready

It's hard to describe how much fun we're having here. Evenings are the best because everybody stays here, Jean is serving magnificent meals and there is some pretty good red wine available from the bar. All a pilot needs. If you add up Hayden's flying stories on top of it all you will have a perfect flying week.

Japanese pilots keep their gliders here and come for only 2-3 weeks each year

THE TUG - tows like a winch - today's record 1 min and 50 seconds up to 2000 ft

it's not all totally dry yet

It was my turn yesterday and I ended up 5th for the day. Not too bad considering that I wasn't trying to race at all. It's been a while since I've had a XC flight just for fun with no pressure whatsoever. Yesterday was one of these days where I just enjoyed being up there and going around a little task.

Umbrella service on the grid today

Ziggy

Ziggy again

Just Soaring goes soaring

A warm welcome from Waikerie, South Australia. Here we are again, after a year, participating in the most friendly gliding event ever known to men. No stress, no pushing, no unhealthy competition - just pure fun. The challenge is different every day. The first day was scored according to OLS Plus, today we had an AAT task with 2 hours task time. We are sharing one glider and fly every other day. All our flights will be posted on the OLC:

http://www.onlinecontest.org/olc-2.0/gliding/flightsOfClub.html?cc=31015&st=olc-league&rt=olc&c=C0&sc=&sp=2014

There was not much time for photos but we're now all set and can start thinking about them.

just few more little things

Just Soaring goes soaring

no fruit or veggies are allowed into South Australia

lunch on the way

on the road and the soil gets red

And in Waikerie:

sticker is on the car

first day - Ziggy has a go

the world in the glasses

sticker on the glider