Day 4

After a long and uneventful day of rest today listening to the rain fall I have been able to process what happened yesterday... I've narrowed it down to three major sections of the flight where it all went pear shaped; my start, middle and final glide.. Well not quite that bad. It was a 320km Racing task, I started with a cirrus and 10 minutes behind Adam hoping to catch the small group that he was with. Into the first turn and I was already close. So were lots of other gliders. Quite a gaggle was forming around Adam and his starting group. They had a good climb out of the turn, I came in underneath with few others though I was still a few 100ft below them and just couldn't make sense of the climb. The core I had was at least 2kts weaker then what Adam was calling 2000ft above and I was visibly dropping away from the few that were just above. I missed the bubble. I searched around and found a better climb a few km further along and took that to about 3500' and set off to the next climb. I snagged a good climb and rocketed up to cloud base at around 5000'. Through the second turn the swarm of gliders Adam was with was a solid climb ahead. Obviously they'd had a good run too. I pulled into a ripper thermal just under two 20m class gliders and again rocketed back up to cloud base. I was hot on the heels of the gaggle.

Organised Chaos..

We were running a very nice convergence line now but quite a way off track and had to jump across to a smaller street with a band of showers to fly through. The gaggle made the jump but I wanted a climb right to base before I would do the same. And to spice it up the terrain up here is getting gnarly adding to my reluctance to get back on track. I'm now in a scrappy climb with Standard Class gliders near their turn point and I follow them across to the next street and back on track for the Club Class turn point. This deviation cost me heaps of time and I was now well behind the gaggle because they found a very good climb on the other side of the rain.. Still with Standard class guys I take a very good climb a I'm back to base. I split the gap between two showers and head to the third turn.

The way back and now heading for the fourth and final turn point was a little soft but i had to play it conservatively.

This was actually an attmpted photo of a rainbow but you can see what the country is like..

The turn point was inside a heavy looking shower and I was 10 km behind Adam and the gaggle. Adam called entering rain at 4600' and losing height fast. I took a good climb up to cloud base on the edge of a wide blue hole right where I need it knowing I wouldn't get a climb before being spat out the other side of the rain. best L/D across the hole and into the rain at about 4800'. Through the turn point still in rain losing height fast I headed to the nearest area of sun following Adams advice and clearly the best option. I had a reasonable climb there and used the bug wipers to wipe most of the water off. I headed for home along the street and right at 49km struck a ripper thermal right where Adam had left it. back to cloud base I ran the street until it started bending right and looking dark, showery and over developed. I decided to jump off the convergence to newer looking clouds more direct on track to find my last climb before the airfield. It wasn't as good as I wanted but it was the last option before the airfield so I hung on until I had enough height for a comfortable glide home.

So the big lesson for the day was about when you should and shouldn't be scared of the dark clouds, when to just go with it and not worry about the water falling out of the other side.

Quite a slow day, I know where I went wrong and what I need to do to fly that flight better.

29 June, from the crew dude

Hi all!!

Last night was the International Night, at which each competing nation put on a spread of items typical to their country, and everyone else partook of same.  Meantime everyone had a good time, and from what I hear, some had an even better time.  I can't remember exactly what was to be had, but Austria had schnapps available, and Russia had vodka.  The Netherlands had an orange-based liquor which was in its way as potent as the others.  I might leave it to others to describe what was available, if they can remember… and are able to describe it, perhaps much later on once they've woken up!  Oh, and the Austrians wore lederhosen.

Forecast yesterday for today was rubbish, and latish last evening a lot of cirrus rolled in.  That's now turned into a huge mass of cloud at 8000 ft, and which is now steadily dropping light rain, I guess typical of a warm front about to pass over us.  The cloud will remain with us the whole day, and the grid is closed, which pretty well means that nothing will happen today.

Yesterday's flights weren't as good as they should have been, possibly because there were some showers in the area which caused deviations, and average speeds weren't nearly as high as I'd expected.  Perhaps there was some over-development too, damaging climbs in some areas.  I'll leave it to Eric to describe his flight anyway, if for no other reason than that I wasn't there!  (grin)

Not sure what we'll do today…

Update 0945 - I forgot - a DC3 is scheduled to arrive today!  And it's just landed.

Some pics.  The first two are a bit grainy, they were taken at max zoom from a distance away.

Update 1420 - some more pictures of the DC3.  Also threw in one of today's briefing, just for the heck of it.

Oh, and today is definitely not a day to spend outdoors.

Cheers!

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28 June, from the crew dude

Hi all!!

Things got hectic yesterday, and I ended up with no time for a new blog entry.  So I'll have to make up for that now I reckon.

Eric was going fantastically, until things went completely pear-shaped around the final turn, and he registered an almost continuous descent to the deck.  I watched it happen on Live Tracking, and knew I'd get an outlanding message.  Fortunately, by now I'd found out how to drive Google Maps, and also learnt that you can enter a lat/lon and get directions to there, as close as possible.  Which came in real handy, as the outlanding spot was well off the beaten track, and certainly not covered by our road map.

By following Google Maps on the phone, I was able to get to Eric without any directions from him, which made the retrieve much easier.  The roads out that way were little-used and narrow, but I managed to drive slowly along them and get there.  You know the rest of the story.

Back here now, and today's dawned fantastically clear and sunny, and today may well be the pick of all the days.  I'm thinking that a racing task will be the go, distance maybe 430 km for around 4 hours in the sky.  The task-setters may even set more!

Briefing at 1000, first launch maybe 1130 or 1145, haven't found out yet.

Stay tuned!

Update 1020 - racing task of 320 km or so, first launch 1115. Some Cu's now forming, but hopefully won't over-develop.

Update 1255 - no delays.  They're all away.  The sky is still looking great!

Now for some pictures.
One of the grids, looking from the other end of the runway.  This is actually a shot from yesterday.

Today's early morning shot.  Haven't seen this sort of sky for ages!

After launching.  Awesome sky!  Haven't seen this for ages either.  Clouds around 5000 ft.

Update 1650 - Eric's on the way in, having found the last thermal necessary.  Should be back soon.  Meantime, a couple of pics of some of the guys returning.

Cheers

Day 3

It was a long day in the saddle. Started well, doing all the right things, following the good lines, only to end up in a paddock 60km from home. Adam almost got me back up today. He called the climb that was the only one for miles but I just couldn't make it. If my wings were dry then I may have been able to push it but it just wasn't meant to be.

Yet another solid performance by Adam so hopefully I can help push him up the ladder some more over the remaining comp days and get a solid top 10 placing for him, minimum. 

Tomorrow is looking like it should be a good day. Hopefully there will be less water falling from the sky and more sun reaching the ground.

Just a few pictures from the paddock. Do you think I should win the spot landing competition?

With the help of the farmer and a few others we pushed the glider up over the road and onto the lawn. Just before the heavy rain hit and turned the paddock to bog. In comparison to my recent outlandings this one was nothing. No mud, hardly and cleaning needed at all. And we certainly didn't need to hose out the wheel box this time and that has saved us a huge amount of time and energy.

Just got back from the sauna and now time to hit the hay and dream of rain-free cloud streets.

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27 June, from the crew dude

Hi all!!!

Beautiful sky today, some light cirrus around but not much, Cu's forming in the distance. But I'm wondering whether it'll over-develop, especially since some rain us forecast for after lunch. Let's see what the met-man tells us. I'm tipping an early start.

Update 0953 - just looked at the task sheet.  AAT of 3 hours, scratch distance 320 km or so,  first launch 1115. Definitely an early start.  Perhaps, with hindsight, briefing could've been at 0930 with first launch at 1030...

Update 1203 - no delays to the start.  Cu's everywhere, but some have now started to leak.  Eric's launched, and will soon be away I guess.

I've got the GoPro outside taking a movie of the launch of the entire fleet.  Yesterday I'd tried to get one of everyone landing, but had the camera pointed up too far, and got clouds only!  Oh well.  The launch direction is such that they're all going overhead our Aussie base, so we're getting almost continuous aircraft noise from the tugs!

Cheers, and stay tuned!

Day 2

I had such a fun flight. Highs and lows and highs again. I really finished on a high, my first competition task completed in Finland... I've been sending Andy all over the Finnish country side but I think he's had quite enough practice and the trailer shouldn't be needed anymore.

Gliders everywhere pre start. The last cloud was quite a way from the start line so I stuck with the pack as we crossed the line in dead air heading to the cloud on the edge of the first turn. That cloud was part of a nice line that stretched 90 degrees left toward the next sector. We ran this line taking a few good climbs then had an amazing run into the second sector with a 45km glide at 250:1 with an average of 138km/h.

Now the exit of this sector is where I went wrong. I back tracked along the same street but needed to turn north to the next sector. Just as I left the second sector I saw a couple of gliders high, and tracking 90 degrees to the path in. This was the fork in the road where only I and Garret didn't take left track. I was at the point where I could see the long jump between clouds and told Adam that I think left track is best. He was behind but with a good group of later starters. Left track was much longer but under clouds the whole time and ultimately faster.

Garret and I jumped across the gap to a cloud giving a good climb. Then again a very long, slow glide accros a dead gap to the clouds at the max of the sector. I cored a rough climb that only gave me 4kts for 2000' but being so bubbly I was lucky and pulled right away from garret. I straightened up running to the edge of the cloud and caught a bubble 7.4kts for the last 800' to cloud base. Now on my own and not knowing where to go I headed direct to the last sector but back through the dead air from the previous leg. I know now that from there Garret followed the wide arc under the clouds where he saw the gaggle. This section cost me more time as the dead air on my direct heading was much longer. Eventually I got back into better air and topped up 1000' with 2.5kts. Losing more time on the others. Under the Cu again I had good climbs but they were much trickier to find and glides weren't as good as early in this part of the sky. Adam was saying the samething and it was definitely right to shift back a gear. I could now see gliders ahead of me and in the area. I met up with 3 and we were stopping in sensible climbs. Not strong but not too weak. Adam called a good climb ahead and my selection standard then rose. I found a great climb in the same area and took that to cloud base for a fast final glide. Into the last sector and I  sped home for the last 20km.

I had a whole lot of fun today, it was amazing in places and tricky in others. I just really need to learn to stick to the group.

From the aero tow I had a blade of grass fold over the wing. For the entire flight it was sitting on my leading edge. I couldn't even push it off with the bug wipers. It would just stick to the wiper and reposition itself somewhere else along the wing. That's got to be worth at least an extra 5 km/h average!

On final glide with a piece of grass

26 June, from the crew dude, part 2

G'day all!

Those who've been following Eric's progress via Live Tracking will know by now that he got back.  And, boy, was he chuffed about it!  No point in my talking about it, he can do that when he gets a chance.  Reckon his post will be kinda long.

The rain that threatened the task area seemed to have left off to an extent, with the result that pretty well everyone got back, although to date not all have uploaded flight details.

Standby for Eric's post! (when it arrives)

Now the bad news.  The local public-access forecast is for rain for most of next week.  It's just possible that this Sunday could even be the last flying day.  I hope not.  We'll have to see how it pans out.  Seems to be a bit like Poland - the weather is quite variable, and difficult to predict days in advance.  Oh, and temperatures getting above 20 degrees only after the comp finishes!!  Maybe the Finnish summer is being uninstalled… :-)

Cheers

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26 June, from the crew dude

Hi all!

Yep, yesterday we actually managed to get a task in.  On Day 4 of the comp.

Tricky conditions, with the task possibly over-set; still, you probably wouldn't expect anything else in a world comp.  The sky started off as alto-stratus, then quite a few Cu's developed and it looked reasonably good.  But the Cu's thickened up and then merely added to the alto-stratus, causing the day to shut down in a fashion, and lots of people in Club Class landed out.

The paddock Eric landed in looked OK, but turned out v. muddy especially once we churned it up a bit trying to tow the glider out to the trailer (wouldn't have got the car and trailer in there).

It took me a bit of road-juggling to find Eric, I kept on taking what would turn out to be the wrong road but eventually ended up on one which looked as though it was going in the wrong direction but eventually curved right around and ended up at the farmhouse where Eric was.  De-rigged and headed off.

Back at home, we pulled the glider out and hosed out the wheel-well and trailer, getting rid of about half a ton of mud in the process, and rigged the glider then had tea.  Just before turning in, though, we also sealed it up again and got it ready for today's onslaught.

Yesterday, the forecast for today was looking promising.  Today, the same forecast has been downgraded somewhat.  We'll have to wait until briefing to find out what's actually happening…

Again, stay tuned!!!

Update 1025 - Eric has an AAT of scratch distance 302 km or so, 3 hrs. First launch 1130.

Update 1125 - no launch delays, they're going.

Some isolated showers around now, and it's over-developing.

Update 1415 - have included picture from yesterday.  I put them in yesterday's blog entry.  Back here, showers not increasing, and Eric's well away.

Cheers

Day 1.. Day 1 for real this time

Southern Finland is covered by a large swirling mass of upper level stratus and sunshine reaching the ground today was very rare. There was some good convection giving some reasonable climbs but overdevelopment was very common even pushing up into the upper level cloud layer and thickening it, causing very dark, dead areas of sky.

Pre-start gaggles were such a huge mix of gliders, 30 to 40++ at times. I started with a small group and crossed a very long dead patch of sky, completely unlandable beneath. We got our first climb over the first area of paddocks and took that nearly to cloud base. Yet again, a long glide over unlandable terrain and a  then a climb over some good landing options. By this time I was in the thick of a large gaggle 3/4 to the top of it and just into the first turn. Not a bad position to be in at all. Showers approaching from northeast, good clouds further west, second turn point north, but terrain not looking very friendly. I went West with an ASW 15, and into what I though was the much better part of the sky. It turned out to be just him and I with every one taking a different route. We took one very nice climb, about 3kts from bottom to top and charged of to a sunny spot where Adam was just getting to. The gaggle was obviously working very well in what looked like worse sky but still faster.

Into the sunny patch I saw some birds soaring. It was rough bumpy air. A few turns and I still couldn't get the core. The ASW 15 left while I hung in. I was right and cored 4.5kts from 1100' above ground right up to cloud base at 4600'. I steamed on and shortly passing the 15 1000' above. I missed Adam's warning about the second turn point and passed up a few weaker climbs and didn't get high enough to get to the turn and back in the dead air. I ended up dropping the wheel at 500' still trying to hang in there. Landed safely and then was expecting 6 other gliders to be dropping into nearby fields shortly. I was watching from the ground and was sure they would follow.  Hanging in their they were eventually working half a knot. Not even above winch height they left toward an area of developing cu and then I lost sight of the group. They were 200' above me when I dropped the wheel, that group eventually made it home. Bugger bugger bugger!

I played it safe, did the right thing for me so only looking forward now.

Very tricky day. Adam touched the second turn and drifted back with the wind to almost the first turn. He made it back on a single thread of hair after nearly 4.5 hours on task. The task was an assigned area task of 2.5 hours...

Very tricky, but it's world's so what else do you expect. Pushing limits. That's what I'm here for.

Gliders rigged again and wheel box has had the mud hosed out. Ready for tomorrow. Can't wait for better weather.

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25 June, from the crew dude

Hi all!!

Well, yesterday got called off completely when it became obvious that the showers were going to continue developing throughout the day, and in fact they did, well into the evening, and with some thunderstorms.

That's all gone now, although it's left us with a lot of middle-level cloud.  And it seems likely to stay there all day.  RASP isn't forecasting anything fantastic, 2-kt thermals to about 2500 ft but we'll get the good oil at briefing today which is at 10.

Not a lot else to report really…  Stand by for further updates!

Update 1030 - Eric has an AAT of 2.5 hours, scratch distance 241 km.  Flying today could be tricky.  There are some feeble Cu's around, but not many.  Trying to find them while in the air might be difficult.  First launch 1200.

Update 1142 - first launch 1220.  Upper clouds thinning out, reasonable-looking Cu's forming now.

Update 1210 - first launch 1230.

Update 1220 - first launch 1245.

Update 1239 - no further delays. At least club class is going.

Update 1335 - they're away, but the clouds have thickened up a bit and there are signs of over-development.  The upper clouds were thinning but that seems to have changed now.  There's also rain on the way, heading directly for the airfield, and getting here in about half an hour.

Club class first, followed by Standard, then 20-metre class.

Update 26 June - now with pictures from the day.  Didn't have time to include them yesterday!


One of the two grids, from the front.  Eric was in this one, near the back.

The tugs.

…one of which has an interesting mod, a 4-bladed prop!

EE, Eric about to get in.

While the launch kept getting delayed, I managed to get a shot of the other grid, with 20m at the back, Standard in front of them, and some Club right at the front.

A shot of the ASG-32.

The flags from the participating nations.

Another view of them.

View of the front of the main grid.

Cheers

24 June, from the crew dude

Hi all!!

Mike's given us the news - the grid is open!  So everyone will tow their gliders out to line up.  Briefing at 1030, and we'll get the weather then.  The local public forecast is interesting though, as showers and even a storm are forecast.  We had some rain in the early morning but the sky is now clear apart from some cirrus.

We'll set the glider up and then go to briefing, and find out what's really happening!

Update 1130 - It's on!  Club class is 2.5 hr AAT, so the directions the pilots choose will hopefully avoid the showers.  First launch 1215, and Eric's towards the back of the field, so will probably launch around 1300 or so.

Update 1155 - first launch 1300.

Update 1158 - it's raining on the gliders now.

Update 1221 - it's absolutely pouring down now!

1226 - Stopped raining, but if this rain has fallen on clay paddocks / soil then apparently that area doesn't generate thermals for the rest of the day.  And even worse to outland in…

1245 - first launch 1330.

1330 - first launch 1400. I'm now at the glider, cleaning off all the dirt that the heavy downpour kicked up all over it, and now it's started to rain again.

1345 - day cancelled for all classes.

Cheers

23 June, from the crew dude, part 2

Well, having toured over the Aviation Museum, we're now having lunch / dinner or something in Helsinki, and the weather's great!! I hear tell that tomorrow may even be a flying day, perhaps the dry patch around the low-pressure system has come through more quickly.

Update 1930 - we're back at Räyskälä now, and quite soon after leaving Helsinki the clouds thickened up and there was quite a bit of alto-stratus around too.  Back home, and I reckon it definitely wasn't flyable; not competition stuff anyway.

Tomorrow's weather - local public forecasters say rain for most of the day; RASP shows some slightly soarable spots for an hour or two; will have to see what tomorrow's weather forecast and briefing bring us!

Too many pics to include in a blog - apart from this one, which I believe is the prototype PIK20, and was at Waikerie for a while.  No doubt Eric can provide more details of its history, he's into that sort of thing.

Cheers

Day 1 b

The weather people are still having difficulty loading the finnish summer...

No task set, briefing at 11. I'm guessing it will be brief.

The mental health of pilots is barely hanging in the balance at the moment. But that's where us Aussies have the upper hand. We're all loopy anyway.

The very accurate tasking indicator. Beer please.

23 June, from the crew dude, part 1

OK, what's with this weather?  Thought it was supposed to be sunny or something!

So, apparently, did the Finns, hence yesterday's entertaining slide at briefing, which it seems has generated quite a lot of chuckles everywhere.

Today's started off even worse.  Light rain throughout the entire night, easing back to a light drizzle right now (0900).  Rain of some kind, scheduled to go on and off for the entire day, maybe easing up a bit in the evening but far too late for anything to happen.  I suspect the day might be cancelled again, although we won't know for sure until briefing which today is delayed to 1100 from the usual 1000.  Tomorrow's looking marginally better but I've been hearing that Wednesday might be the first taskable day.

We didn't go to the Aviation Museum yesterday; instead most of the guys watched the Austrian Grand Prix from a television feed on a laptop here.  Not sure if there was a big screen showing it anywhere at the airfield but we elected to watch it at Aussie Base.  The shots showed much better Cu's there than there were here!

The weather station here (installed specifically for the event, and costing a cool 95,000 euro if you want one) shows broken cloud at 400 ft and total cover at 700 ft.  The rain radar pictures show an enormous mass of light rain extending over pretty well all of SW Finland, moving slowly away.  There's been a low-pressure cell sitting off the WSW coast for the last two days; it's now moved slowly to just off the south coast.

The weather forecast for the next 10 days shows maxima all below 20 degrees - those 25-degree days that we experienced earlier seem to be just a memory now.  Laundry is going to be interesting - there are some washing machines around the place, but no dryers that I've discovered so far…

Plan for today might this time be the Aviation Museum if the day's cancelled!

Cheers