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topic: Daniele Piana (52 articles)

Valerio Albrizio Trophy 2022 »

Tue, Jun 7 2022, 5:23:07 pm MDT

34th, Sport Class

Alexandre Ferreira|Manfred Ruhmer|Serge Mainente|Valerio Albrizio Trophy 2022

https://civlcomps.org/event/xxxiv-valerio-albrizio-trophy-2022/results

1 Manfred Ruhmer
2 Alexandre Ferreira
3 Serge Mainente

Discuss "Valerio Albrizio Trophy 2022" at the Oz Report forum   link»   »

Valerio Albrizio Trophy 2022 »

Sun, Jun 5 2022, 9:53:11 pm MDT

34th, Jun 2-5, 2022

Christian Ciech|Lorenzo de Grandis|Mario Alonzi|Valerio Albrizio Trophy 2022

https://civlcomps.org/event/xxxiv-valerio-albrizio-trophy-2022/results

Mario Alonzi 1st
Christian Ciech 2nd
Lorenzo de Grandis 3rd

Discuss "Valerio Albrizio Trophy 2022" at the Oz Report forum   link»   »

Christian Ciech's Penalties on Task 3

Mon, Aug 23 2021, 3:16:06 pm MDT

Just short of goal

Christian Ciech|Davide Guiducci|Filippo Oppici|Marco Laurenzi|Monte Cucco Piero Alberini International Trophy 2021|Moyes Litespeed RX|PG|Tullio Gervasoni|Wills Wing T3

I wondered in the last Oz Report why Christian got fewer time and arrival points than pilots who were slower than he was. Turns out if I had looked more closely I would have seen that he made the end of the speed section but just came up 90 meters short of the goal cylinder. His points were docked 20%.

Paraglider scoring takes away all your time points if you don't make it to the goal cylinder and there are no arrival position points.

# Name Glider Time Speed
(km/h)
Distance Dist.
Points
Lead.
Points
Time
Points
Arr.
Pos.
Points
Total
1 Filippo Oppici Wills Wing T3 144 01:58:11 59.4 119.96 380.8 73.3 433.4 77.4 964.9
2 Marco Laurenzi Icaro Laminar 01:58:31 59.2 119.96 380.8 70.3 429.1 70.6 950.8
3 Karl Reichegger Icaro Laminar 01:59:34 58.7 119.96 380.8 81.9 419.3 58.5 940.5
4 David Gregoire Icaro 2000 Laminar Z9 01:58:48 59.1 119.96 380.8 67.7 426.2 64.3 939.0
5 Mario Alonzi Aeros Combat 12.7 C 02:00:57 58.0 119.96 380.8 72.9 408.3 48.4 910.4
6 Davide Guiducci Icaro 2000 Laminar 13.2 02:03:12 57.0 119.96 380.8 73.1 392.1 44.0 890.0
7 Tullio Gervasoni Wills Wing T3 02:03:20 56.9 119.96 380.8 73.2 391.2 40.0 885.2
8 Roland Woehrle Moyes Litespeed RX 3.5 Pro 02:04:11 56.5 119.96 380.8 69.6 385.5 36.4 872.3
9 Christian Ciech Icaro 2000 Laminar 01:59:43 58.6 119.87 380.7 108.4 334.4 42.6 866.1

Fastest Competition Speed?

Mon, Aug 23 2021, 9:53:41 am MDT

Task 3 at the Monte Cucco Piero Alberini International Trophy 2021

Filippo Oppici|Marco Laurenzi|Monte Cucco Piero Alberini International Trophy 2021|Steven "Steve" Pearson|triangle

The task:

No Leg Dist. Radius
1 0.0 km 400 m
2 Ss 2.3 km 15000 m
3 36.8 km 5000 m
4 56.8 km 3000 m
5 91.4 km 5000 m
6 113.3 km 2000 m
7 Es 119.4 km 1000 m
8 120.0 km 400 m

The task is almost an out and return from the start of the speed section (SS) to the end of the speed section (ES). The leg distances shown in the chart above are the optimized distances, those displayed on the map.

Three pilots had average task speeds of over 59 km/h (36.7 mph) in the speed section.

# Name Speed (km/h)
1 Filippo Oppici 59.4
2 Marco Laurenzi 59.2
4 David Gregoire 59.1

The optimized task distance between the SS and the ES is 116.939 km.

Steve Pearson asks the question, is this the highest task speed attained in a competition in Europe for a triangle or out and return task over 100 km?

Monte Cucco Piero Alberini International Trophy 2021 »

Sat, Aug 21 2021, 12:34:32 pm MDT

Saturday, the last day

Christian Ciech|competition|Davide Guiducci|Filippo Oppici|Marco Laurenzi|Monte Cucco Piero Alberini International Trophy 2021|Moyes Litespeed RX|Tullio Gervasoni|Wills Wing T3

https://airtribune.com/monte-cucco-piero-alberini-international-trophy-20/results

Task 4:

# Name Glider Time Total
1 Christian Ciech Icaro 2000 Laminar 03:11:57 988.6
2 Vanni Accattoli Moyes RX4 Pro 03:24:13 920.8
3 Marco Laurenzi Icaro Laminar 03:28:19 864.2
4 Filippo Oppici Wills Wing T3 144 03:28:49 856.3
5 Mario Alonzi Aeros Combat 12.7 C 03:30:49 843.7
6 Manuel Revelli Icaro Laminar 03:34:47 818.1
7 Davide Guiducci Icaro 2000 Laminar 13.2 03:42:58 762.7
8 Valentino Bau Icaro 2000 Laminar 14.1 03:42:21 757.5
9 Francesco Marsella Moyes Litespeed RX 03:45:28 747.4
10 David Gregoire Icaro 2000 Laminar Z9 03:43:51 746.6

Final Results:

# Name Glider Total
1 Marco Laurenzi Icaro Laminar 3794
2 Filippo Oppici Wills Wing T3 144 3785
3 Christian Ciech Icaro 2000 Laminar 3723
4 Mario Alonzi Aeros Combat 12.7 C 3569
5 Roland Woehrle Moyes Litespeed RX 3.5 Pro 3392
6 Manuel Revelli Icaro Laminar 3287
7 Fabien Zadora Combat GT 12,7 3279
8 Francesco Marsella Moyes Litespeed RX 3177
9 Vanni Accattoli Moyes RX4 Pro 3136
10 Tullio Gervasoni Wills Wing T3 3134

Monte Cucco Piero Alberini International Trophy 2021 »

Fri, Aug 20 2021, 5:30:42 pm MDT

Friday

Christian Ciech|competition|Davide Guiducci|Filippo Oppici|Marco Laurenzi|Monte Cucco Piero Alberini International Trophy 2021|Moyes Litespeed RX|Tullio Gervasoni|Wills Wing T3

https://airtribune.com/monte-cucco-piero-alberini-international-trophy-20/results

Task 3:

# Name Glider Time Lead.
Points
Time
Points
Arr.
Pos.
Points
Total
1 Filippo Oppici Wills Wing T3 144 01:58:11 73.3 433.4 77.4 964.9
2 Marco Laurenzi Icaro Laminar 01:58:31 70.3 429.1 70.6 950.8
3 Karl Reichegger Icaro Laminar 01:59:34 81.9 419.3 58.5 940.5
4 David Gregoire Icaro 2000 Laminar Z9 01:58:48 67.7 426.2 64.3 939.0
5 Mario Alonzi Aeros Combat 12.7 C 02:00:57 72.9 408.3 48.4 910.4
6 Davide Guiducci Icaro 2000 Laminar 13.2 02:03:12 73.1 392.1 44.0 890.0
7 Tullio Gervasoni Wills Wing T3 02:03:20 73.2 391.2 40.0 885.2
8 Roland Woehrle Moyes Litespeed RX 3.5 Pro 02:04:11 69.6 385.5 36.4 872.3
9 Christian Ciech Icaro 2000 Laminar 01:59:43 108.4 334.4 42.6 866.1
10 Manuel Revelli Icaro Laminar 02:05:37 74.0 376.1 33.2 864.1

So why did Christian Ciech receive so many fewer speed points compared to pilots that flew slower than he did? And fewer arrival position points?

Cumulative:

# Name Glider T 1 T 2 T 3 Total
1 Marco Laurenzi Icaro Laminar 996.5 982.3 950.8 2930
2 Filippo Oppici Wills Wing T3 144 979.1 984.2 964.9 2928
3 Christian Ciech Icaro 2000 Laminar 934.3 933.6 866.1 2734
4 Mario Alonzi Aeros Combat 12.7 C 910.0 905.0 910.4 2725
5 Roland Woehrle Moyes Litespeed RX 3.5 Pro 900.0 937.8 872.3 2710
6 Fabien Zadora Combat GT 12,7 942.5 804.7 785.2 2532
7 Manuel Revelli Icaro Laminar 677.9 926.6 864.1 2469
8 Francesco Marsella Moyes Litespeed RX 958.3 851.7 619.4 2429
9 Karl Reichegger Icaro Laminar 661.1 806.9 940.5 2409
10 Tullio Gervasoni Wills Wing T3 650.6 856.0 885.2 2392

Filippo has barely won the last two days an is two points behind Marco who just beat Filippo on the first day.

Monte Cucco Piero Alberini International Trophy 2021 »

Thu, Aug 19 2021, 6:53:30 pm MDT

Second task on Thursday

Christian Ciech|competition|Filippo Oppici|Marco Laurenzi|Monte Cucco Piero Alberini International Trophy 2021|Moyes Litespeed RX|photo|Tullio Gervasoni|Wills Wing T3

https://airtribune.com/monte-cucco-piero-alberini-international-trophy-20/results

Task 2:

# Name Glider Time Total
1 Filippo Oppici Wills Wing T3 144 01:30:16 984.3
2 Marco Laurenzi Icaro Laminar 01:30:22 982.1
3 Roland Woehrle Moyes Litespeed RX 3.5 Pro 01:33:34 937.4
4 Christian Ciech Icaro 2000 Laminar 01:34:05 933.0
5 Manuel Revelli Icaro Laminar 01:33:50 926.1
6 Mario Alonzi Aeros Combat 12.7 C 01:34:33 904.4
7 David Gregoire Icaro 2000 Laminar Z9 01:36:20 877.2
8 Lorenzo De Grandis Icaro Z9 01:38:35 859.6
9 Tullio Gervasoni Wills Wing T3 01:38:39 855.5
10 Francesco Marsella Moyes Litespeed RX 01:38:48 851.3

Cumulative:

# Name Glider Total
1 Marco Laurenzi Icaro Laminar 1979
2 Filippo Oppici Wills Wing T3 144 1963
3 Christian Ciech Icaro 2000 Laminar 1867
4 Roland Woehrle Moyes Litespeed RX 3.5 Pro 1837
5 Mario Alonzi Aeros Combat 12.7 C 1814
6 Francesco Marsella Moyes Litespeed RX 1810
7 Fabien Zadora Combat GT 12,7 1747
8 Manuel Revelli Icaro Laminar 1604
9 Tullio Gervasoni Wills Wing T3 1506
10 Karl Reichegger Icaro Laminar 1468

Photos by Flavio:

More Here.

Monte Cucco Piero Alberini International Trophy 2021 »

Wed, Aug 18 2021, 2:42:48 pm MDT

First task on Tuesday

Christian Ciech|competition|Corinna Schwiegershausen|Filippo Oppici|Marco Laurenzi|Monte Cucco Piero Alberini International Trophy 2021|Moyes Litespeed RX|Tullio Gervasoni|Wills Wing T3

https://airtribune.com/monte-cucco-piero-alberini-international-trophy-20/results

Task 1:

# Name Glider Time Total
1 Marco Laurenzi Icaro Laminar 01:39:33 996.5
2 Filippo Oppici Wills Wing T3 144 01:39:55 979.1
3 Francesco Marsella Moyes Litespeed RX 01:40:40 958.3
4 Fabien Zadora Combat GT 12,7 01:40:57 942.5
5 Christian Ciech Icaro 2000 Laminar 01:43:52 934.3
6 Mario Alonzi Aeros Combat 12.7 C 01:44:45 910.0
7 Roland Woehrle Moyes Litespeed RX 3.5 Pro 01:45:23 900.0
8 Manuel Revelli Icaro Laminar 02:28:43 677.9
9 Karl Reichegger Icaro Laminar 02:31:10 661.1
10 Tullio Gervasoni Wills Wing T3 02:32:25 650.6
11 Frantisek Kostal Aeros Combat 09 14.2 02:40:43 596.9

Twenty six pilots.

Photo by Corinna.

Monte Cucco Piero Alberini International Trophy 2021 »

Tue, Aug 17 2021, 9:29:39 am MDT

Looks like they didn't fly on Monday

Monte Cucco Piero Alberini International Trophy 2021

https://airtribune.com/monte-cucco-piero-alberini-international-trophy-20/blog__day_1

Ready to fly now.

Discuss "Monte Cucco Piero Alberini International Trophy 2021" at the Oz Report forum   link»  

33rd Valerio Albrizio Trophy 2021, day 3

Sun, Jun 6 2021, 9:37:57 pm GMT

Task two

Christian Ciech|competition|Davide Guiducci|Icaro 2000|Manfred Ruhmer|Tullio Gervasoni|Valerio Albrizio Trophy 2021|Wills Wing T3

https://airtribune.com/xxxiii-valerio-albrizio-trophy-2021/results

Task 2:

# Name Glider Time Total
1 Mario Alonzi Aeros Combat 12.7 C 02:07:31 1000.1
2 Christian Ciech Icaro 2000 Laminar 02:09:28 962.3
3 Lorenzo De Grandis Icaro Z9 02:16:56 887.7
4 Manuel Revelli Icaro Laminar 02:16:59 876.1
5 Tullio Gervasoni Wills Wing T3 02:17:55 864.8
6 Vanni Accattoli Moyes RX4 Pro 02:18:08 855.0
7 Davide Guiducci Icaro 2000 Laminar 13.2 02:27:12 802.5
8 Fabien Zadora Combat GT 12.7 02:29:03 780.5
9 David Gregoire Icaro 2000 Laminar Z9 02:33:32 756.4
10 Valentino Bau Icaro 2000 Laminar 14.1 03:00:35 624.9

Final:

# Name Glider T 1 T 2 Total
1 Mario Alonzi Aeros Combat 12.7 C 998.4 1000.1 1999
2 Christian Ciech Icaro 2000 Laminar 967.0 962.3 1929
3 David Gregoire Icaro 2000 Laminar Z9 917.3 756.4 1674
4 Manuel Revelli Icaro Laminar 657.1 876.1 1533
5 Fabien Zadora Combat GT 12.7 678.5 780.5 1459
6 Lorenzo De Grandis Icaro Z9 469.5 887.7 1357
7 Tullio Gervasoni Wills Wing T3 346.8 864.8 1212
8 Vanni Accattoli Moyes RX4 Pro 0.0 855.0 855
9 Davide Guiducci Icaro 2000 Laminar 13.2 0.0 802.5 803
10 Valentino Bau Icaro 2000 Laminar 14.1 0.0 624.9 625

Task 2 Sport:

# Name Glider Time Total
1 Manfred Ruhmer Icaro 2000 Piuma 01:25:47 1000.0
2 Pawel Wierzbowski Vega Mx 01:47:56 776.5
3 Serge Mainente Wills Wing SPORT2 02:17:59 576.7
4 Francisco Munoz Garcia Wills Wing U2 02:24:52 513.0
5 Federico Romani Icaro 2000 Mastr 02:28:12 488.3

https://www.xcontest.org/world/fr/vols/details:tahiidelta/2021-06-6/12:01

Final Sport:

# Name Glider T 1 T 2 Total
1 Manfred Ruhmer Icaro 2000 Piuma 887.7 1000.0 1888
2 Pawel Wierzbowski Vega Mx 646.5 776.5 1423
3 Francisco Munoz Garcia Wills Wing U2 557.4 513.0 1070
4 Serge Mainente Wills Wing SPORT2 479.2 576.7 1056
5 Federico Romani Icaro 2000 Mastr 461.1 488.3 949
6 Cesare Cristoforoni Icaro Mastr 281.6 271.7 553

Discuss "33rd Valerio Albrizio Trophy 2021, day 3" at the Oz Report forum   link»

33rd Valerio Albrizio Trophy 2021, day 1

Sat, Jun 5 2021, 5:11:17 am GMT

Pilots making goal

Christian Ciech|competition|Manfred Ruhmer|Valerio Albrizio Trophy 2021

https://airtribune.com/xxxiii-valerio-albrizio-trophy-2021/results

Task 1:

# Name Glider Time Total
1 Mario Alonzi Aeros Combat 12.7 C 01:36:51 998.4
2 Christian Ciech Icaro 2000 Laminar 01:38:32 967.0
3 David Gregoire Icaro 2000 Laminar Z9 01:42:28 917.3
4 Fabien Zadora Combat GT 12.7 02:16:14 678.5
5 Manuel Revelli Icaro Laminar 02:15:20 657.1

Task 1 Sport:

Name Glider Time Total
1 Manfred Ruhmer Icaro 2000 Piuma 00:45:36 739.8
2 Pawel Wierzbowski Vega Mx 01:11:40 557.5
3 Francisco Munoz Garcia Wills Wing U2 01:23:45 490.1

Discuss "33rd Valerio Albrizio Trophy 2021, day 1" at the Oz Report forum   link»

33rd Valerio Albrizio Trophy 2021

Mon, May 31 2021, 3:28:04 pm GMT

June 4-6, 2021

Valerio Albrizio Trophy 2021

https://airtribune.com/xxxiii-valerio-albrizio-trophy-2021/info/details

Discuss "33rd Valerio Albrizio Trophy 2021" at the Oz Report forum   link»

Spring Meeting - Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2020

Tue, Nov 26 2019, 7:28:57 am PST

25 Apr, 2020 - 01 May, 2020, Travesio/Meduno, Italy

Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2019|weather

https://airtribune.com/springmeeting-2020/info/details__info

The Spring Meeting - Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy, at its 4th edition, is a FAI 2 competition (Hang Gliding class 1, class 5, Sport class) which takes place in a flight zone well known by European pilots. It is also part of the big flying area which have hosted the XXII Hang Gliding World Championship.

The flight area is mainly in the foothill but, depending on weather conditions, it is possible to fly also in the Alps and in the flatland. There are different takeoffs; two of them are in Slovenia and can be chosen in case of changeable weather.

Discuss "Spring Meeting - Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2020" at the Oz Report forum   link»  

2019 Italian Open and pre-Europeans

August 18, 2019, 5:18:48 pm CDT

2019 Italian Open and pre-Europeans

Final Results

Alessandro "Alex" Ploner|competition|Davide Guiducci|Facebook|Italian Open 2019|Marco Laurenzi|Moyes Litespeed RX|Pre-Europeans 2019|Tullio Gervasoni|Wills Wing T3

https://airtribune.com/cucco2019/results

Task 5:

# Name Glider Total
1 ALESSANDRO PLONER icaro laminar z9 1000
2 ANTON MORODER icaro 2000 laminar 13 933
3 VALENTINO BAU ICARO 2000 LAMINAR 14.1 925
4 LORENZO DE GRANDIS Icaro z9 915
5 TULLIO GERVASONI Wills Wing T3 879
6 MARCO LAURENZI Icaro Laminar 824
7 DAVIDE GUIDUCCI Icaro 2000 Laminar 13.2 821
8 ROBERTO FERIGO moyes rx14 750
9 YEVGEN BUBLYK Aeros Combat GT 12.4 730
10 MYKOLA POLOVYY Aeros Combat 13.5GT 697

Final Results:

# Name Glider T 1 T 2 T 3 T 4 T 5 Total
1 ALESSANDRO PLONER icaro laminar z9 1000 1000 1000 744 1000 4744
2 MARCO LAURENZI Icaro Laminar 853 899 876 745 824 4197
3 DAVIDE GUIDUCCI Icaro 2000 Laminar 13.2 853 816 848 700 821 4038
4 EVGEN LYSENKO Aeros Combat 12.7C 852 875 946 709 567 3949
5 Pedro L. Garcia Wills Wing T3 144 790 823 807 729 612 3761
6 ROLAND WOEHRLE Moyes Litespeed RX 3.5 PRO 853 700 795 704 478 3530
7 LORENZO DE GRANDIS Icaro z9 560 455 840 703 915 3473
8 VALENTINO BAU ICARO 2000 LAMINAR 14.1 605 470 938 487 925 3425
9 VANNI ACCATTOLI Moyes rx4 pro 853 406 810 715 605 3389
10 TULLIO GERVASONI Wills Wing T3 847 406 835 178 879 3145

Almost a perfect score.

2019 Italian Open and pre-Europeans

August 15, 2019, 5:56:41 pm CDT

2019 Italian Open and pre-Europeans

Montecucco

Alessandro "Alex" Ploner|competition|Davide Guiducci|Italian Open 2019|Marco Laurenzi|Moyes Litespeed RX|Pre-Europeans 2019|Tullio Gervasoni|Wills Wing T3

https://airtribune.com/cucco2019/results

# Name Nat Glider T 1 T 2 T 3 Total
1 ALESSANDRO PLONER ITA icaro laminar z9 1000 1000 1000 3000
2 EVGEN LYSENKO UKR Aeros Combat 12.7C 852 875 946 2673
3 MARCO LAURENZI ITA Icaro Laminar 853 899 876 2628
4 DAVIDE GUIDUCCI ITA Icaro 2000 Laminar 13.2 853 816 848 2517
5 PEDRO L. GARCIA USA Wills Wing T3 144 790 823 807 2420
6 ROLAND WOEHRLE GER Moyes Litespeed RX 3.5 PRO 853 700 795 2348
7 TULLIO GERVASONI ITA Wills Wing T3 847 406 835 2088
8 VANNI ACCATTOLI ITA Moyes rx4 pro 853 406 810 2069
9 VALENTINO BAU ITA ICARO 2000 LAMINAR 14.1 605 470 938 2013
10 ANTON MORODER ITA icaro 2000 laminar 13 771 452 766 1989

The competition lasts through the 18th.

Spring Meeting - Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2019

Wed, May 1 2019, 8:28:52 pm EDT

Results for the final day

Alessandro "Alex" Ploner|Christian Ciech|competition|Filippo Oppici|Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2019|Marco Laurenzi|Suan Selenati|Wills Wing T3

https://airtribune.com/springmeeting-2019/results

Task 3:

# Name Glider Time Total
1 Christian Ciech Icaro Laminar 03:02:25 995
2 Alessandro Ploner Icaro Laminar 03:02:34 988
3 Peter Neuenschwander Aeros Combat 03:03:17 951
4 Suan Selenati Wills Wing T3 03:08:05 936
5 Benedikt Braun Aeros Combat 03:19:13 853
6 Filippo Oppici Wills Wing T3 03:20:58 839
7 Arturo Dal Mas Wills Wing T2C 03:23:02 829
8 Olav Opsanger Moyes Litespeed 03:27:16 810
9 Roland Woehrle Moyes Litespeed 03:39:21 769
10 Andrew Hollidge Wills Wing T2C 03:42:04 757

Final:

# Name Glider Total
1 Christian Ciech Icaro Laminar 1982
2 Alessandro Ploner Icaro Laminar 1925
3 Peter Neuenschwander Aeros Combat 1920
4 Suan Selenati Wills Wing T3 1841
5 Filippo Oppici Wills Wing T3 1767
6 Arturo Dal Mas Wills Wing T2C 1556
7 Marco Laurenzi Icaro Laminar 1506
8 Roland Woehrle Moyes Litespeed 1465
9 Francois Isoard Aeros Combat 1428
10 Olav Opsanger Moyes Litespeed 1416

Spring Meeting - Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2019

Wed, May 1 2019, 8:29:58 am EDT

The weather turns

competition|Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2019|weather

https://airtribune.com/springmeeting-2019/blog__day_5

Pilots are already on takeoff. Weather seems perfect today, so we expect to go in the air early in the afternoon for a consistent task.

Because pilots weren't assigned Flymaster trackers through Airtribune, live tracking on Airtribune doesn't work for this competition. Follow the pilots on the Flymaster web site.

The task has started: https://lt.flymaster.net/bs.php?grp=2636

You can see the Replay from yesterday here: https://airtribune.com/play/4032/2d at the two times faster speed (compared to the Flymaster web site). The Airtribune replay uses the IGC files found here: https://airtribune.com/springmeeting-2019/results. The Airtribune Replay user interface is vastly superior to the Flymaster Playback user interface. It does have a problem with screen clutter on cell phones.

Discuss "Spring Meeting - Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2019" at the Oz Report forum   link»  

Spring Meeting - Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2019

Tue, Apr 30 2019, 1:39:46 pm EDT

Results

Alessandro "Alex" Ploner|Christian Ciech|competition|Filippo Oppici|Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2019|Marco Laurenzi|Primoz Gricar|Suan Selenati

https://airtribune.com/springmeeting-2019/results

Task 2 (a 40 kilometer task starting at almost 4 PM):

# Name Glider Time Total
1 Primoz Gricar Aeros Combat 01:11:30 389
2 Christian Ciech Icaro Laminar 01:13:12 370
3 Anton Moroder Icaro Laminar 01:13:40 367
4 Suan Selenati Wills Wing T2C 01:16:06 362
5 Alessandro Ploner Icaro Laminar 01:16:17 352
6 Filippo Oppici Wills Wing T2C 01:16:27 350
7 Marco Laurenzi Icaro Laminar 01:19:07 342
8 Peter Neuenschwander Aeros Combat 01:24:04 328
9 Francois Isoard Aeros Combat 01:27:09 317
10 Joost Eertman Icaro Laminar 01:27:58 315

Cumulative:

# Name Glider Total
1 Christian Ciech Icaro Laminar 982
2 Peter Neuenschwander Aeros Combat 965
3 Alessandro Ploner Icaro Laminar 932
4 Filippo Oppici Wills Wing T2C 923
5 Anton Moroder Icaro Laminar 920
6 Suan Selenati Wills Wing T2C 900
7 Marco Laurenzi Icaro Laminar 853
8 Francois Isoard Aeros Combat 817
9 Joost Eertman Icaro Laminar 786
10 Matjaz Klemencic Moyes Litespeed 770

Spring Meeting - Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2019

Tue, Apr 30 2019, 9:33:12 am EDT

Mostly canceled tasks

Facebook|Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2019|video|weather

https://airtribune.com/springmeeting-2019/blog__day_4

Wednesday is a possible recovery day due to all the bad weather.

Pilots are on the takeoff, we had rain during the morning but we plan a late task in the afternoon, when weather should improve enough for a go.

Pilots will have a briefing at 13:00

The first flying day: https://youtu.be/VPP3_Cdnou0

The task has started: https://lt.flymaster.net/bs.php?grp=2636

Task has started for all classes. It's a 40 km task for class 1 and 5, and 15 km for Sport class.

Discuss "Spring Meeting - Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2019" at the Oz Report forum   link»  

Spring Meeting - Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2019

Sun, Apr 28 2019, 5:12:48 pm EDT

One task so far

Alessandro "Alex" Ploner|Christian Ciech|Davide Guiducci|Filippo Oppici|Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2019|Suan Selenati

https://airtribune.com/springmeeting-2019/blog__day_2

# Name Glider Time Total
1 Peter Neuenschwander Aeros Combat 01:22:01 637
2 Christian Ciech Icaro Laminar 01:23:18 612
3 Alessandro Ploner Icaro Laminar 01:27:53 580
4 Filippo Oppici Wills Wing T2C 01:28:20 573
5 Matjaz Klemencic Moyes Litespeed 01:28:29 569
6 Davide Guiducci Icaro Laminar 01:29:21 565
7 Anton Moroder Icaro Laminar 01:31:12 553
8 Andrew Hollidge Wills Wing T2C 01:32:22 546
9 Arturo Dal Mas Wills Wing T2C 01:34:44 539
10 Suan Selenati Wills Wing T2C 01:33:55 538

Spring Meeting - Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2017

Wed, May 3 2017, 6:31:36 am MDT

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Facebook|Friuli Venezia Giulia Trophy 2017|video

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George spins his ATOS

Tue, Aug 29 2000, 2:00:01 pm GMT

ATOS|George Ferris|Harry Sudwischer|James "Jim" Zeiset|Mark Bennett|spin|Worlds 1999

George Ferris sent to the rigid wing list and to me a report on his spin and crash of his ATOS. I have included it here. I have also included some updates from George, responses to a few comments, and additional comments. George wrote:

I have over 200 hours on my Atos and previous to this incident I have never experienced a tendency for the Atos to spin. There was no warning, like previously stated by other pilots. I had just initiated a hard turn to the left, high bank, with a lot of speed when the glider began spinning to the left.

(editor's note: I ask George: "What exactly do you mean by a hard turn?" He responded: "Going from a neutral position (bar centered) then jamming the bar to one side and push out slightly."

Personally, I have only once jammed the bar to one side on my ATOS when I had little ground. One day in Italy at the 1999 Worlds, I tried to whip the ATOS around like I would a flex wing as I came into land, jamming the bar out to one side, and pushing out. The ATOS turned real quickly, it also slid (or appeared to) on the inside wing. I had to jam the bar in the other direction to get it straightened out and level over the lz. I landed on my wheels with my hands still on the base tube. I haven't tried this particular maneuver since at any altitude.

I will move the bar to one side quickly, but I really don't push out. I certainly don't move my weight to one side as I'm just trying to deploy the spoileron quickly and not add weight shifting to the mix. I have never had the problem that George discovered with his ATOS other than the one day in Italy.)

The glider spun twice in a nose down attitude then went into a vertical dive, which it quickly recovered from.

(editor's note: I asked George, "How high a bank?" George responded:

"I meant to do a 90°, but it went past 90 because the inside wing stalled. When I first initiated the turn I felt the outside wing rise faster than normal. I thought it had entered lifting air, which may have happened, but it kept accelerating because I was entering, or entered a spin immediately."

George had initiated a very high-banked turn. Personally, I have never tried to initiate or even continue banking up to 90° or anywhere near it. In the strongest, smallest thermals, I couldn't be over 60°. Therefore, I haven't had occasion to experience what George has.)

This all happened about 200 ft above the trees in front of the ridge I was flying. It happened so fast that I felt that I was just along for the ride.

Did my inputs help the glider to recover? I have no idea, they were all reflexes, there was no time to think about it. It was all over in a matter of seconds.

When I recovered from the dive I was facing into the ridge 20 feet over the trees tops with no air speed and no room to pull in for recovery. If I had another 50 ft to spare I would have been able to get the glider flying again but that wasn't the case.

The glider stalled and I plowed through the treetops ending up on the ground. The only injury I received was from my knee hitting a rock as I made contact with the ground.

I really have no explanation on why the glider entered the spin after I initiated the turn other than I may have pushed out more than I normally would but I'm not sure. The snap turn at high speed, that I meant to do, I had done many times before.

The only advice I can give is not to initiate any sudden inputs, particularly at high speeds( 40+ mph), when in close proximity to the ground. I consider myself lucky, even though my glider is destroyed, to come out of this with a swollen knee.

Well, has anyone got any spare D-tubes and ribs for sale?

Dennis, <catapult@bendnet.com>, writes into the rigid wing list:

"Aw c'mon Suds, don't do an "unbiased journalist" number on us. Your CBRW bashing is no more credible for than Davis's Mill bashing. I was among the ranters and ravers back when Davis was claiming it was impossible to spin or overspeed a CBRW but the facts are out there now so let's try to be objective."

Oz Report readers are free to go back and check the record. During the time that I was reporting on the spins of the Millennium, and for almost a year afterwards, there were no reports of any rigid wing hang gliders spinning. My personal experience with the Exxtacy was that I could not spin it. The only spins that have been reported recently on the Exxtacy (we didn't have Ghostbusters and ATOSes at the time) have been deliberate spins. It still appears to be very difficult to get an Exxtacy to spin.

At the time of my reports on the spinning Millenniums, it was clear to me that there was a very distinct dividing line between the Millennium and hang gliders. Part of that distinction was the fact that the Millennium was easy to spin, and hang gliders, by and large, were very difficult to spin. Therefore, hang glider pilots, unlike ultralight sailplane pilots, did not have to be concerned with spin and spin recovery. This was another sharp dividing line between two separate pilot communities.

Now, that is no longer the case. Because the control frames of the Ghostbuster and the ATOS have been moved back relative to the Exxtacy, these hang gliders can be spun by pushing out. Pilots who fly these hang gliders, need to know something that only sailplane pilots needed to know before.

Harry Sudwischer<skywild@mindspring.com> writes into the rigid wing list:

"Davis keeps harping on his dislike for rough or sharp edged thermals . His love of big smooth lift Florida Style comes through in a lot of his writing. His instinctive dislike and avoidance of rough air while flying his ATOS is right on the money. All you CBRW pilots should take heed and modify your flying habits accordingly. You could do worse than emulating the "barefoot one" .Remember nothing succeeds like success :-)"

I, of course, have often thought about this issue. Is my dislike of rough air a function of my glider? Am I just a wimp? Having tasted the fruits of great flat land flying does the rough air often present in the mountains just seem second rate by comparison? Or am I getting older and wiser?

This is a very emotional issue for long time hang glider pilots, so even if I try to present a rational perspective, it threatens many entrenched feelings, life style choices, etc., etc. Recently I had an opportunity to exchange a few e-mail messages with Mark Bennett. He wrote how he hadn't moved to Houston in part because of the lack of access to the mountains for flying. He thought it was quite ironic considering our world record encampment in Zapata, and then the Lone Star Meet in Hearne, right next to Houston, and how great the flying was there.

Today I was talking with Jim Zeiset, long time Colorado mountain pilot, who spoke about how great the flying was in Hearne. He then said that he cut short a possible cross-country flight in the mountains, that he would have taken if the other pilot had stayed up. After that pilot went down he felt that it wasn't worth the effort to fly in the trashy air even though he had a retrieval driver.

As I recall my most vivid memory of how much I enjoyed the smoother air, was in fact not at a time that I was contrasting a mountain site with a flat land site, but rather the contrast between two gliders. I was in Australia flying a 166 Moyes Xtralight that I bought from Moyes. The glider was really too big for me, but it sure was fun to fly. I loved how it felt in the air, and had my longest flight up to that point on it, on a day that the task at Hay was called at 142 miles.

By the time that we got to Forbes for the next meet, by Icaro Laminar ST showed up, and I got a chance to fly a little racecar of the glider. The contrast was stark, especially because it had been so soon after my Moyes glider. It scared me a bunch of times. It just wasn't as enjoyable to fly it, even though I could penetrate a lot better with it.

Later I took this glider to the King Mountain meet, and scared myself a bunch more. For example, I continued to fly there on the day that the US number 1 pilot refused to fly his Laminar ST.

After thousands of hang gliding flights, my preference is to fly in conditions that are enjoyable. Others are free to make their own choices. I "harp" about flying in fun conditions because I want pilots to be aware that it is OK to fly in enjoyable conditions. You don't have to prove your "manhood" ever time you take to the air. That's not the point, as far as I'm concerned.

So I leave it up to the reader to determine whether they think I "harp" on the fun air of Texas, Kansas, or Florida, because I fly an ATOS. Maybe, but not likely.

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Rotor Harness »

Thu, Nov 18 1999, 6:00:02 pm EST

André Wolfe|David Glover|Scott Rutledge|weather|Worlds 1999

Nene Rotor from Brazil has come out with a streamlined harness, one of many super slick harnesses that were on display at the Worlds in Italy last July and August.  At the time I wanted to do an article on the various cool harnesses, but I couldn't get enough pictures of pilots in the harnesses.  They all wanted to launch just as I wanted them to line down in their harnesses.

Gerolf Heinrich was flying a cigar-shaped M2 from Austria.  The Woody Valley harnesses from Italy had second skins that fit completely over the pilot and harness.

My Seattle-based flying bud, Scott Rutledge (proud owner of a Ghost Buster) finally got himself a new harness, after flying his rigid wing gliders with a mess of spaghetti.  He's pretty amazed about his new harness in the following article, and I'm hoping other pilots will write in about their new world-class harnesses.  Then you can discount some of the extra enthusiasm from each pilot.

Scott writes:

You may have seen a testimonial about a new harnessin this month's Hang Gliding Magazine (USA).

Andre Wolf, second-place finisher (World Championships), comments, "The Rotor harness is the most aerodynamic and comfortable harness I have ever flown."

I now posses a Rotor harness and let me tell you that this thing is a marvel.  The only protrusions that exist on the outside are one small chest buckle (the other waist buckle is inside the zippered area) and the chute handle.  The four externally accessible pockets for radio, cameras and drogue chute, are behind neoprene covered slits.  Even the aero tow loops that are sewn just below the shoulder straps have slits to allow them to be tucked inside when not in use!

There is a unique system of bungees inside the harness that allow cameras or radios to be attached, such that they will be pulled back into their internal pocket automatically.

A normal sized parachute is accommodated internally and sits inside a Mylar lined pouch just behind the lower back.  The chute handle is easily grabbed with either hand.

Another amazing aspect of this harness is in how many adjustments are possible.  The slider mechanism is a large diameter polypropylene rope, and the attachment to the fiberglass back plate can be repositioned via numerous adjustment holes to accommodate CG. The single point suspension attaches to a plastic tube around the rope, which creates enough friction to hold a head up or head down position, and still allow repositioning by pulling or pushing against the control bar.  The entire slider mechanism is concealed underneath a slit along the back.

Ingress and egress are accomplished with a single zipper track.  Down at the top, and up from the bottom via close and open strings.  Since there is only one zipper track, and no other lateral slits, it is easy to bring the two zippers together to stop any cold air leaks.

The shoulder straps and leg loops are adjustable, and the overall length can be altered via shims in the boot.  For added comfort there are foam inserts for lower leg rests.  These inserts are foam blocks that slide into pockets that can also be adjusted backward and forward.

The outside cloth is heavy-duty Cordura, while the inside material is finer pack cloth.  The foam material between the two layers is relatively thin.  There are huge full length zippered pocket areas inside for storage.  And I even discovered a previously overlooked smaller zippered pocket in the boot area.  Permanently mounting my camelback inside was easily facilitated with a Velcro closure for the top back inside pocket.

Overall harness weight has been kept very low, most likely due to the lightweight back plate, and slider rope.

The bullet shape, which is found to be more aerodynamic than a blunt boot, is held via a foam block in the boot.

The harness is custom built by body measurement, but because it is very adjustable it can easily be made to fit another person, if resale happens.

Since the weather has been so crummy I have only been able to hang in my basement, but even so I find that this harness is very comfortable.

I flew with my last harness for 10 years.  It has become increasingly obvious that with all its suspension lines, it had too much drag.

If you want to purchase a Rotor harness check out:

Contact: David Glover, (706) 657-8485, «david».

The Worlds - reflections »

Sun, Aug 8 1999, 10:00:00 pm GMT

Worlds 1999

You can find the final official results for the 1999 Worlds at: http://www.fivl.it/mondiali/CLASSIFICHE/clasweb.html.

I hope that you didn't mind me going a bit overboard on the last Oz Report and sending out so many pictures. I wanted to give a feeling for the day of celebration. I feel the need to promote the sport and encourage everyone. I do that by trying to let everyone participate, even if it is just by seeing what is going on.

On Sunday after the competition we all marched again in Sigillo and we were saluted at the town square. The flag wavers came from Gubbio and put on a show that we unfortunately missed during the first march. The mayor herself spoke again, as did numerous regional and FAI officials. We got incredible support from Sigillo and from the regional Italian governments and sport agencies.

Here, David Glover, who provided all the digital photos during the Worlds, captures the flag wavers with their flags in the air in front of the Sigillo municipal building across from the central plaza:

Chris Arai mentioned that when they marched in Bishop at the Worlds in Owen Valley no one there even took notice. The Italians were much more into the pageantry and importance (self generated, of course) of the 1999 World Hang Gliding Championships as an event. It was great to be a part of it.

The town of Sigillo is well aware of the draw of Monte Cucco and built a hang glider youth hostel just to the north to provide cheap housing and food to visiting hang and para glider pilots. Adventure tourism for a site that has little other reason to draw foreign tourists other than the fact that it is not full of tourists.

For our third place as a team we (the rigid team) received bronze medals from both the FAI and the FIVL (the Italian hang gliding association). Of course this was a bit corny, but it felt real enough after the fact. We were definitely working hard to win the team championship during the last few days as we realized that we had a very good chance to win.

All the pilots took home a box of regional food specialties provided by the town, and we ended up with actually the best meal I had in Umbria, a lunch for pilots at the Villa Anita park in the center of Sigillo. I wouldn't have minded even a bit of regional dancing during lunch.

This was the first hang gliding world championships with a substantial Class II presence – 25 pilots from eight countries. The meet organizers responded to our interest and definitely made us feel welcome. We were more than happy to complete the tasks with a high percentage and quite a bit quicker (most often) than the flex wing pilots.

I expect that there will be a growing pilot interest in Class II gliders and that we will see them in future meets including the World Championships. I'll be at the Austrian Nationals starting on Thursday, and hope to entice enough Class II pilots to fly to make for a valid championships.

Monte Cucco had been described as quite windy during the previous competitions (1998 pre Worlds and 1999 British Nationals). The organizers moved the competition to a bit later in the year to address this problem. Apparently it worked because we had only three days where wind was even an issue and on two of those days we easily flew tasks (not so easy for me), and one was cancelled but turned out to be very flyable.

It was great to have a long meet, so that there were plenty of opportunities for valid tasks and no great pressure to get a task off every day if the conditions weren't right. The meet director may have cancelled the task on the last day somewhat before he took in all the information provided by the FAI stewards, but this was a relatively minor slip up.

While the Italians are reputed to be disorganized, I found them to be surprisingly well organized, if in an Italian manner. There were many, many volunteers, and everyone seemed to be happy doing their part to help us out. I got to speak with the computer guru and he worked hard to get out the results in spite of difficulties with the servers. On the last day every team leader got a CD-ROM with the results in HTML.

There were no major accidents during the meet. There was one tumble, Christian Ciech, flying a Laminar ST 14 (1999 model). The next day he flew the Laminar ST that was produced for Larry Tudor on the US team (Larry didn't travel to Italy), and decided to keep the sprogs in their factory position. He seemed to do better after that. ☺

In general, Gianni Hotz's boys did well on their Icaro 2000 Laminars, winning the top three places (Betino Schmitz was the third Brazilian in fourth place and he flies a La Mouette Topless glider). Laminars sell well throughout the world except in the US.

Those of who flew the AIR ATOSes really enjoyed them. Obviously they did well as Christof Kratzner won the meet on one, and 7 out of the top 10 finishers flew them. They do have little production/design problems still, especially the number eight rib (I broke my other one doing a perfect landing on the last day), but I'm sure that they will work all these little bugs out. Dave Sharp helped me fix both of the breaks, and they are much stringer now.

It was a great test of the ATOS to fly it at the worlds with the first production runs and do so well. The fact that the company principals were there flying in the Worlds and supporting the pilots speaks to their commitment to and participation in the sport. This is what it takes to make a great glider, and they certainly did that.

I flew the meet with a round base tube and plastic wheels (I usually fly with no wheels and my aero base tube). While this reduced the performance of the ATOS somewhat, it didn't account for any of my poor performance days. I really appreciated the wheels one day (not a task day) when I landed on them after making too quick a turn after my base leg. We had two spare down tubes with us and I don't recall any ATOS pilot requiring any new down tubes. Mine are as straight as they came from the factory.

I hope to fix the wheels so that they can work with my aerodynamic base tube. Perhaps I can make the wheels a bit sleeker also. I really appreciate the extra safety factor provided by wheels, and for me it is worth the tradeoff in performance.

The UK team flew as a team, and as a consequence did well (coming in second). The Austrians who had flown as a team at Forbes in 1998, and won the meet, apparently went without radio communication between pilots, and therefore slipped to third in Class I.

I got to land in some interesting fields in valleys that had no flat bottoms. Landing up hill in light winds was great, even if the vegetation turned out to be above my head. There were lots of oddly placed power lines, but there always seemed to be options, although I was pretty cautious about this aspect of flying here. Only now and then did I find a field that was actually level or flat except at goal.

I only experienced one small bout of substantial turbulence (coming into Mount Subasio on the southeast side) during all the flights, in spite of some often times reasonable winds. The air was quite thick and supportive and the ATOS always felt solid. I did get to see Christof's flex quite a bit as we raced to goal at 70 mph (without speed bumps). He beat me by 4 seconds (as I recall).

The Worlds were quite challenging due to the terrain, winds, and light thermals. Judgment was a big factor, and pilots had to stick together in hard times. There never was a day for all out racing (even if I thought so).

You could often race up and down the spines of the main range until you got near the canyons that cut through the range. If you had to go out in the valley for a turnpoint, either it was great as the valley was working even better, or it was very hard as the only lift was on the mountain sides. Sometimes you went fast, but you had to put on the brakes very often and assess the new conditions carefully.

I had the great fortune to go completely off course line to find lift on a dark day and thereby get almost to goal when many others failed to get the first turnpoint. This has often not worked for me, so it was great when it actually did work.

I learned a lot, and I'm sure that others did. Now I hope that it just sticks with me. The competition is not just for those who end up in first place, but requires the cooperation of everyone. We all agree to come here and test ourselves against ourselves and against each other. Both competitions are happening at once.

The world hang gliding community and their supporters around the world have once against produced a lively and interesting competition with lots of human drama and excitement. I hope that I have communicated a bit of it to you, and will try to improve my communication skills for future events.

One final note. Other than the Worlds, my other reason for going to Italy was to enjoy the food. I had previously had an opportunity to visit Venice, Florence, Rome and Sicily, and had a great time eating wherever I went, whether fancy or plain. There were numerous bests of life in all sorts of categories, including when we accidentally walked into Alfredo's in Rome.

I had hoped for a similar experience this time, but have been sadly disappointed by the regional cuisine (if you can call it that) in Sigillo. Mike Barber had complained to me before I left about the fact that you could only get pasta and pizza in Sigillo and Costacciaro. I thought this was a bit cavalier, and gave short shrift to the fine Italian pasta that I had experienced early.

Unfortunately Mike was quite right in his evaluation, both in its tone as well as its description. The pizza, a recent phenomena in Italy, is very cheap food, extra, extra thin crust like cardboard, with bad toppings. The pasta is mediocre by my standards (the fresher pasta you can buy at supermarkets in the US and in the local grocery stores). There is other food, but not the various types of eggplant and pepper dishes (other than at the grocery stores) that I had really appreciated on my previous Italian tours.

I felt that the Umbrians were a bit too prideful about their food, and that they should learn from their brothers to the south or in more traveled areas where foreigners have a more experienced palate.

The photos above were taken by David Glover (http://www.1800hangglide.com).

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World's wrap up »

Sat, Aug 7 1999, 10:00:00 pm GMT

Worlds 1999

The official results are in and Manfred Ruhmer and Christof Krtazner are indeed the World Champions.

You can find the results at: http://www.fivl.it/mondiali/CLASSIFICHE/clasweb.html.

Here's a shot of an actually happy Manfred at the awards march. Manfred flew an Icaro 2000 Laminart ST 14, and flew for the Austrian team (which placed third in Class I. The UK was second.):

Also Christof is quite happy winning in Class II for Germany on an AIR ATOS:

The US rigid wing team came in third place and received bronze medals from the FAI and the FIVL:

The Swiss rigid wing team was in first and wished to thank Felix Ruehle for his wonderful ATOS gliders which they all flew.:

Brazil was the winning team in Class I with three pilots in the top four and sprayed the crowd with Champaign. Andre Wolf made an impassioned plea for safety at competitions and thanked the meet organizers for running a very safe meet:

The photos above were taken by David Glover (http://www.1800hangglide.com).

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Manfred Ruhmer and Christof Kratzner – World Champions

Fri, Aug 6 1999, 10:00:02 pm GMT

Worlds 1999

Manfred Ruhmer, flying an Icaro 2000 Laminar ST, and flying for the Austrian team, has won the World Championships in Class I at Monte Cucco. When the last day of the competition was cancelled a great cheer went up from all the pilots who all admire Manfred greatly and felt that he deserved the championship. He was promptly covered with Champaign.

Here's a shot of Manfred coming in on the last task day:

We are as yet unsure why the last day was called, although there were issues with high winds forecasted for later in the day, which proved to be in error. A number of pilots flew the task and found it to be the easiest day of the meet. We found the smoothest lift out in front and pilots who ran the back range zipped up and down it without any problems.

Jim Lee finished 14th and Chris Arai was 24th as the top placing class I USA pilots (in fact the only class I USA pilots to make goal during the meet).

Christof Kratzner, flying an AIR ATOS, and flying for the German team, is provisionally the world champion in Class II, awaiting an appeal on photos from Johnny Carr. We will find out the final results tomorrow. Dave Sharp was the top finishing American at fourth and Brian Porter was fifth.

You can find the results at: http://www.fivl.it/mondiali/CLASSIFICHE/clasweb.html.

The USA rigid wing team was third. The first three team scores were very close (139 points separated us out of 10,000) and the Americans had closed quickly on the Swiss and Germans in the last few days.

The Brazilians won the Class I team competition and you would have thought that they had just won the World Soccer Cup.

The ATOS pilots did very well over all with seven of the top ten placings, to go along with Christof's first place.

The last task was called at Mount Subasio near Assisi as it faced into the prevailing south wind. The inversion broke late at about 2 PM. There was a wave cloud behind the mountain. The air in front, and apparently behind, was smooth and the climbs were easy in front for us.

After the task was called, Guido Gehrmann was doing aerobatics in front of Monte Cucco. On his his third loop his glider broke. The wires were attached up the down tubes a ways and he blew the down tubes out. He threw his chute, then shot his other rocket deployed chute.

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Big tasks, light day, some at goal »

Fri, Aug 6 1999, 10:00:00 pm GMT

Worlds 1999

On the next to last flying day of the Worlds, the meet organizers call two long tasks, one for rigids and one for flex wings. We are so happy not to have to fly together as the gaggles are thick. I have never seen such gaggles. Lots of folks don't seem to mind coming up really really close to you.

The tasks are long, 140 kilometers for the rigids and 129 for the flex wings. We launch from Monte Cucco, but our start gate is out in front and the flex wings start from a bit down the course line.

We are asked to go south along the range to a town to the south and east, then back to the turnpoint north of Gubbio, then to the towers north east of there back on the range, and then to Sigillo.

The weatherman calls for the inversion to break through just as we begin to launch, so they've added a few start gates later in case it is too hard at launch. Dave Sharp and I take off later. Jim Zeiset is suppose to get the first start clock at 1:15 PM, we get ours at 1:30 PM, and Brian Porter goes in at 1:45 PM.

Launching later I find much better lift to the right of launch and out away from the hill. All the pilots who've been floating around with light lift suddenly notice that someone is getting up and we have a party.

The American rigid team is still in third place, but due to Brian's big win in his ultralight sailplane, we are only 100 points out of second and another 100 points out of third. If two Americans make goal, we could go into the lead.

After Hansjorg fell down yesterday, Christoff Kratzner from German is in second behind Johnny Carr in his barely foot-launchable ultralight sailplane (he tripped on launch yesterday way down the run and had to restart from much lower. His knees had bandages on them today). Brian moved up to fourth and Dave Sharp down to fifth. Johnny Carr had his fitieth birthday today.

With the American rigid team with a chance to win the worlds, we are acting even more like a team. Now if only everyone's radios worked well enough to actually communicate. Jim and I are the only ones that can be clearly heard.

We catch Jim at the end of the valley (about 13 miles from the start gate) as we race down 25 miles toward the first turnpoint. We are with the flex wings for the first part of the run down the course. They will peel off to the right to go to Trevi, then Assisi, back to north of Gubbio then to goal. At the end of the valley Jim goes down. Soon after that many of the flex wing pilots go down near Nochera Umbria.

This is a notorious pass and it is often hard to get passed here if there is shading, you are low, or there is wind. The rigids get to go over the back to the east at this point to go to their turnpoint, so they don't have to deal with the problems that many flex wing pilots faced.

We are able to get quite high before we bail over the back, and work the next big ridge to the east. The turnpoint is at the end of the ridge a few miles after it peters out into low hills. We get stuck on the low hills until Dave Sharp tells me that he has made the turnpoint and found weak lift in the valley downwind of us. I zip around it, head for the valley and show the other rigid wing pilots where the better lift is. A bunch of us get up and out of there and on course back toward Gubbio.

With the west wind we still have to jump a range to get up into the main valley, but it presents no problem as we cruise to the west face, rigid soar moving along to the north until we hit a good lift. After that we still have the task of jumping into the wind to the next shallow ridge about three miles to the west.

By now we've heard of the carnage in the flex wing division. Chris Arai is down at Qualdo Tadino, Ryan, Paris and Jim Lee all go down at or near Nochera Umbria.

I take the back range (Monte Cucco) while Dave Sharp gets high at the windmills and heads out across the valley to catch the lip of the small ridge at 3,000' (1,500' AGL). I'm able to find a good thermal just north of launch, get to 6,700' and cross the valley to get good lift just south of Gubbio. I'm five minutes behind Dave now, and we are running in front. Hansjorg is just a few minutes behind.

Dave joins Christof and Johnny Carr at the turnpoint north of Gubbio. They find a hot thermal north of the turnpoint and climb to 7,200'. We had just passed Brian ridge soaring low at Gubbio accompanied by an ATOS.

I get to 6,200' just before getting the turnpoint photo and plunge off downwind to get into the great lift that Dave reported. He takes the altitude that he gained and uses it to get all the way to the towers at Mt. Norena, the third turnpoint. I don't find the lift on the course, and continue down wind to the base of the mountain and land.

Johnny Carr is the first glider into goal, followed by Christof and then Dave. Hansjorg comes in a half hour later and Alain Chauvet a bit later. No one else makes goal from the rigid wings. Brian Porter lands to the northeast of the third turnpoint.

A few minutes later Gerard Thevenot comes in first from the flex wing pilots. About twenty flex wings make goal. Manfred Ruhmer, who is in first, makes goal third, so he probably keeps his place. A number of Brazilians make goal, so their team is still in the lead for the World Championship.

Here's a shot of Gerard landing after crossing the goal:

The photos above were taken by David Glover (http://www.1800hangglide.com).

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Manfred's birthday present to himself

Wed, Aug 4 1999, 10:00:00 pm GMT

Allan Barnes|Andre Wolf|Betinho Schmitz|Brian Porter|Chris Arai|Dave Carr|Dave Sharp|David "Dave" Glover|David "Dave" Sharp|Gerolf Heinrichs|Guido Gehrmann|James "Jim" Zeiset|James Freeman|Jim Lee|Johnny Carr

James Freeman writes that you can find the results of the Worlds at: http://www.fivl.it/mondiali/CLASSIFICHE/clasweb.html. This is sort of true. Check it out and see if they are up to date.

The second day of a high pressure brings a bit lighter conditions, and they are worried about a stable air mass coming in later in the day. When we first get to launch at Monte Cucco, there are no cumulus clouds, and lots of scattered cirrus.

After an initial attempt at a task call is called off after the whole task committee quits when the meet director calls a different task (after agreeing to the tasked called by the task committee), we get a shorter task – 80 kilometers, pretty much in front of Monte Cucco.

As we begin to take off around 12:30 PM, a rigid of high clouds comes in and really brings the dark shadows throughout the valley in front of launch as well as up the hill. Still there is a nice breeze at launch and pilots are slowly climbing out to 5,500'.

Here's what the launch looked like just before we launched:

We are asked to fly south down the range about 15 miles and take a photo of a factory out in the valley. The next turnpoint is to the north on the west side of the valley, although every one runs back to the range to get back up. This turnpoint is at the south end of a low range on the west side of the valley, and it is followed by a turnpoint at the north end of this low range.

The next turnpoint is back to the east at the Monte Cucco range 4 miles north of goal at Sigillo, which makes for a short final glide.

With almost complete shading, we head south along the range, working light lift and every now and then finding 600 fpm. It's easy to make the factory to the south.

Working back north along the range again presents lots of opportunities to get up, but no one gets real high. About half way back to goal it is time to head out into the valley with little hope of getting up.

The lead gaggle heads into the gloom with those of us 5 minutes behind watching to see what happens as we work on getting high before taking the plunge. There are about 15 gliders still hanging on a bit to the north of me on the range also waiting.

As I cross the valley and get to within 2 miles of the castle on the low range, I spot a couple of flex wings circling in zero to a bit up. I join them as I watch other flex wing pilots deck it in the dark near the turnpoint. Chris Arai, Gerolf Heinrichs, Guido Gehrmann, and many others are going down. Dave Sharp is out in front with them down to 150 feet.

I hang with the flex wing pilots as the gaggle at the wind mills comes and joins us. The gaggle is now full of ATOSes with Hansjorg, etc. We continue hanging in zero to a little bit up and gain maybe 300' over 15 minutes.

We slide a bit to the north, find another patch of lift in the darkness, and then run to the turnpoint, before heading to the south end of the ridge. There are gliders way below us turning so there must be something.

We work the top of the ridge line and the dark begins to lift a little, and we start getting up better as the pilots 2000' below us also work whatever they can find. As we continue working the low ridges and moving north, we get more sun and we are able to get up to 5,500' and it feels like the slow times are over and we are back to hang gliding.

The rest of the task goes well with plenty of sun on our west facing hills. Dave Sharp gets up and gets going really well just south of Gubbio. Brian Porter who went over first with Dave, drifted back over the valley to the Monte Cucco range, got up really well, and was able to fly right back to us and join us in a good thermal just south of Gubbio.

We blaze down to the turnpoint north of Gubbio, and then have no problems making it to goal Almost all the rigid wing gliders make it into goal within a half hour of each other.

Here's the results from today for Class II:

Hansjorg came in first today overall and in Class II. This means that he will probably be in the lead overall again, after the lead was taken by Johnny Carr in the Swift yesterday. Johnny Carr flew very conservatively today.

Dave Sharp came in third and should move into fourth place overall. Jim Zeiset decked it just after the second turnpoint as he was out early and in front of everyone.

Manfred came in second to goal today, but we don't as yet know just when he started it is our understanding that he got the fastest time and should move back into first place. Oleg decked it by the second turnpoint.

Here's the placing at goal for today for Class I:

With Andre Wolf in soon after Manfred he should move from first down to second place. Betino Schmitz came in right after Andre, so the Brazilian team should continue their dominance of the Worlds. Allan Barnes had a good finish, which may move him up to third.

Jim Lee was the only American flex-wing pilot to make it into goal. As of yesterday the top five places who Laminar ST (Icaro 2000). Also team Wallaby Ranch is not doing too badly with Manfred first, Andre Wolf second, Allan Barnes third, and Betino Schmitz in the top ten.

Oh yes, Manfred is thirty four today.

Padro Matos who was leading until today, Manfred happy after completing his task, and a faired instrument package.

The photos above were taken by David Glover (http://www.1800hangglide.com).

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Ghostbuster reappears at Worlds

Tue, Aug 3 1999, 10:00:01 pm GMT

Ghostbuster|Worlds 1999

We were surprised to see one of the Ghostbusters return to launch today. We asked Daniele Bello what the story was. He had told us earlier that he had problems with the flaps and with the speed bumps.

It seems that yesterday when he landed out, he had company. Francois Chamoux flying the ixbo, landed on Daniele's Exxtacy 99 and broke the leading edge.

With a broken Exxtacy, Daniele decided to go back to the Ghostbuster. Francois didn't seem to have any problem with his ixbo and was up there flying it today. We think that Daniele is flying factory gliders from Flight Design, especially now that he has ordered an ATOS.

Berndt Weber's special ATOS nose, the weather giy who called it right today, and the gliders on Monte Cucco launch with Monte Cucco in the background.

The photos above were taken by David Glover (http://www.1800hangglide.com).

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Manfred storms back »

Tue, Aug 3 1999, 10:00:00 pm GMT

Worlds 1999

Big air, big task, high altitudes, big finish, a big day.

When I go outside in the morning I see that Sigillo and Monte Cucco has returned to the conditions that we first experienced here two weeks ago. It’s warm, there are no clouds in the morning, and the air is still. It looks like it will be a good day.

Finally we get to take off from the main Monte Cucco launch facing west out into the valley that contains Sigillo and the Villa Dama. Clouds are forming by 10 AM as we start setting up.

The task is 72 miles. We are asked to head down the range to a tower 30 miles to the south, jump out in the valley to the Basilica at Asissi, and back to the LZ just below the launch just north of Sigillo.

The rigids get two start times 1 and 1:15 PM, and the flex wings get the same start times, plus a few more to spread them out a bit.

Unlike every other day in this meet so far, we immediately start climbing at launch and get to cloud base at 6,700' MSL (5,200' AGL). The main problem is waiting long enough to take the second start gate. Christof and Juerg Ris don't wait and get out on the course as the first rigids. Most of the flex wing pilots hold back.

With strong lift running down the range is a piece of cake. I get a later start then most as I run out to the valley first looking for lift that turns out to be false. Oh, well, just trying to get ahead of everyone puts me a bit behind.

Dave Sharp is running with Hansjorg as the rigids are in front of the flex wings who start a bit later. Johnny Carr on the Swift and Brian Porter on the Utopia are catching up with the ATOSes 15 minutes in front of them and finally catch them at the first turnpoint.

Manfred starts late and Joseph Zweckmayr starts early so he's out there with Dave and the other rigid wings. I've turned the risk factor way up on the Ball Vario and am working with a bunch of flex wing pilots hoping from one 500 to 700 fpm thermal to the next trying to catch up. Until today, 300 fpm was great.

The course line is full of thermal markers and it makes it easy for racing as we blow down the course. Brian is now in front with Johnny Carr and Dave is with Hansjorg. They are catching up with Christof and Juerg. The flex wing pilots for the most part are just behind them.

The jump to Asissi, which has its own big mountain out in the valley, can be taken from a point further north off the range to the east, or in a straight line from the turnpoint. Those pilots who stay high can get up on the mountain first and blast into Asissi. Dave and Brian are blasting, I get low and have to work the sunny side of the mountain, but get to cloud base very quickly at 7,600'.

Johnny Carr gets to goal first to win the day. Brian lost him and makes it in 24 minutes later. Then the ATOSes start coming in with Dave Sharp in fifth and Hansjorg in fourth. As they started later than Juerg and Christof, they are the winning Class II "hang gliders" for the day.

Josef Zweckmayr comes in after Dave as the first flex wing pilot, and soon behind him Manfred. Manfred got a much later start and wins the day.

More pilots pour into goal and probably 100 flex wing pilots make it in. Almost all the rigid wing pilots get to goal. I'm slow having made Asissi late, and having to work the range low back 20 miles to goal.

Bettino appears to be the top placing Brazilian for today in 22nd, but it looks like the total scores will again completely change. Here are the totals in the flex wing class after yesterday:

There were three Brazilians in the top four places yesterday with Allan Barnes from the UK in third. Manfred had been moved down to a tie for sixth with Oleg. Steve Moyes had moved into tenth. Here's a shot of Andre Wolf who was in second:

The Brazilian team is doing well and appears to be leading in the team competition. I say appears because we aren't getting provisional team scores.

Jim Lee and Chris Arai made goal for the US team. All the US rigid team members made goal.

I have asked the meet organizers to get the daily results up on the web, but it doesn't appear to be happening.

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The Worlds – Day Eight »

Mon, Aug 2 1999, 10:00:00 pm GMT

Worlds 1999

A very challenging day indeed. The meet organizers send us to the west facing launch up at Monte Cucco (finally we go to the main launch), knowing that it is blowing down (light). Hmmm!

We wait around with our gliders on our racks, until finally we get the word to go around to the east-facing launch about 1 km away, where, what do you know, it is blowing up lightly. We set up in another huge launch area with lots of well-chewed grass.

The meet organizers have given up all pretense of separating class I and II, as we can now setup wherever we like, we have the same launch times and start gate times. Of course, this means that we class II pilots have to suffer the infernal gaggles of 194 pilots over launch in weak conditions.

With high clouds blocking the sun at launch, but cumulus a few miles to the north predicted to OD, it looks like a tough day for a 76 kilometer task to the north and back to the LZ on the west side of Monte Cucco.

The multiple start gates does provide a small bit of spread in the field, but most of the pilots take the 2:15 PM gate and run the east face of Monte Cucco heading to the next valley and the west face of an even bigger mountain. Wherever you go the place is packed. Slide up within a few feet of the hillside, and you still find yourself with lots of "friends."

Dave Sharp and I follow Oleg (a familiar strategy) and hook up with Jim Lee on the west face of the bigger mountain a few miles to the north of launch, and start working the broken and jagged lift to 5,400'. The task is 20 miles to the north, a large tower on the top of a high mountain. It is possible to get the turn point photo from below the top of the mountain as long as the tower is still in the picture.

Once we top out I head east to jump over into the valley on the east side of the mountain. I had just seen a couple of pilots try the west face further to the north, and they plummet. Everything is in shade as we are now under the over development.

Forty pilots cruise along the east side of the ridges, trying to find zero sink and hoping to stay up as we lose 2,000'. After ten minutes of this, I break off from everyone heading slowly down, but toward goal, and head out east into the valley about 3 miles to a land fill that looks like it has been in the filtered sunlight for about 10 minutes at least. It is a very small bright spot in a twenty-mile square dark area.

At 200' off the ground, I start working zero, which turns into fifty. I'm flying with Dave, but he's still hanging on the mountain, until he gets my report. Fifty turns into a hundred, then two hundred, and finally, three hundred, as I climb 4,000' and drift back toward the course line.

Many other pilots have maintained on the course line, and now they are in trouble. All the Austrian team, including Johann Posch, Manfred Ruhmer, Robert Resinger, and Josef Zweckmayr go down by the first turnpoint. Oleg and Gerolf are down there also.

Dave and I work our way toward the first turnpoint, but we are high and get up again to 5,400' over the previous day's first turnpoint, just 6 miles south of today's turnpoint and high on the ridge. Working now the west side of the ridge line, we are watching the sun shine on the valley's to the west, as small gaggles work light lift over sunny fields below us.

After dropping 1,800' I catch some broken lift on the rocks below the turnpoint and start working back up. After a few turns, twenty of our friends come over from the west to join Dave and I as we climb out to get over the tower. Down below at the base we can see a field with at least twenty gliders, and there are others plastered on the steep hillsides next to us.

Five hundred feet over the top, we swoop to the turnpoint about a mile away, rounding the base of the tower at about 200'. We then skim along the top of the mountain on our way back out to our previous thermal and toward the next turnpoint to the west just north of Gubbio.

No one is at goal yet, and it looks like this is the remnant of 194 pilots - about 20 to 30 pilots. The gaggle includes the British team, which is flying very much as a team. Dave and I have been flying together and as a team, but we are having difficulty communicating with Jim Zeiset (who lands at the first turn point), and Brian Porter, who is way behind because he forgot to take a photo of the task board.

We glide for 5 miles, and then work zero sink that gets better as we make our way out of the hills and into the Gubbio valley. We finally get enough lift to get us back to 5,400' and on our way strongly to the turnpoint. Dave goes on a head missing the last thermal, but finds the best thermal of the day to the south of the turnpoint. We climb to sixty five hundred feet. Working together we are able to leave twenty flex wing and two rigid wing pilots behind.

Dave has a lead foot and goes on final 11 miles out. I go with him but reluctantly as I feel that it would be better to head south to the next set of clouds and then get into goal from the west. There is a strong east wind at goal: 10 to 15 mph. None the less, I overrule my gut and go with Dave. The pilots behind us go south toward the clouds. The Brits are working together.

Dave and I don't find any lift coming into goal and we both get low. At 300' AGL Dave pulls rabbit out of the hat as I land less than 2 miles from goal. Dave comes in to goal as the fourth rigid to goal. I get the distinct displeasure of watching all the pilots I climbed through and out glided pass over my head to goal.

Dave and I are again the top placing American pilots (as well as American rigid pilots) as Brian Porter isn't able to get to the first turnpoint. Chris and Jim Lee land by the first turnpoint. Ryan goes down on the leg from the first turnpoint to Gubbio. Mike Barber goes down by the first turnpoint.

Five of the six first crossings to goal were British pilots. Here is a shot of Allain Barnes who was the top placing British pilot after the third task:

Johnny Carr won the day in his Swift. He gets to goal just as we start our final glide. The top two rigid wing leaders – Hansjorg Truttmann, and Christof Kratzner, did not complete the task. They landed by the first turn point. The Brazilian flex wing pilots did very well with three Brazilians at goal. We think that Pedro Matos who was in second, is now leading the flex wing competition. The Brazilian team may be leading the flex wing team competition.

Andre Wolf, another Brazilian, who was in 6th, may be in second, or perhaps ahead of Pedro. Carlos Niemeyer, a Brazilian who was in 9th, is now in the top five. I'm guessing a bit on these results, as the score keeper is not getting out the scores to the Internet or to the team leaders in a very timely fashion.

Seven of the top ten flex wing pilots did not make goal. Everything is turned upside down, and this is a meet that Manfred and Oleg will head to battle back to win. Chris Arai was in fourth place after yesterday and Jim Lee was in 16th, as the highest placing Americans in the flex wing category.

Andre Wolf was placing bets at 5 or 10 to 1 that Manfred would win the Worlds. It doesn't look like a good bet at the moment.

Gaggles over Tre Pizzi, rigid wing gliders line up, Paris Williams launches at Tre Pizzi.

The photos above were taken by David Glover (http://www.1800hangglide.com).

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ATOS cracking their ribs »

Sun, Aug 1 1999, 10:00:02 pm GMT

Worlds 1999

We've got Dave Sharp, Berndt Weber, and Felix Ruhle here at the Worlds, so there couldn't be any better support from the manufacturers and their US representative. This is great because we are breaking quite a few ATOS ribs. Berndt says that he fixed 5 yesterday. Dave fixed a cracked rib on my glider the day before, and a mushed one on Johann's today.

Some of the problems come from pilots pounding in, and some from pilots not properly folding in the ribs, but there are too many problems to all be the fault of the pilots. The eighth rib is especially easy to crack by a hard landing or an improper folding. Berndt says that they will fix this by putting in a plastic pin that will flex. On the Exxtacy the final rib had bungies. It's great that it is so easy to fix carbon fiber ribs.

The ATOS doesn't have cams on the wing tips like the Exxtacy, Ghostbuster, and E7. This makes for a bit of unpleasant grunting and groaning. I bought some clear green plastic hose to put over the tips to protect the strings. It looks pretty nice (wish I had some red hose also for the left tip), but it sure wish I had cams.

There is already wear on the sail, and some of it came from bolts on the spoilerons actuators. I told Berndt to turn the bolts around to reduce the wear and to cover the bolts tops with Velcro (which I did). Felix first wanted to blame the pilots for not releasing the spoileron wire before swinging the ribs, but it was in fact a manufacturing mistake.

The sail zipper is still hard to zip up although it is getting better. I really had a hard time with it at first.

I wish there was a way to keep the outer three ribs closed when you break down the glider so that they could be in the most protected position. The fact that they can swing out easily (a feature actually), may make it easy to crack the eighth rib.

It is hard to insert the spoileron wire after setting up the glider without pulling out the pin that connects the base tube and downtubes. It is a very clean connection, but still this is a problem. Felix recognizes this and says that he is coming up with a solution.

The bag is much bigger on the ATOS than on the Exxtacy, so that is much appreciated. It is now easy to get the glider in the bag. Still, it would be nice if there was a bit of extra padding around the nose, which wears on the bag. Thank goodness it has two zippers unlike my Exxtacy bag.

It is not all that easy to roll up the tips and get the spoilerons to fit nicely in the bag. I still haven't figured out how to do this, and Felix couldn't provide any good advice.

I put a crinkle in my whack tube sleeve because it is easy to have the turnbuckle sit in it when you open the wing. You had to be careful about this on the Exxtacy also, but it seems easier to screw this up on the ATOS. Well at least my Exxtacy and ATOS match. I much prefer the nose wire clip on the ATOS. It definitely won't come off.

I almost wore through a flap rope on my first ATOS flight. This was because the pulley was reversed at the back by the keel. I put a new rope on and I haven't had a problem with it since.

Felix mentioned that he was able to stall the ATOS when he was banked up in a turbulent thermal and he pushed out hard on the outside corner bracket in an attempt to reverse the glider. The glider started shaking and he pulled it in to gain speed. Unlike the Exxtacy, Felix built the ATOS with the bar back further, so it is possible to stall it.

I still need to put my hang point further back in order to reduce the bar pressure when I push out. It was very easy to get the ATOS flying fast into goal and I pulled away from the two flex wing gliders that were with me.

I did get the ATOS to slip a bit when turning into final when I really whipped it around. This surprised me because I was use to the Exxtacy, which you really can't whip around. I flattened it out quickly, but it was a bit of a scare.

I'm really enjoying flying the ATOS (but, then I liked my Exxtacy also). It is very nimble and has great performance, although not so great with me at the controls. All the problems I've had are minor relative to those I originally had with the Exxtacy. I sure hope that Berndt and Felix listen as well as they have this week to pilot feedback. It is great that they are here and can see what is going on.

I asked Berndt if it is true what I had heard which was that he wanted to produce a glider with soul. He said yes, and that he thought that they had done that.

Felix and Berndt at goal (although neither flew there today), Hansjorg at goal, and Dave Sharp fixing Johann's 9th rib at goal.

The photos above were taken by David Glover (http://www.1800hangglide.com).

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Italian world team abandons Ghostbusters

Sun, Aug 1 1999, 10:00:01 pm GMT

Worlds 1999|Ghostbuster

Yesterday we noticed that there were new Exxtacy 99's on launch, but no Ghostbusters. Today we went and asked the Italian pilots who were flying the Ghostbusters what was up.

They said that they were too scared to fly them anymore. They kept getting speed bumps at not very high speeds on their previous two competition flights. They are now flying the new Exxtacies instead (which also experience speed bumps, but at much higher speeds).

We previously reported that there were problems with speed bumps with the Ghostbusters and that according to our sources these were inherent in the design. We'll see, but right now, there are no Ghostbusters at the Worlds.

I have been accused of favoring one rigid wing glider over another in an unfair manner. A few pilots have written to say that I wouldn't write anything bad about the glider that I am flying (see the next article). Apparently their memories are a bit short, but they can easily refresh them by looking are my long article discussing all the problems that I had with my Exxtacies. You'll find it on my web site. It hasn’t changed since I wrote it almost two years ago.

When there are problems with gliders I write about them because I want to put the fire to the feet of the manufacturers to get them to fix the problems. I am especially interested in doing this to manufacturers of the glider that I'm flying. I mean it is in my interest to get my glider fixed.

The Ghostbuster appears to have a number of problems, and I am reporting both their successes and problems. I'm sorry if some people think that is biased, but too bad.

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The Worlds – Day Seven »

Sun, Aug 1 1999, 10:00:00 pm GMT

Worlds 1999

Finally, a good day. Light winds, although they are over the back at Monte Cucco, so once again we are sent to Tre Pizzi with its east-facing launch. This is not the Monte Cucco worlds, but the Tre Pizzi worlds.

Hansjorg Truttmann in his ATOS finds out just how light when he takes off and the glider gets away from him without going up. He takes out a downtube and bottom bracket. Felix Ruhle switches gliders with him and fixes Hansjorg's glider on launch and launches a bit later. Hansjorg is leading class II, so Felix wants him to continue winning.

Hansjorg had moved to the right of the main class II launch to launch and it was a rounded hill that didn't provide any ground effect to the wings. Perhaps that is why he didn't get off.

With the light winds and weak thermals due to the high cirrus, many of us are stuck low over launch as the class II and class I gliders have the same launch and start times. We work weak lift until a few minutes before the last start gate opens at 1 PM and then head out low to a thermal over the start gate 2 miles in front of launch in the valley.

The task that is called asks us to fly north back to Monte Cucco through the mountains and away from the valleys, and then head further north to a big building high on an upper plateau. Next we have to head west to a small lake north of Gubbio, hit the Monastery above Gubbio, and then southeast against a head wind, back to the LZ at Sigillo – a 50 mile task.

After getting the start gate Dave Sharp and I ignore the light lift in the valley and run back to the ridge north of the launch. There we find much better lift (200 fpm) to get us up to over 5,000' MSL (3,500' AGL) and now we're ready to jump back into the mountains to the north. There are a few pilots out in front of us, but many are still left over launch with its weak conditions Probably a third of the field hasn't even launched yet. We hear that Jim Zeiset, Ryan Glover, Paris Williams, and Mike Barber are down near the start gate. Brian Porter is behind us in the air trying to get his GPS to work.

Dave and I race to catch up with the ten pilots in front of us. Since we started on the last start gate, we assume that everyone is racing from the same start time of 1 PM, and you know exactly where you are in the race. Fifteen miles later we are over the launch at Monte Cucco, but on the east side or back side of the launch. We are 500 feet over launch, but below the top of Monte Cucco, and we have to slide around the east side of it with our wing tips in the grass. Thank goodness the winds are light. Jim Lee and Chris Arai are with us and flying well.

I make a wrong guess as to where a bit of lift is and get 200' below Dave, Jim and Chris. They will use that extra altitude to leave me way behind as we approach the 1stturnpoint.

I climb to 6,500' 5 miles out from the 1stturnpoint, which we can see high up on the plateau to our north. Dave Sharp climbs to 6,500' 3 miles from the turnpoint and is able to glide into it and get around it with 4,700'. I don't find lift to take me to 6,500' that close to the turnpoint, and get lower as I head upwind toward it. Christian Chiech and Bettino Schmitz, both of whom are top flex wing pilots, are in front of me and well below me as we head for the turnpoint. They are not going to make it on a glide.

There is a narrow gorge between the turnpoint and us and Christian Chiech is running along the north side of the gorge heading east below the turnpoint. Suddenly, I see what appears to be another glider next to him, then I see that it is a parachute. He falls a few hundred feet and then lands gently in the trees, 1000' up the gorge from the main road. I call in his position and he is later retrieved with no problems.

Not getting any lift and falling fast, I head east to a cloud over the town on the east side of the gorge. It works, I climb to over 5,000' and am able to snap a shot of the red roofed building as I pop over the top of the mountain and then plummet into the valley to the west. By now, Brian Porter and Johnny Carr in the Swift have caught up with me, and they head north up the valley, while I fall to the south with four flex wing pilots.

We start working 50 fpm up 800 feet above a small town next a little ridge, hoping for anything to get us out of this valley which is far off the main roads from Sigillo. We work forever to get up enough to dive into the hills on the back (east) side of Gubbio, and then again I get stuck working ridges with zero sink, while I wait for something to change.

Half an hour later, the sun comes out and I suddenly find myself going up at 200 fpm and there appear three flex wings who enjoy my newfound fortune. Meanwhile Dave Sharp has made it into goal having found more lift than he could deal with after the second turnpoint. Hansjorg and Christof were the first and second class II gliders into goal.

Manfred and Oleg were the first gliders period into goal with Oleg just behind Manfred, as is his want. Here's a shot of Manfred and Oleg discussing the task, which they agreed was too easy:

The flex wing pilots are I are able to climb out to over 5,000' and get to the clouds north of Gubbio for the second turnpoint, and another climb now to 6,500' just after the turnpoint. Foolishly, I thought this was enough to get me to goal, as Dave had reported too much lift in the convergence getting to goal.

I lose 2,000' getting to the turnpoint at Gubbio 4 miles to the south, and almost another 2,000' running along the west-facing hills south of Gubbio and am forced to drive into the sunlit valley south of Gubbio and west of Sigillo, downwind from the goal.

A couple of us work 200-300 fpm, drifting away from goal, but getting up enough, 4,500' to try once again to get up over the hills between us and Sigillo. We see a flex wing and a ATOS low in the hills, but turning. The ATOS turns out to be Felix.

Felix continues forward and lands about 3 miles from goal on the hillside. I and two flex wing pilots stop at the crest and work weak lift, that finally gets us up to 4,100' (2,600' AGL) 4 miles from goal, and lets us pull in against the 15 mph head wind, and make it to goal quite late. Only one other glider makes it in after us.

30 or 40 pilots make goal out of 194, so there are a lot more happy faces than on previous days. Johan Posch again makes goal for the third time in a row. Perhaps his film will work out this time.

I reported yesterday that Gerolf had hurt his knee. It wasn't hurt too bad and he was flying today.

I don't have results yet and they seem to be pretty slow about putting up the results on their web site. It would appear that Manfred is now leading Class I as Gerard Thevenot came in quite late. Hansjorg Truttmann got his film problems straightened out and is now in first in Class II. Brian Porter landed just short of goal, but Johnny Carr in the Swift made it to goal (he had a hard time getting down). Christof is probably in second.

Chris and Jim Lee make goal, with Chris scoring well. Chris was the fourth flex wing into goal. Jim broke his nice new carbon fiber downtube.

It is not clear yet how many points the day is worth as many flex wing pilots landed very early by the start clock. About half the rigid wing pilots made goal. The one IXBO made goal along with all the ATOSes.

Here are the Class I results before that last task:

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The Worlds – Day Five »

Fri, Jul 30 1999, 10:00:00 pm GMT

Worlds 1999

In the morning it is blowing over the back again at Monte Cucco (which we have yet to launch from), but the only clouds are on the hills, so we are headed for Tre Pizzi with its east launch. By the time we get to launch, at 10:30 AM, the clouds are right at launch and we can't see 100 feet, but the wind is less than ten miles per hour straight up, so we set up.

The clouds clear and the day looks great, even with the low cloud base. Finally, they call a task which both Class I and Class II gliders will attempt, 55 miles, up and down the ridge with little forays out into the valley for some turnpoint photos.

The rigid wings are the first off again with a start gate at 12:45. The flex wings will follow with three start gates beginning at 1 PM. With the flex wings starting 15 minutes behind, the best flex wing pilots will soon be catching the slower rigid wings.

We gain a few hundred feet right off launch, but it is mostly ridge lift. Most of the us work it down the ridge to the start gate where there is a convenient thermal that gets the first ten rigid wing pilots out on course and headed 19 kilometers to a small church on the hill side (the first turnpoint). There is reasonable lift and staying away from the ridge works as we work the thermals in the valley and smaller hills.

With a northeast wind, there is plenty of head wind on the way back to the second turnpoint north of the launch. Hansjorg Truttman, Christof Kratzner, and Brian Porter are in the lead, with Felix Ruehle, myself and another ATOS pilot just behind them. As the first three pilots make the second turnpoint, the second gaggle gets stuck low on a ridge just before the turnpoint, and have to find a thermal out in the valley. Just as we enter it, Manfred Ruhmer and Johann Posch in an ATOS join us. We climb to 4,800' (3,300' AGL), which is quite high for this meet so far, and race to the second turnpoint.

One piece of advice: if Manfred is turning in weak lift, stay with him. I don't and land soon there after. Three rigid wing pilots and Manfred keep turning at the second turnpoint in broken lift. Johann and Manfred (at least) make goal.

Manfred was the first flex wing pilot to launch and got the start gate at 1 PM. Therefore, he was able to catch the second gaggle of rigid wing pilots about an hour into the flight.

Here's a shot of Manfred just before he launched:

Dave Sharp got low early but was able to slowly work it up. He makes the second turnpoint about ten minutes after the second gaggle, and continued on course, but was unable to get to goal landing at the last turnpoint. Felix Ruhle made goal along with a number of other ATOS pilots. Jim Zeiset landed early after the first turnpoint.

Hansjorg, Chritsof, and Brian (in the Utopia) battled it out for the lead working their way toward the turnpoints out in the valley, and scooting back when they didn't have enough altitude to make them. They would then gain altitude back at the ridge, before making another try.

Hansjorg was finally able to get away, and while Brian was doing a few extra turns wondering where the goal field was, he flashed into goal to win the day. Brian figured it out, and came in next.

Here's a shot of Hansjorg at goal:

After a few more ATOSes made goal, Manfred came in alone only to be followed by more ATOSes. It was a very long time before another flex wing made it into goal – maybe an hour or more before Gerard Thevenot came in followed by about ten flex wing pilots. Chris Arai was the only American flex wing pilot to make goal.

It looks like Manfred might jump into the over all lead after being 97 points down after the first day. Hansjorg should jump into first place in the rigid wings, as Johnny Carr, in the Swift, came in quite late (for a rigid wing pilot).

There may be results at: http://www.fivl.it/mondiali/cucco99.html

The three small shots above: Pilot meeting, Jos Guggenmos's red E-7 with winglets, an ATOS launching.

The photos above were taken by David Glover (http://www.1800hangglide.com).

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The Worlds – Day Four »

Wed, Jul 28 1999, 10:00:00 pm GMT

Worlds 1999

The day is called at 9 AM before we have a chance to go up to launch.

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The HG Worlds – Task One (Day two) »

Tue, Jul 27 1999, 10:00:00 pm GMT

Worlds 1999

Late Monday afternoon the rain stops, the clouds rise, and we head an hour north of Sigillo for a later evening light thermal and rigid lift flight that gets us 800' over and back to Villa Dama at 12:30 AM.

There are no clouds on Tuesday morning, and we take off down the hill toward town around 9:30 AM heading toward Trapezi an hour to the south east, assuming that with the north east wind they will move the competition to this site. Amy is still in the team leaders meeting and contacts us on radio to confirm our launch location.

We are the second van to launch, and have to climb a couple of hundred feet up to the east facing launch. The rigid wings get the first and a bit lower launch, well the flex wings get to go around the corner a bit more directly into the wind. It matters not.

There are two Ghostbusters here and a prototype Top Secret (it looks a lot like the ATOS that Gerard saw at the Wallaby Open, but no sail over the front of the leading edge, and folding ribs) from Gerard Thevenot. We all swarm around the lower launch, and get ready quickly because we will be launching first. Our launch window opens at 1:15 PM and closes at 1:45 PM. The start tarp comes out at 2 PM, and it is a race.

Dave Sharp and I get off at 1:35 PM and we are among the first 5 to launch. The launch is actually closed before all the rigid wing pilots get off. The last ones force their way through the launch director. There will be some kind of penalty.

We are great wind dummies for the flex wings as we climb right out 1000' to cloud base. Oh, boy, what is the deal with this 1000' to cloud base business? The winds at launch were about 15 mph out of the northeast.

After getting the start gate 5 miles south down the valley we catch a thermal in the middle of the valley and drift back toward the ridge. There proves to be sparse and broken lift there, but we need to work whatever we can. Lift was good at launch, but weak thereafter.

I geek it at the first turn point, not even finding it, given that the GPS co-ordinates are ½ mile off. Jim Zesiet lands about ½ mile from me. Dave Sharp continues on then, misreads his GPS or vario. Thinks he's way high coming into goal, then realizes he's not anywhere near goal, and has to go on final anyway. He lands short

Brian Porter also misses the first turnpoint, has to go back after going ten miles north up the valley, and gets another shot of the turnpoint. He makes goal, but stalls his Utopia on landing and hurts it pretty bad. We'll see if he'll be in action tomorrow.

We think that Christof Kraztner in an ATOS wins the day, but he will be getting a penalty as he launched late. Twelve rigid wings made goal out of the two dozen or so here at the Worlds.

The flex wing gliders take off after us, but no one launches until ½ hour into their launch window. Then they dribble off the hill. Conditions are now quite weak. They have a slightly longer task, and no flex wing pilot makes goal. Gerard Thevenot may have won the day.

Results may or may not be up at: http://www.fivl.it/mondiali/cucco99.html.

Tomorrow looks like it will be blown out. The next day looks like rain. Maybe Friday will be good.

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Cold and wet in Monte Cucco »

Sun, Jul 25 1999, 10:00:01 pm GMT

David "Dave" Glover|Worlds 1999

It's hard to remember back to Tuesday and Wednesday when we were bathed in lower ninety degree temperatures with plentiful cues and great flying. On the day before the start of the 1999 World Hang Gliding Championships, it rained here most of the afternoon. Today, the first day, has been called at 9 AM as the clouds are well below launch, with full coverage of high clouds above, and strong winds parallel to launch. At 11:45 AM it begins to rain. Five days in a row of non-flyable conditions here at Monte Cucco.

On Sunday night there was a pilot reception and parade through the center of town at Sigillo. We arrived back from Asissi at around 6 PM to find that the only through street in town had been blocked off in preparation for the festival and parade.

We didn't march until 10 PM, after the parishioners of a local church held their march. While the town is small, and our parade was short, we kept stopping and waiting. I couldn't figure out what was going on, and there were few, if any spectators.

Finally, we approached the central square, and I saw what the problem was. The whole town had come out to greet us and the parade route was squeezed down to single file. As we marched through the central plaza, the town's people, all cheering for each country, mobbed us. It was really moving.

There were speeches by the mayor of Sigillo, and the president of the local region. The Korean ambassador to Italy was there. Then a whole pageant began.

A woman dressed in white robes hung from a rope that came out the bell tower of the municipal building, and danced across the face of the building missing the pigeon spikes. Two women wearing masks and long hooped skirts stood 12 feet tall and moved through the crowd. Two fifteen foot diameter helium balloons painted to represent brother sun and sister moon, carried dancers above the crowd. A light show played on the municipal building's wall.

Photo credits for the last few Oz Reports go to Dave Glover at http://www.1800hangglide.com.

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Arriving at Sigillo »

Mon, Jul 19 1999, 10:00:04 pm GMT

Amy Whitfield|Belinda Boulter|Chris Arai|David "Dave" Sharp|James "Jim" Zeiset|Johann Posch|Paris Williams|Worlds 1999

After enjoying the camaraderie at the beer hall at the LZ of the Alpen Open, we get an hours drive toward Italy, and our eventual destination, Sigillo, a small resort town at the base of Monte Cucco, site of the 1999 Worlds. We heard from Jim Zeiset's report that it looked like a 200-kilometer day at Gnadenwald on Monday.

We finish the drive the next day at around 6 PM and check in at the American team's villa, the Villa Dama, situated across the 5 mile wide valley from Monte Cucco. The view from the pool takes in the length of the valley and gives the guest pilots a good idea of the coming tasks. Later in the evening Jim and Amy join Chris Arai, Dave Sharp, Johann Posch, Belinda, and I here. We expect Jim, Kathie, and Rachael Lee tomorrow. Paris Williams is already setup at the camp ground.

Monte Cucco towers about 3000' above this high valley, rounded and grass covered at the top. It appears that there are launch areas for hundreds of gliders. The wheat and hay fields below have been harvested and they sit golden brown and reassuring to any cross country pilot. The stories about the venturi and turbulence in the narrow valley to the south are true according to Chris, but from here it seems like just an extreme story. Perhaps when the winds kick up, it will be more of a concern.

Nikki Hamilton told us that 26 rigid wing glider pilots are signed up for the worlds.

Pictures will follow.

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British Nationals at Monte Cucco

Mon, Jul 5 1999, 6:00:02 pm EDT

Allan Barnes|André Wolfe|Betinho Schmitz|Blue Sky|British Nationals 1999|Gordon Rigg|Jim Bowyer|Jim Lee|Jim Page|Justin Needham|Kathleen Rigg|Mike Barber|Monte Cucco|Richard Walbec|Steve Elkin|Steve Elkins|Wills Wing|Worlds 1999

Jim Bowyer reports on the British Nationals:

A good entry - 95 pilots from GB, Belgium, Brazil, Columbia, Denmark,France,Israel, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Norway, Sweden, the USA and Venezuela.

This will definitely be serious practice for the forthcoming World Championship with the entire French national squad here plus other world class pilots from national teams including Gerard Thevenot, Jim Lee and Mike Barber, Betinho Schmitz and Andre Wolf, Lars Bo Johansen amongst others.

BRITISH NATIONALS - Monte Cucco Day 1

Day 1 dawned with mainly clear skies but some signs of early cumulus over the mountains. After three practice days with the wind on the northeast side of the hill a light breeze from the southeast was very welcome and the task was set from the main Monte Cucco launch.

No met forecast was available but the day looked set to improve from a weak start and a 102 km task was set. The route started off 41 km south to the aerials at Pale di Foligno, 16 kms out west to Assisi and a difficult 32 kms north to Gubbio before the short run back into goal at Villa Scirca.

The sky always looked better well to the south but the launch area and first part of the course was under clear blue and pilots were in no rush to get started. Eventually a few launched and the climb out, although not looking easy initially, improved as the afternoon wore on. As they headed south a large cu-nimb could be seen developing down there; fortunately it was behind the main line of mountains and never really threatened the task. However, many found the conditions down towards the first turnpoint difficult and some failed to climb there to photograph it.

The struggle out to Assisi claimed a few more but the leg from Assisi to Gubbio was always going to be the difficult one and lack of time dictated that pilots had to take the direct route, rather than the longer but probably easier one back to the mountain chain. The lead gaggle developed into two and Justin Needham dropped out to land about 10 km short of Gubbio. The remaining mix of French, Brazilian and British pilots (plus Gerard) pressed on and eventually three could be seen approaching goal.

Allan Barnes was first across the line with Gerard Thevenot and Betinho close behind. A few minutes later a larger gaggle appeared, with a couple of stragglers behind and needing a little more height. Steve Cook and Jean Francois Palmarini led this group in with Steve Elkins, Richard Walbec and others following. Eventually the stragglers made it, Ron Richardson, Jean Francois Gerard and, some 15 minutes later Lars Bo Johansen. It was then 6:15 and the day had pretty much died off at this point leaving Gordon Rigg to land at Gubbio with a feeling of dejavue - he landed in the same field as he had towards the end of last year's pre-Worlds when the day closed down on him at Gubbio.

The start gate timing was by data back camera and provisional timings have shown that Betinho played his usual racing game from behind and made the fastest time, followed by Gerard and Steve Cook. With two Brazilians, four French and four British pilots among the 13 in goal the French team Envoi DuBois lead the team comp and Francoise Mocellin leads the ladies rankings from Kathleen Rigg.

The conditions had not developed quite as well as expected and made the task a challenge. However, with a good quality field to show what is possible a lot of good flying was done and some of the lower ranking British pilots took advantage of the possibilities to show up well in the task results.

Day 2 Report

No met again today so WYSIWYG for task setting. Light southerly wind on the main Monte Cucco launch and blue out front. No met means no info on possible cu-nimbs so stay in front of the ridge. The task was set as a 84 km elapsed time race starting with a 20 km run north to Mt Petrano then back 41 km south to the factory at Colle before racing back to goal at the Monte Cucco south landing.

Despite the blue sky and slow climb outs for the gliders early to launch most pilots soon found booming conditions along the course. There were some minor delays as they returned from the first turnpoint and topped up at Monte Cucco for the run south. Early pilots through were Andy Hollidge and Carl Wallbank who had taken advice to get around the course early and hope to follow the fast guys through some of the sections as they caught up.

However once they had joined up they raced each other and were surprised not to get caught until they were half way to the second turnpoint. Here Gordon and Kathleen Rigg overtook them after getting much better air across the Fabriano gap and arriving above them. Gordon eventually arrived in goal 17minutes before the next pilot - Carl.

From then on the goal marshals had their work cut out to keep track of the packs of gliders racing across the line. Goal was a happy place with well over 70 pilots getting in and results are going to be all about time points. Most of the top pilots had recognized this early on and climb and race was the order of the day.

Risks were taken and the most high profile casualty was Allan Barnes who took a dodgy final glide and decked it just short of goal. Happiest pilots were the lower ranking ones making goal with new league pilot Jim Page hugging his borrowed Laminar and Claudia Mejio last in but almost speechless with excitement at making it for the first time.

Results after 2 tasks

1 66 Richard WALBEC 1,846 Fusion
2 9 Steve COOK 1,775 Topless WC
3 100 Betinho SCHMITZ 1,749 Topless
4 62 Jean-F PALMARINI 1,733
5 89 Gerard THEVENOT 1,708 Topless
6 64 Jean-F GERARD 1,655 Laminar ST
7 7 Ron RICHARDSON 1,655 Cheetah
8 78 Andre WOLF 1,638 Laminar ST
9 2 Gordon RIGG 1,588 Laminar ST2
10 72 Lars Bo JOHANSEN 1,535 Laminar ST
11 56 Koji DAIMON 1,526 Topless
12 55 Jim LEE 1,525 Wills Wing Fusion
26 71 Mike BARBER 1,271 Topless

Full results can be found at;

http://www.theleague.force9.co.uk/national/2ndleg.htm

The Worlds - behind the times »

Fri, Jun 25 1999, 4:00:00 am GMT

Manfred Ruhmer|Worlds 1999

I feel like I'm going to a third world country heading into the wilds of central Italy for the 1999 Hang Gliding World Championships at Monte Cucco.. Yes, I realize that that is part (or all) of the charm, but still I have grown so dependent on sophisticated communication technology, that I'm wary of what awaits me.

No only will it be difficult to connect back to the rest of the hang gliding community to report on what's happening, but it appears that the meet isn't up to date on the latest innovations in competition technology. In fact it is quite a bit behind the competitors.

The use of GPS turn point verification has been proven in at least three Australian meets and two US meets over the last 9 months. Competition pilots and meet organizers have raved about this innovation that makes everyone's life so much easier.

Unfortunately, CIVL, the governing body for the Worlds, decided at its last meeting to stick with photo turn point verification. This is really too bad, as those pilots who have been exposed to the new ways will find the old ways so creaky. Manfred Ruhmer in his rumors column mentioned how he would like to see GPS's used at the Worlds (for turn point verification).

Also, there appears to be a rule that may disallow the use of the Automated Pilot Tracking System and the netcast. Now it will be difficult to do the netcast at all, as we are not sure if there is a digipeater anywhere near the site. But to keep pilots from using this simple means of telling their drivers where they are would be most unfortunate.

The Worlds seem to have the least amount of flexibility and innovation of any of the many meets that I've attended. It would appear that the CIVL BOD mechanisms just aren't up to snuff. I truly hope that we can get around these problems and work with the stewards and the meet organizers. My experience in Australia doesn't leave me hopeful, but maybe that was just a case of an extraordinarily bad meet director.

I, of course, have exchanged numerous e-mail messages with CIVL BOD members as well as the organizers. I politely point out these issues and hope for the best. Perhaps if you are a World Team pilot for your country and want to be able to use GPS turn point verification, you can have your team leader bring up this issue. You might take a look at the rules as published on the World's web site (http://www.fivl.it/mondiali/cucco99.html) to see what I'm getting at.

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Manfred's rumors

Thu, Jun 10 1999, 6:00:01 pm EDT

Manfred's rumors

Icaro 2000|Manfred Ruhmer|PG|Quest Air|record|Wallaby Ranch|weather|Worlds 1999

Icaro 2000 has added as new magazine to their web site.  With kudos to the Oz Report, they've decided to take their destiny in their own hands, and get Manfred to give his own opinions about what's what.  You'll find it, as well as a contest to name their first paraglider at their web site http://www/icaro2000.com.

Saskia Cavotta, at Icaro 2000, asked me to put Manfred's first article in the Oz Report:

Introduction

I am about to introduce you to our new initiative, here at Icaro 2000; it consists of a periodically report written by Manfred Ruhmer, about his life and views.  As most of you know, he is presently the best ranked pilot and has been among the best in the world during the ‘90’s. He started flying in 1986 and entered his first international competition in 1989 –World Championships in Fiesch (Switzerland)– where he came in 44th. In 1990, he participated in the European Championships in Kranjska Gora (Slovenia), where he came in 2nd: ever since he has been in the top –during 9 consecutive years.  His perseverance and devotion are admirable.  During the ‘90’s, in the Europeans he has always placed among the first 5 and in the Worlds among the first 10, added to the innumerable competitions, national and international, that he has won.

Manfred is a naturally talented pilot and an incredible individual.

I often talk with him about several flying subjects, he has a lot of knowledge, experiences, opinions and information about hang gliding; therefore, I think it is great that this project intends to share it with you.  I will be collaborating with him and organizing the issues.  I hope you will find this web page appealing and am interested in knowing what you think about it; therefore, looking forward to receiving your suggestions in order to improve it. Since it is an experiment, it is very important to receive lots of feedback.  Besides, this project also gives you the opportunity to write directly to Manfred and ask him about the aspects of hang gliding that most interest you.  Your questions, and their respective answers, will be published because they may be what others would like to know.  It will also help us decide the topics to review.

The aim of this work is to present Manfred’s points of view in a clear way; these are Manfred’s ideas, as mentioned above, and does not mean they are always shared by Icaro 2000.

We will dedicate this first issue to Manfred’s recent trip to the U.S., where he flew 2 competitions and won both of them.

Claudia Lucía Mejía de la Pava

Icaro 2000 – Italy

The Wallaby Ranch Open & the U.S. Nationals 1999.

The Wallaby Ranch Open was held in Florida, from April 18th until April 24th. Many pilots have agreed that it was one of the best meets they have ever attended to, and I am among them.

The facilities were excellent for towing, landing and relaxing, the organization was superb and the weather great!  It was my first time flying in Florida and, even though these flatlands are not like the Australian ones, they are good enough to satisfy demanding pilots.  This competition was very close to being a perfect meet; it has set standards that will be very hard to beat and I am looking forward to the next year’s Open!  Even though I was satisfied and the outcome was totally positive (I even came in first!), there are a couple of comments that I would like to make, which may help improve the meets.

Something I lament from every U.S. meet I have attended to, is the fact that the Americans have been reluctant to adopting the GAP Scoring System.  This is the most suitable scoring system for hang gliding meets, any other system used will not satisfy the needs of the competition nor those of the pilots.  I noticed, for instance, that the lack of the Early Bird Bonus (extra points awarded to the pilots who start the task earlier in compensation for the risks implied by flying in front of the others) and of the Early Arrival Bonus(points awarded to the first pilots in goal), influenced the pilots’ choices.  Such bonuses encourage pilots to start early and try to finish first because you do not need to be the fastest one in order to get them; these extra points may help you climb positions, though.  Without this type of motivation, every pilot waited until the last minute to start; therefore the air was very crowded, increasing the hazard of a mid-air collision.  These are not the only advantages of the GAP system, maybe the most obvious ones, but it is certain that any respectable, mid-size competition must use it.

The organization provided GPS transmitters, which were placed inside the glider’s sail, in order to always know the path flown by the pilots.  This system is commonly used in sail plane competitions.  It was pretty nice to fly with them and, hopefully, they will be used in every decisive competition (i.e. Worlds, Europeans, Air Games…). Scoring may be done much faster since you do not need to wait for picture developing, -only if you want to have a back up camera but these will only be considered in case of problems with the transmitters.  It was even possible to make a live broadcast via internet, of the daily tasks, thanks to these gadgets!  The transmission interval can be set by each pilot, going from intervals of 5 up to 30 seconds, depending on your GPS model.  Intervals of 15-20 seconds are all right as you make the transitions (flying from one thermal to the next one); you must be careful, though, when you want to track your flight around the turnpoint, especially if you are a fast pilot who usually takes the pictures very close to the trunpoints.  It happened to me once that the line traced between the two points, showed by the transmitter, was very close to being out of sector.  I could have lost a lot of points even though I did fly around the turnpoint properly!  The solution to this is either setting the GPS to a 5sec.  interval (which will give you 2.8hrs of recording), or, marking your position as soon as you are in sector.  This is done by pressing "mark" and then "enter" –within 5 seconds–.

The organizers mentioned planning to set a rental service of these devices, it would be interesting to have them during the Worlds!

The WR Open counted with good prize money, which was great and encouraging.  Prize money is a big motivation for pilots and a step forward in getting the sport to be known; hang gliding needs to become a more commercial sport and organizers should be able to sell it as a product in order to get some real sponsorship.  If the WR Open organizers keep up their good work maybe they will be able to make of it a BIG event, with TV coverage, spectators and much more!

Unfortunately, for the U.S. Nationals organizers, this meet was held right after the WR Open (April 25th – May 1st) and, as I said before, the standards set by the WR was very hard to meet.  Anyway the good weather conditions –only 2 days cancelled–, the excellent flying facilities plus the effort of the organizers made it worth flying; the people at Quest Air (another flying ranch in Florida, place where the nationals were held) gave their best to make of the Nationals a good competition, and they succeeded!

I was never really 100% happy with the way the U.S. Nationals I have flown in (’96, ’98, ’99) were run (I was happy to win every time, though). I regret the lack of the GAP Scoring System, mentioned above, and the high costs this competition involves for the participants.  We all know that the United States is huge; therefore, it costs a lot to get to the different places where this competition is held.  The entry fee is extremely high, for a national competition (between 250-350$, while in Europe we pay between 50-150$), plus the films for the main cameras were not always included!  I have never really been thrilled by this competition, my decision to attend relied on marketing convenience and, like this year, how easy it was for me to be there: since I was already there for the WR Open it was quite simple to go to the nationals because Quest Air is very close to the Wallaby Ranch and it was one competition right after the other one.  I must admit it was a good strategy, knowing that a lot of pilots would go to the WR Open the organizers made it easier for them to attend to the nationals too!

I was definitely satisfied with this trip to the U.S., as I said, the only major drawback was the scoring system.  I also mentioned another couple of things which I retain would only help improve the meets.  During these 2½ weeks I spent there, I was able to fly a lot and get to know a new location: the Florida flatlands.  These are not as dry as the Australian ones (which I know well and use as reference); –Florida has lots of swamps, the famous ‘Everglades’–, has somewhat weaker conditions –thermals up to 6-7m/s– and do not offer the opportunity to fly extremely long distances (I doubt being able to break the world dist.  record there). Still these flatlands have good weather conditions, are excellent for x-country flying and for hosting great competitions; moreover, Florida offers the advantage of being flyable during February and March, months that in Europe do not offer conditions to fly good x-country making it even better because meets in Florida will not overlap with the European ones.

First combined FAI 1 + FAI 2 hang gliding competition in Europe

Fri, Jun 4 1999, 4:00:01 am GMT

A.I.R.|Bernd Weber|Bob Baier|Christof Kratzner|Guido Gehrmann|Hans Bausenwein|Jos Guggenmos|Lukas Etz|Martin Henry|Oliver "Olli" Barthelmes|Ralf Miederhoff|Rosi Brams|Worlds 1999

by Hans Bausenwein

The German Hang Gliding League meet from 22nd of May to 30thof May was the first real European competition, where flex wings and rigid wings flew against each other.

The first task was launched from Hochfelln, a mountain in the south-east of Germany, famous for it's XC-potential. The transport up to the top was by a two section cable car, that only had the capacity to transport 5 flex wings or two rigids at a time. This was the main reason, why the competition was moved to another site after just one task. The rigid wing pilots were just complaining too much about the lack of easy transport.

Task no. 1 was a 93 km flat triangle with only 5 pilots out of the 55 competitors at goal.

There were 8 rigid wings and 47 flex wings in the competition. The rigid wings were 3 ATOS, 2 Guggenmos E 7, 2 Exxtacy and 1 Ghostbuster. Among the 47 flex wing glider were only 3 king posted gliders. The task wasn't a very valid one since 17 of the pilots, which were on the course early, had to land after only 15 km, among them half of the rigid wing field. Christof Kratzner on his first thermal flight with the ATOS was winning the task for the rigids, with Bernd Weber, managing director of A.I.R., coming second on his ATOS. Bob Baier on his Laminar ST was the overall winner of the task and with 3:25 hrs. almost one hour faster than Christof.

In spite of the Bob's brilliant result it was obvious, that the flex wings had no chance to keep-up with the "stiffies". Therefore it was decided to run two separate scores for the "flexxies" and the "stiffies". This is why I cannot give you a combined results list.

We moved to Zell am See in Austria. Schmittenhöhe was our launch site for the next three tasks. And what amazing tasks these were going to be! Schmittenhöhe is 2000m asl, 1250m above the wide open valley floor with spectacular views to the main range of the eastern Alps, called "Hohe Tauern". Jo Bathmann has launched his 205 km World Record FAI-triangle from there. Transport for gliders was easy, but expensive in a big cable car with ⅓ of each glider sticking out of the window. Launching is possible to any direction. There is enough space to rig hundreds of gliders at a time.

The 2ndtask was a flat triangle with 70 km. The day was under called because it appeared to be too wet in the beginning because of the thunderstorms on the previous day. It was a race to goal with 34 "flexxies" and all 8 rigids in goal. Christof Kratzner was winning again with 48,6 km/h and Bob Baier in the flex wing class with 44,27 closely followed by Hans Bausenwein..Christof's and Hans' times showed a difference of 15%. Both pilots had very similar performances during the past years. Later tasks showed a similar difference between the ATOS and a well tuned Laminar ST, which can be understood as the performance difference of these two gliders. The E7's and Christian müller on an Exxtacy, that was Felix Rühle's private one (which tells me, that it certainly is very well tuned) showed similar performances, less than the ATOS. Christian müller is a paraglider competition pilot, who hasn't flown hang gliders for 6 years and just started to fly his Exxtacy.

Task no. 3 was the biggest closed circuit task ever set in a hang gliding competition, a 210 km flat triangle, set along the race course of the "Pinzgauer Spaziergang" (Pinzgau walk). Christof Kratzner was smoking (he really smokes in flight) down the course on his ATOS and again winning with an amazing 46,4 km/h average. 7 of the 8 rigid wing gliders made goal and 11 of the 47 "flexxies". Jobst Bäumer was winning the flex wing competition with an as well amazing average speed of 42,95 km/h.

Task no. 4, the last task of this competition, to me seems to be a valid task to look at the performance differences of rigid wings and flex wings again. The task was a 106 km FAI-triangle followed by an add-on part of 24 km, total task distance 130 km. Very consistent conditions over the whole task and flying time. The task was set to beat the existing speed over a 100km FAI triangle world record, set by Martin Henry from Canada on 22-07-98 with an average speed of 34,81 km/h (FAI 1).

Again all 8 rigid wings made goal again and 18 of the flex wings. Christof Kratzner on his ATOS (who else?) was winning again averaging 42,47 km/h, best flex wing pilot was Jobst Bäumer with 37,96 km/h closely followed by Oliver Barthelmes and Hans Bausenwein. Jobst's average over the course of the triangle was 35,62 km/h, so he claimed a new World Record, as well as Rosi Brams (29,22 km/h) in the feminine category. Christof and Hans did not have their barographs turned on.

The next day, after the comp was over, Hans went up again to beat Jobst's World Record of the previous day with all the documentation well prepared and an official ÖAeC observer at site he managed to fly the course all by himself averaging 36,43 km/h, a new World Record.

So let's look at performances again:

Christof Kratzner ATOS: 42,47 km/h
Hans Bausenwein Laminar ST: 37,46 km/h
Christian müller (Felix Rühles Exxtacy): 38,01 km/h (second fastest time of the day)
Kurt Schuhmann E 7: 37,55 km/h

The result shows a performance difference between Hans' and Christof's gliders

(Christof and I are convinced it is the gliders and not the pilots) of appr. 14%. If the Laminar has a glide ratio in between 14 and 15 than the glide ratio of the ATOS can be calculated to be in between 16 and 17. Many of my friends, who fly hang gliding competitions agree, that the performance of a good Laminar ST is in between 14 and 15. Flying next to Christof's ATOS even lets me believe the performance difference is bigger, than what I unscientifically calculated. The performance of the E 7 is similar to a very well tuned Exxtacy and somewhere in between the ATOS and the Laminar ST, but closer to the ATOS. This was also what I could see when I watched Bernd Weber on his ATOS and Kurt Schuhmann on his E 7 doing a long valley crossing together.

So what about the Ghostbuster? Lukas Etz did not seem to do too well with it. He only flew it in the first two of the 4 tasks. The glider suffered by some transport damage and Lukas did not dare to continue to fly it anymore. He changed to an Exxtacy. I also would not want to evaluate the performance of this Ghostbuster. It was the first one made, the one which was presented at the FREE FLIGHT exhibition mid of April in Garmisch and it looked pretty prototypish too me.

German Hang Gliding League 99 FAI 2 total scores

position pilot's name glider task 1 task 2 task 3 task 4 points
1 Kratzner Christof Atos 575 617 940 774 2906
2 Weber Bernd Atos 548 454 557 473 2032
3 Guggenmos Josef Guggenmos E 7 303 423 754 458 1938
4 Hoffmann-Guben Marcus Atos 107 433 681 605 1826
5 Schumann Kurt Guggenmos E 7 107 406 651 541 1705
6 Etz Lukas Ghostbuster 100 422 615 505 1642
7 müller Christian Exxtacy DNS 363 646 572 1581
8 müglich Dieter Exxtasy 107 114 229 463 913

The first four pilots of this list will be the German Hang Gliding National Team FAI 2 for the 1999 World Championships at Monte Cucco Italy.

German League 99 FAI 1 total scores

position name 1.task 2.task. 3.task 4.task 5.task 6.task points
1 Baier Bob 636 294 443 710 830 812 3725
2 Baeumer Jobst 828 197 374 128 941 932 3400
3 Barthelmes Oliver 591 195 118 553 826 910 3193
4 Bausenwein Hans 560 155 118 640 817 888 3178
5 Bolz Holger 616 195 DNS 631 895 674 3011
6 Woll Gerald 479 168 118 606 835 681 2887
7 Kausche Peter 502 160 251 527 794 437 2671
8 Miederhoff Ralf 497 146 353 425 584 593 2598
9 Rauch Thomas 417 154 202 498 566 756 2593
10 Hertling Steffen 458 109 199 451 702 666 2585

As by 30-05-99, the German National Team FAI 1 for the Hang Gliding World Championships 1999 at Monte Cucco in Italy will be:

1. Guido Gehrmann, La Mouette Topless

(the current World Champion, who could not fly the League this year, because he is trainee Lufthansa pilot)

2. Bob Baier, Icaro Laminar ST
3. Jobst Bäumer, Aeros Stealth
4. Hans Bausenwein, Icaro Laminar ST
5. Gerald Woll, Icaro Laminar ST
6. Oliver Barthelmes, Moyes CSX 5

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Worlds? »

Mon, May 3 1999, 3:00:02 pm GMT

Worlds 1999

I found the following at the World's web site:

We regret to inform you that as the World Championship tasks assignment has been delayed, we are not in a position to supply anyone with further information regarding registrations, invitations and references.

Therefore, we suggest all the teams, which intend to take part in the Championship, to contact Mr. Vittorio Zardo (Aeroclub d'Italia General Manager) fax no. ++39.06.519.57.034 phone no. ++39.06.519.59.760 in order to receive specific information.

We will inform you on our web-site, as soon as the AEROCLUB will decide about who will be concerned in the practical organization of the Championship, and who will be the people in charge for it.

We apologize for the inconvenience, which is due to the "well-known" bureaucracy of the Aeroclub d'Italia, the unique Italian Deputy by the FAI.

http://www.fivl.it/mondiali/cucco99.html

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Northern California aerotowing clinics

Mon, May 3 1999, 4:00:02 am GMT

Dragonfly|Moyes America|USHGA|Vicki Cain

Vicki at Moyes in Australia sent me the following notice:

Moyes America will be hosting a two weekend tow clinic June 4-14 to introduce aerotowing to the pilots of Northern California and to demonstrate the feasibility of the establishment of a Dragonfly Tow Club in the area. We have been invited to utilize the beautiful facilities of Jim and Connie Indredo, Crazy Creek Soaring, 3 miles North of Middletown California. 'Hungary' Joe Sazarli will be providing the Dragonfly and Aerotow seminar material.

All current USHGA member, hang 3 pilots are welcome to attend. The registration fee for the two day clinic is $250. Attending pilots receive two complete days of Aerotow instruction, 5 slow climb tows (to maximize tow time) to 2500', use of glider, all tow equipment, site use for two days one night, two soda-pop tickets and tons of fun.

Tow clinics are limited to six pilots. Each day start promptly at 7 AM with a mandatory Ground School. Clinics are scheduled for the following dates. June 4-5, June 6-7, June 8-9, June 10-11, and June 12-13. Dates subject to change with notification.

All pilots are welcome to drop in for a look and aerotow rated pilots are encouraged to tow up for a flight behind Hungary Joe's Dragonfly from the beautiful Crazy Creek Gliderport. First tow is 25$ (covers site use fee and tow to 1500') all subsequent tows are $15 to 1500', $20 to 2500'. Onsite camping is available for $10 per night, per car.

Send the $250 clinic registration fee to Moyes America 1795 40th Ave SF CA 94122. Include your name, address, phone #, email address, USHGA #, hang rating and desired clinic dates with second choice. A package of study info and local area info will be sent upon receipt of registration fee. Cancellations after May 31, 1999 will incur a $50cancelation fee.

A Dragonfly Tow Club Party will be hosted by Moyes America June 12. Pilots, friends and family are invited for an afternoon of flying, eating and late night BS sessions.

<flyamoyes@aol.com>

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The Oz Report at the Worlds

Mon, May 3 1999, 4:00:01 am GMT

Worlds 1999

It looks like the Oz Report will be going to the 1999 Worlds in Monte Cucco, Italy. They'll take place the end of July and the first week of August. We'll know for sure within a few weeks.

The US is sending a ten person team (6 Class I pilots, and 4 Class II pilots). We are still checking to be sure that there will be enough countries (4) at the Worlds to hold a valid World meet in Class II. Germany and the US are definitely committed to going. We are hoping for Switzerland and Austria at least. Please encourage your country to send at least one rigid wing pilot to the Worlds.

The Worlds last for three weeks, with one week for practice and two weeks of competition. This means I won't be able to cover the Canadian Nationals personally, but I hope to have a correspondent there.

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Short Takes »

Sun, Mar 28 1999, 5:00:01 am GMT

Alejandro Gonzalez|Avron Tal|Brian Porter|G.W. Meadows|Stewart Midwinter|Worlds 1999

Avron Tal sends in the web addresses for the 1999 Hang Gliding World Championships:http://www.fivl.it/mondiali/cucco99.html and the European championship ishttp://www.hanggliding.at/home.htm, July 10th - 18th 1999, just before the worlds at Mt. Cucco.

Alejandro. Gonzalez writes:

Davis, I know you are not exactly an Aeros fan, but perhaps it would be worth mentioning that the last day Oleg was 7 points from Manfred and had a camera problem.(This at the Brazilian Open).

Thanks Alejandro. I thought that I’ve been giving Aeros and G.W. lots of play here in the Oz Report, so I wonder if your statement is really fair. The record, as they say, speaks for itself, and, it is all available, on my web site (https://OzReport.com)

Bright Star has announced their new Utopia, a bigger and better Millenium (for more bucks). You’ll find out more about it at Stewart Midwinter’s Rigid Wing site at: http://www.globalserve.net/~midtoad/RigidWings/Millennium.html#Utopia.

We’ve heard that despite what it says here, that the span is 4 feet longer than the Millenium. The cage is quite a bit closer to the wing, than the Millenium (does that make it even harder to see around you?), and that there will be a fairing for the cage. We expect Brian Porter to show up here at Wallaby with one for the Wallaby Open. Will the ATOSes be able to match its performance?

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Class II at the Worlds

Mon, Mar 8 1999, 11:00:06 pm GMT

Hans Bausenwein|Worlds 1999

I wrote previously that it wasn't going to happen, but maybe they will prove me wrong. If there is enough of a movement in Europe by the rigid wing manufacturers, it could happen. I asked Hans Bausenwein about this and this is what he had to say:

It did not seem to me, that there will be great effort by the organizers to get many class II participants. But I expect that pilots and manufacturers will push to be there. Apart from a full team of 4 pilots from the US, where the move into rigid wing flying seems to be strongest, I expect strong interest by some good German, Swiss, Italian and French pilots. The class II glider manufacturers will certainly make additional effort to have the best possible pilots fly their wings at the worlds.

Will there be American rigid wing pilots willing to go to Europe with their wings not knowing if there will be enough participants to make a valid rigid wing world championships? We'll see. They could at least hope for a greater effort on the part of the meet organizers to keep them informed about the possibility of other countries coming to Italy with Exxtacies, Swifts, etc. I'm doing my best to keep everyone up to date.

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Is competition hang gliding out of control?

Sun, Mar 7 1999, 11:00:00 pm GMT

Bob Baier|competition|Corinna Schwiegershausen|G.W. "GeeDub" Meadows|Gerolf Heinrichs|Guido Gehrmann|Hans Bausenwein|Jos Guggenmos

Han Bausenwein, my European correspondent, has sent in a report on the CIVL meeting held over the weekend in Copenhagen. I also hope to be able to publish something soon from G.W. about his experiences at the meeting.

I have just come back from the 1999 CIVL meeting in Kopenhagen last night. The meeting was from 5.3.-7.3. I was there as the chairman of the Austrian/German working group on new technical standards for competition hang gliders. This working group was founded during the October 1998 League meeting and celebration party for our two World Champions Guido Gehrmann and Corinna Schwiegershausen.

Gerolf Heinrichs was at this League meeting as well and gave a speech, which had more or less the same contents as his article, that was published in Fly and Glide 12/98. This speech was the start of the Austrian/German working group on new standards for competition hang gliders.

At the CIVL meeting the proposal of the Austrian/German working group was welcomed unanimously and a CIVL working group was founded to refine and complete the proposal. The new standards will also be backed by manufacturers and with a bit of luck, if there is agreement from all sides, be even valid for the 1999 World Championships.

Another thing, that will be of interest for the competition orientated part of the hang gliding community and the readers of Oz Report is:

The local regulations for the 1999 Monte Cucco World Championships state, there will be a maximum of 10 participants from each country, out of which 6 can be class 1 and 4 class 2. The competition for class 2 will be held if there are at least 8 participants from at least 4 different countries.

To me it is obvious: If this news is spread wide enough and soon enough, we will have to celebrate a class 2 World Champion as well. As it stands at the moment I will be on the German team for class 1. It is possible, that Jos Guggenmos will compete on his new rigid wing. I have not yet deceided, if I will be flying my new Laminar in class 1 or on the ATOS in class 2. I still have not flown the ATOS yet, but hope, that I will receive one from Felix Rühle soon.

I am also planning to come over to the US (Bob Baier is coming as well) to compete in the US Nationals. Bob Baier only was flying a Bullet in the 1997/98 competitions in Australia including the Worlds. After that he started flying a Laminar and still flies for Icaro this year. In the 1998/99 Forbes Flatlands he flew on a CSX 5, that he borrowed from Moyes.

There is one change in Sporting Code Section 7, that has been made on the weekend, that might be also applied to paricipants of class two hang gliding in the 99 worlds.

It is: " if a pilot wants to enter a CIVL category 1 event, i.e. a World Championships or Continental Championships, this pilot does have to be placed within the top ⅔ of a CIVL category 2 event, i.e. National Championships or other, that have been open to international participation and that have been sanctioned by CIVL as category 2 events within the last 3 years".

If this rule is applied to class 2 hang gliders as well and used for the paticipation of pilots with a class 1 hang glider, not very many pilots are able to enter class 2 in the Worlds. You and I would be able.

Regards

Hans

Hans Bausenwein Thann 22 D-83098 Brannenburg
home: fone **49-(0)8034-309386 fax **49(0)8034-309387
email <hans@aerosport.de>
business: fone **49-(0)8034-1034 fax **49(0)8034-3384
email <info@aerosport.de>web http://www.aerosport.de

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Not really Class II in the Worlds this year in Italy »

Tue, Feb 16 1999, 4:00:03 pm GMT

Belinda Boulter|G.W. "GeeDub" Meadows|Worlds 1999

Basically it ain't going to happen. That's not what they are saying, but they are saying the same things that the meet organizers at the Worlds in Australia said (the standard CIVL line), and they didn't happen there.

Class II will perhaps be allowed and made official if 8 pilots from 4 countries show up (pretty much on their own). Could happen, but it isn't likely at the moment.

The problem is that meet organizers in Europe (or those connected with CIVL) are not encouraging the inclusion of Class II hang gliders in competitions. The only competitions that counted toward PIRS points in Class II were held in the US last year.

This sinks. CIVL is basically out to lunch on Class II, and the European meet organizers are in a fog. We can only hope that with the increase in the number of Class II manufacturers that we will see some action on this front.

G.W. Meadows has been a pioneer in this effort to let a number of different classes fly in the hang gliding meets, and why not. We need more people at the meets, not less. We want to be inclusive and let everyone enjoy the thrill of competition. G.W. has a single surface class this year, and Belinda's thinking about joining the Aeros Target team.

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