So I just ordered a new hangglider, the new Moyes Malibu. I bought it to see if I like to have two gliders, the Malibu is just for pure fun flying when I do not need the performance of the Litespeed RS. If I do not fly it much I can always sell it without much loss. The market here needs more gliders like the Malibu, Fun, and Falcon, so that beginners can get a modern and easy glider after learning to fly.
I think these are the same colours as I ordered, looks cool with the “inlaid” design.
Videoen som er omtalt i nettavisen;
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Seems like they finally got a good day in Greifenburg, with a task around 156 km. Check out the Norwegian National Hanggliding team blog for updates from Olav (In Norwegian)
After 6 canceled days in the rain, the first task stopped because of dangerous conditions, the second task with a fatal accident, and a forecast for even more rain it was time to take stock and make some hard decisions. All in all it seemed quite pointless to waste more days in Greifenbug, and we decided to head home early. Bjørn, Speidern and I drove home, while Olav stayed because he is going on to the Pre-Worlds in Laragne
I concider this the worst flying trip in my 12 years of flying, I did not enjoy the little flying we had. I’m sorry for the organizers that had such bad luck with the weather. they deserved better than this. I hope the pilots that are left get some good days at the end so we can have a real European champion.
No task today due to bad weather and the fatal accident yesterday. The forecast for tomorrow is rain and no flying, and a small possibility of flying on Wednesday with thunderstorms and north wind. Thursday and Friday looks bleak too.
My condolences to the family and friends of the Swiss pilot that died.
Back down to 1:100 odds again…
So finally we woke up to sun and blue skies, and an early task before the warmfront shut us down. We got a 101km task to the east, to try to stay out of the shade. It was also the first day with the new rule about a max height at the start gate.
I got off quite late, but went straight to cloudbase and went towards the start circle to wait around 30 minutes there. I was in a good position for the first startgate, and flew with some of the leading pilots. But it started to rain, and I had to run from the shower with a very wet and misbehaving glider. I went into the start circle where there was some sun, and started scratching on the ridge at 1500 meters. The start gate was at 2200 meters, through a mountain peak that was 2400 meters, so we had to fly out into the valley.
I spend a long time looking for a better lift on the ridge, and missed the first start gate again. Got a better thermal flying back towards takeoff, and got up to take the second start with a nice gaggle. Unfortunately for us the warmfront and cirrus had come over us by now, giving us slower and tougher conditions ahead. Racing down the ridge we hit some shitty air that I did not want to stay in, and just kept on going to the edge of the ridge where we had to get up before crossing the next walley.
I had a pretty good run from there, and stayed in a good gaggle until between the second and third turnpoint where I went on a little to aggressively under good clouds, and had a too low valley crossing. I ended up having to glide out to a landing around halfway through the task, where the gaggle stayed back watching my stupid mistake, and slowly climbing a few hundred more meters before crossing.
It really feels like I’m out of competition shape, my mind is not where it should be, I’m flying too much on instinct, and not planning enough ahead. I know this from before, and I just need a few good days to get into shape, but the few short days here did not do the trick so far.
Kjell did a pretty good run, landed 10 km from goal, Bjørn J raced too hard and landed before the first TP, Olav Lien did not get up after the start circle, and landed at the main landing.
One pilot tumbled just after the start circle, I’ve not heard anything official about it expect that there will be no task. The weather forecast is for rain and crap conditions.
Our hotel is at 1800 meters, and we woke up inside cloudbase this morning. It was not raining, but lots of high clouds stopped any sun from drying out the valley. We went down to takeoff at 10:30 expecting to see few other pilots, but the organization believed it would be taskable, and everyone was set up. We had a chat with some of the pilots, and went back and got our gliders and harnesses in the very unlikely event it would clear up, but we left the gliders on the car.
Waiting at takeoff reminded me of Bassano this year, but at least we could buy hot Goulash soup and hot chocolate at the cafe. At 14:30 I gave up and went back to the hotel for a hot shower, while the rest of the guys waited until it started raining 30 minutes later and the organizer finally canceled the day.
Forecast for tomorrow is OK for the morning, but a warmfront will move in early and shut us down around noon, and for the next days.
I’ve updated the video with some more footage I found on my PC of Sindre’s flights. Check it out!
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Not that many that I know of yet, send me links if you have them.
Lots of rain cancelled day 4 and 5. We drove to Skyline in Germany, where Bjørn and I had a few upgrades and maintenance done on our harnesses. The Skyline crew is very helpful and worked overtime on finishing off the work so we had everything done in one day. I had my rescue repacked, replaced the hangloop and reserve loop, and added a better locking screw to the extension plate to make the harness easier to pack.
There’s lots of new features coming for the Skyline harness. I really liked the new automatic slider lock, that locks the slider in the back position when flying. This releases all pressure from the feet, so the pilot can relax the feet even in very upright thermaling position.
Here’s a short clip from Day 3 that was cancelled due to storms. We flew the gliders down from the takeoff before the storms came through. Audio commentary by me in Norwegian only. I’ll do it in English the next time. (I talk about the day beeing cancelled, clouds building, nice nature, and the landing site)
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