All of the pilots pose for their official portrait.
The scheduled air service taxis by our "dummy" grid. 
Everyone got onto the course within maybe 200 feet of vertical separation. The run down the Hawea Ridge to Timaru Creek and Dingle Mountain was fast and aggressive, with many gliders getting right into the rocks. There was a a lot of high speed bobbing and weaving with everyone trying to eeek out the best possible lift from the craggy mountains, wind and sun angles we were given.
TM was able to pull a nifty little move with DW and MS to go into the dingle Burn on the downwind side of Dingle Peak. Pucker-factor high, but it worked and got me caught back up. A quick transition to the range separating the Dingle Burn from the Hunter River Valley led us all into the first turn and then onto the Dingle Ridge (downwind).
It was here that the field spread out a little bit with many gliders trying different cruising altitudes (some on the rocks, some up at cloud base) and ground tracks. TM went cloud hunting and had a pretty good run down to the end of the Hawea Ridge.
At this point, I was pretty much alone and had gotten down to about 4,000 feet MSL (less than 1,000 feet above the terrain). Or so I thought! Suddenly the camera helicopter appeared to be descending to my altitude and coming toward me. As I ground my way out of this minor hole, the helicopter positioned itself about 1 km away from me and stuck with me. Look ma, I’m on T.V.!
It did not immediately click that I might be with the leaders. Instead I thought, “Oh no, here goes TM giving the broadcast crew another hard luck “save.” Had I pushed a little harder at this point, I might have been able to make a little more headway. Oh well!
The “black rocks” at the end of the Dunstans around Cromwell worked like a charm with a 4 knot thermal building to 8+ knots both on the way into the turn and back out of the turn. At this point in the task more than a few of us should probably have taken and extra hundred feet in that 8+ knot thermal.
If you were just a hundred feet higher or 20 knots faster at the last turn at Tarras, you had a pretty easy go of the final glide. But, if you we on the backside of that energy curve, then you had another Pucker-factor high final glide. As I was slowly sinking under my polar on final glide, a caught site of Petr Krejirik (CZE) rapidly descending and then landing out right ahead of me. Yikes – better slow down and hope to get home.
It was about this time when I was really wishing for a better glider, as old tired TM was just not performing with the new ships. As Christophe Ruch (FRA) came past me about 20 knots hotter I was seriously considering the field at the bottom of the end of the runway if I got any lower on energy. Just then a little energy line formed ahead of me and I was able to make the field – not handily, but safely. It was quite a sight to see about ten other gliders waiting at the far end of the runway and me entering the flare with Giorgio Galetto (ITA) blowing past me at 50 feet about a wingspan to my right. Manage the energy, roll to a stop, and this GP is over!
The final exhibition race went as follows: 1st Sebastian Kawa (POL), 2nd Mark Holliday (RSA), and 3rd Michael Sommer (GER). Unfortunately, the first pilot back to the field, Ben Flewett (NZL), was not the winner today. The GP format really lets fans see who wins at the end of the task, but even that winner has to make all the turnpoints! Ouch…
With most people on tight timelines to get back home. Peter Harvey (GBR) and Oscar Goudriaan immediately took tows back to Omarama. Most of the others will grid up again tomorrow at about 10 a.m. for the aerotow back to Omarama. TM will be returning to its snug hangar, while all the other Europeans who brought their own ships face the daunting prospect of loading the shipping frames back up with gliders and getting the frames into the containers before they leave for home. Once again there is some trepidation on the part of the glider pilots as the holes for the GPS aerials are going to be fixed tomorrow AND the gliders need to be loaded tomorrow before most pilots leave for Europe.
With the GP family breaking up, I will have some more thoughts on the GP when I get back stateside. But I will leave you all with the final and most fitting glider activity of this event.
At the end of the task the four remaining German pilots did not dump their water and landed short on the runway. After a short time back on the ground, all four took off, organized themselves into a trailing line abreast over the field, then made a high speed pass down the length of the field in front of the crowd, dumping water, and then peeling one glider way in the missing man formation in honor of Herbert Weiss, “29”
Herbert, you are missed.
That’s it from here in New Zealand. Team TM will be going back to Omarama tomorrow and then off for some sightseeing in the day and a half we have left in country. We’ll catch you all back in the states in the new year.
Happy New Year to all and See Ya! Tim/TM
Friday December 28, 2007
Gidday Race Fans!
After yesterday’s wash-out, today dawned crisp and clear for the second, and last day of the New Zealand Air Games. In view of some of the scheduling conflicts with even yesterday’s shortened program, all the leaders of the individual airsports got together and hashed out a new timeline for today that worked pretty well.
The GP Task was a 178 km drag race from Wanaka to Cotters (midway up the Dingle Burn), south to Tomsons (back south of our old favorite from last week, Goodger), down to the most southern turnpoint of Cromwell (at the bottom end of the Dunstan range), then back home with a steering turn at Tarras. The weather was pumping pretty good by the time we launched at 2:30 p.m.
The launch at this new site went very well with everyone getting up on the Pisa range (or Pizza Range in Brian Spreckley-speak). There is a fair amount of airspace around Wanaka due to its proximity to Queenstown, so we were capped out at 7,500 feet MSL before the start. The max start height was 6,000 feet MSL. Lucky for us the working band was not much above 7,000 feet anyway. This start line was an even smaller 3 km and it provided quite the spectacle as we roared out onto course right above the fair sized crowd and live on the internet.
Gidday Race Fans!
After yesterday’s wash-out, today dawned crisp and clear for the second, and last day of the New Zealand Air Games. In view of some of the scheduling conflicts with even yesterday’s shortened program, all the leaders of the individual airsports got together and hashed out a new timeline for today that worked pretty well.
The GP Task was a 178 km drag race from Wanaka to Cotters (midway up the Dingle Burn), south to Tomsons (back south of our old favorite from last week, Goodger), down to the most southern turnpoint of Cromwell (at the bottom end of the Dunstan range), then back home with a steering turn at Tarras. The weather was pumping pretty good by the time we launched at 2:30 p.m.
The launch at this new site went very well with everyone getting up on the Pisa range (or Pizza Range in Brian Spreckley-speak). There is a fair amount of airspace around Wanaka due to its proximity to Queenstown, so we were capped out at 7,500 feet MSL before the start. The max start height was 6,000 feet MSL. Lucky for us the working band was not much above 7,000 feet anyway. This start line was an even smaller 3 km and it provided quite the spectacle as we roared out onto course right above the fair sized crowd and live on the internet.
The scheduled air service taxis by our "dummy" grid.
The crowd watches the action on the bog screen. They paid NZ$18 each for entry.
Everyone got onto the course within maybe 200 feet of vertical separation. The run down the Hawea Ridge to Timaru Creek and Dingle Mountain was fast and aggressive, with many gliders getting right into the rocks. There was a a lot of high speed bobbing and weaving with everyone trying to eeek out the best possible lift from the craggy mountains, wind and sun angles we were given.
TM was able to pull a nifty little move with DW and MS to go into the dingle Burn on the downwind side of Dingle Peak. Pucker-factor high, but it worked and got me caught back up. A quick transition to the range separating the Dingle Burn from the Hunter River Valley led us all into the first turn and then onto the Dingle Ridge (downwind).
It was here that the field spread out a little bit with many gliders trying different cruising altitudes (some on the rocks, some up at cloud base) and ground tracks. TM went cloud hunting and had a pretty good run down to the end of the Hawea Ridge.
At this point, I was pretty much alone and had gotten down to about 4,000 feet MSL (less than 1,000 feet above the terrain). Or so I thought! Suddenly the camera helicopter appeared to be descending to my altitude and coming toward me. As I ground my way out of this minor hole, the helicopter positioned itself about 1 km away from me and stuck with me. Look ma, I’m on T.V.!
It did not immediately click that I might be with the leaders. Instead I thought, “Oh no, here goes TM giving the broadcast crew another hard luck “save.” Had I pushed a little harder at this point, I might have been able to make a little more headway. Oh well!
The “black rocks” at the end of the Dunstans around Cromwell worked like a charm with a 4 knot thermal building to 8+ knots both on the way into the turn and back out of the turn. At this point in the task more than a few of us should probably have taken and extra hundred feet in that 8+ knot thermal.
If you were just a hundred feet higher or 20 knots faster at the last turn at Tarras, you had a pretty easy go of the final glide. But, if you we on the backside of that energy curve, then you had another Pucker-factor high final glide. As I was slowly sinking under my polar on final glide, a caught site of Petr Krejirik (CZE) rapidly descending and then landing out right ahead of me. Yikes – better slow down and hope to get home.
It was about this time when I was really wishing for a better glider, as old tired TM was just not performing with the new ships. As Christophe Ruch (FRA) came past me about 20 knots hotter I was seriously considering the field at the bottom of the end of the runway if I got any lower on energy. Just then a little energy line formed ahead of me and I was able to make the field – not handily, but safely. It was quite a sight to see about ten other gliders waiting at the far end of the runway and me entering the flare with Giorgio Galetto (ITA) blowing past me at 50 feet about a wingspan to my right. Manage the energy, roll to a stop, and this GP is over!
The satellites that brought you the webcast. www.r2.co.nz
The final exhibition race went as follows: 1st Sebastian Kawa (POL), 2nd Mark Holliday (RSA), and 3rd Michael Sommer (GER). Unfortunately, the first pilot back to the field, Ben Flewett (NZL), was not the winner today. The GP format really lets fans see who wins at the end of the task, but even that winner has to make all the turnpoints! Ouch…
With most people on tight timelines to get back home. Peter Harvey (GBR) and Oscar Goudriaan immediately took tows back to Omarama. Most of the others will grid up again tomorrow at about 10 a.m. for the aerotow back to Omarama. TM will be returning to its snug hangar, while all the other Europeans who brought their own ships face the daunting prospect of loading the shipping frames back up with gliders and getting the frames into the containers before they leave for home. Once again there is some trepidation on the part of the glider pilots as the holes for the GPS aerials are going to be fixed tomorrow AND the gliders need to be loaded tomorrow before most pilots leave for Europe.
With the GP family breaking up, I will have some more thoughts on the GP when I get back stateside. But I will leave you all with the final and most fitting glider activity of this event.
At the end of the task the four remaining German pilots did not dump their water and landed short on the runway. After a short time back on the ground, all four took off, organized themselves into a trailing line abreast over the field, then made a high speed pass down the length of the field in front of the crowd, dumping water, and then peeling one glider way in the missing man formation in honor of Herbert Weiss, “29”
Herbert, you are missed.
That’s it from here in New Zealand. Team TM will be going back to Omarama tomorrow and then off for some sightseeing in the day and a half we have left in country. We’ll catch you all back in the states in the new year.
Happy New Year to all and See Ya! Tim/TM
4 comments:
Tim;
I enjoyed your Grand Prix blog reports. It was exciting to see your glider marker on the live telecast. I subscribed to both the GP and the Air Games. At times the feed was less than expected but the idea and techniques show promise in presenting air sports to a wide audiences in the future.
Wayne Wolf, Soaring Club of Houston
I've very much enjoyed your blog too - really, you've provided the best coverage of the whole event!
I only watched one race live as in the UK we're half a day behind, so the races were in the small hours. What I did see was great - full live coverage, just as promised.
GP racing really is the future of the sport.
Hey Tim!
I am French and live in Irving, looks like you might have met my uncle Didier Hauss during the competition... the world is small!!
Looks like youo had a great time in New Zealand!
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