Day 8
Day 8 was a tough one, but turned out to be a pivotal day for the Open Class.
Another blue day on the Central Plateau meant that the three remaining contestants had a tough job getting away on their task to the Waikato and back. Two could not get away, but Steve Forman in the Open Class made it to the Kaimais and far enough back to score enough points to move him from 4th to 2nd place overall! Congratulations to David Jensen and Tony Van Dyk on 1st and 3rd respectively.
Geoff Thompson was not able to add to his score, but remained Overall winner of the Racing Class - a really creditable performance in his first ever gliding contest. Well done to Gerard Robertson and Trace Austin on 2nd and 3rd.
All in all a good week at Centennial Park. Thanks to all those that helped make it the event that it was.
Day 7
Forecast to be a blue day, but a task was set which took advantage of the best-looking area of thermals up the middle of the island to near Thames and back. A few clouds started to appear around the middle of the day so a launch was made and everyone made a start. The Open Class coped better with the conditions and had a great day with good distances covered and some really close racing, despite eveyone being a bit over time. The first four gliders home were all within 12 points, the first three...
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Day 6
Best day yet! It's a rare day when you can glide right around Lake Taupo, but today all gliders in the Open Class got set a task which challenged them to do just that, and all of them achieved it. Well done you guys. Well done to the Racing Class as well - the day winner is in his first contest, so another great achievment there. Bring on the weekend!
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Day 5
Thank you all for crosing your fingers - we got a task in! Not a boomer of a day, but good enough to lauch, and just two landouts, so we can call that a successful day. Here's to at least a couple more!
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Day 4
Very disappointing. The forecast was quite good and Skysight was optomistic, so a task was set accordingly. Our CPC Met man did express a warning that because of the very wet ground and the strongish wind and the lowish temperature that things might not be quite as good as forecast, and it turned out he was right. We sent up a sniffer (the Met man!) at 1200 and he reported difficult conditions, very broken thermals, and not great cloudbases, so unfortunately we could not launch a task into those...
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Day 3
Definitely a no fly day. Low cloud and steady rain. Good news is it is looking good for tomorrow.
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Day 2
The 1000 briefing described an OK start to the day, but not a great forecast. Before setting a task, however, it was prizegiving time from yesterday; a day which did fulfill its promise and although not easy, gave some great flying. Results were; Open Class - 1st.Tim Bromhead, 2nd.Tony vanDyk, 3rd.Dave Jensen Racing Class - 1st.Trace Austin, 2nd.Craig Hunter, 3rd.Peter Cook. The Met briefing contained good news and bad news. It was good to the Northwest, but the cloudbase...
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Day 1
What a great start to what will hopefully be a great week! The day dawned a bit cloudy, but developed into a very good gliding day. Most gliders made it round the task which had some quite generous AAT circles, so it will be interesting to see who cut it short and who went the distance when the results are published tomorrow. Fingers crossed for many good days to come.
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Practice Day
We're on the way! Practice Day dawned overcast but flyable, and after a hive of activity rigging and checking gliders several pilots had good "shakedown" flights. Tomorrow is looking much better, so after a dinner at the Club tonight (all done by Neil Harker), it will be rest time until briefing at 0930 tomorrow with lots of good news. Hopefully!
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