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Saturday 13th August 2011 – seventh competition day, more happy pills

Briefing was postponed until 11:30. We went to do some groceries with Hannah, as we remembered that tomorrow is Sunday, and shops won’t be open. What can I say about the weather, except that the clouds are really low and there isn’t even a hint of blue sky in sight. Perhaps Bernd, Christof and Axel had their daily dose of happy pills in the morning – or they know more than others.

The story of stolen FAI flag continues… 

Axel got a message from the group who stole the FAI flag and the answer was:

*****

We return the flag under conditions that better weather is coming and better tasking set for all pilots!!! We suggest you look please under the trailer for the Duo Discus “AF”

From the revolution alliance against flags!

XXX

*****

So the flag was found.

Weather was getting better while launches were postponed, also task times changed – finally Club class got 2 h task time and Standard class only 1:30 h. At 14:00 weather was good enough and it was possible to start launching. Tasks were going (surprisingly) to south and east. Christof tried to explain that even tasks are going in the same direction every day, tasks aren’t the same as the weather is always different. I guess he didn’t remember that the weather doesn’t change the landscape.

The airfield was very active as there were model planes, couple of skydivers and Extra doing aerobatics. Launches and landings and all this extra program was followed  by big group of spectatorswith great interest.

If this blog would be traditional story of a gliding competition, now it would be the time to tell how fast and long distances winners flew. But those details you can see from the results, so there is no point repeating them again. Not today, as there are more interesting (and funnier) things to tell. And that is outlanding stories.

In the afternoon one local had called to police as somebody had landed on the field close to Dornstetten. He didn’t call them because the pilot would have ruined his crops or stolen the chickens, but just because he was scared that it was an emergency. Well, we all know the tabloid headlines “Wind stopped – sailplane fell out of the sky”. So no wonder he was scared.

Other outlanding story is about getting in contact with the nature. Martin (from Germany) told that unfortunately he didn’t realize early enough where he was going to land. He saw farmer with the tractor on the edge of the field doing something, but he didn’t realize that it would be anything abnormal. (and it wasn’t…) On final glide he started smelling that everything isn’t quite right. The farmer just had finished spreading fresh, moist, nutrient rich, brown – there isn’t nicer way to say this – animal poo. And you don’t need any wild imagination to figure out what that thing does to your shoes and those places where you walk (trailer, car…). So I know one glider and trailer which might have certain “natural scent” around them.

Ok, back to the airfield, I think it would have been my turn to eat those “happy pills” which Axel and Christof had in the morning. I would have never believed that the weather would be as good as it wasin the evening . Actually Axel admitted that he didn’t either.  The day ended well anyway, it was third competition day. We need one more day to have a valid competition.

In the evening we had pizza in Freudenstadt with team Canada (thank you Selena!), also UK, USA, Germany and Finland was represented.

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