Postscript

Pilot and Glider in better times

The Empire Team achieved great results:-

15M: Leigh won, Dane second
Standards: Coutts first, Ben, Jay
18's: Afandi fourth technically, second morally

Personally I can't say I enjoyed the last few days, particularly not the landout that broke my beloved T6, but there were some great moments prior to that. Another time there's a number of things I'll do differently...

Huge thanks to Contest Director Franca who worked incredibly hard and was great to have running the competition...



The hard working contest director, Franca

The glamorous Met lady...

Why can't UK comps have met people like this?

and the ground team including Emma, Alex, Martyn and Bex

Leigh's crew - Martyn and Bex

The grid launch underway...

Arrivederchi Rieti

Day 6

Dick Daninson demonstrates the approved Kiwi salute

We launched early at 1230 today and into a moist sky with a relatively low cloudbase of 8,000' over Terminillo. The NE wind is still blowing making things less predictable and that combined with cliudbase coming down to 6500' at the first turn made things a little uncomfortable. Leigh and Dane cazme out back up the second leg well and ran the West side of the ridges up to the last turn at Gualdo. Dane got the day at 114kph in the 15's with Leigh second: nice work.



Aaaaghh! My eyes!!

Day 5

Another amazing pilot who's also a good guy: John Coutts

The cold front went through last night but there was a lot of cloud hanging around to the South East and hence it was time for another blasted AAT.

The 15kt NE lent a tempting hint of wave so we spent a good hour or so trying to get in it - without success. Most of us set off within 15 minutes of each other and turned early in the overcast first sector, halfway up the second and third, clipped the fourth and fifth sectors. 5 sectors for an AAT: hmm.

The penultimate sector was blue and stable and virtually the whole field congregated on East facing ridges 40kms out. Lots of scratching around before limping over the final ridge and home around 1900hrs. Only 5 of the 12 in our class got back, most of the landouts happening on that last ridgeline from the look of it.

Rest Day

Today was forecast for rain and storms and a rest day was announced 24 hours in advance: good move.

It was indeed overcast but fine for bike rides, floating on lakes, lying by pools and chilling out.

In the evening Alex invited us to his uncle's house in a hilltop village near Rome. It was beyond outstanding. Trestle tables set out in a piazza high in Montilibretti with risotto and suckling pig: fantastic and thank you Alex.

The hero of the day: Alex Trovalusci

Day 4

Overkeen at attention: flying brilliantly for his experience, He'll go far in the next couple of years.

A day of two halves.

For the clubs, 15's and standards it was excellent. The 18's and Opens were scrubbed which seemed very harsh indeed. The launch was delayed to 1415hrs for the clubs and then a 10 minute break before the 15's and standards went. Launching at 1440 for a 356kms task felt a little daunting and the first climb off tow was naff. A risky glide out behind the Terminillo mountain paid off and I was able to climb up to where Leigh was waiting with Riccy Brigliadori. A brief wait and we were able to set off from 11,200' and glided 45 degrees left off track onto the Gran Sasso range to link with a booming cloudstreet. From that climb I had a 205km glide at 415:1 into the first turn and back to Castellucio at 175kph. Back up to 10,000' here and it was off to Gualdo Taldino and onto the ridges for a less marginal run through the soft and fluffy valley of fun and home. 356kms at 161kph is a personal best: yeehah!

Jay had a nightmare and finally landed at 2015hrs having manfully struggled home exploring hitherto unknown ridges in the valley of fun. Epic perseverance!


Dinner was takeaway pizza  for most of us, but the sophisticates (Dane and Coutts) opted for fine dining and went offsite for the extra large with fries. Classy.

Day 3

Leigh: ridiculously good AND an all round nice guy: Bastard.

What a difference a day makes. After yesterday's disaster, today was fabulous fun. Leigh rocketed around 460kms at 143kph in a 3 hour AAT and won the day by a big margin: superb. I didn't fly today, but I did sit in my glider as it was towed around by Leigh. To be fair, I did manage to repay some of his earlier kindness with a bit of moral support on the ridges later in the flight.

We had a great run South setting off with Jay Rebbeck and John Coutts and our second climb behind Vellino saw the average at 13.4kts and looking back at the trace the instant vario peaked at 19.7kts. Not a bad climb! Further down track we were delighted to bump into Riccy Brigliadori and assumed he'd show us the way for the rest of the flight. We turned deep in the first sector and ran back the way we'd come to avoid the rain to our East. Back up at 11,000' over Vellino we lost sight of Riccy and set off for the Assergi bowl, looking enviously at a motorway of clouds on our East. We assumed that was where Riccy had gone, and looking back at his trace that was indeed the case, but  it didn't work out for him and we overtook him here. The last bit of the flight was on the ridges for 150kms in the 10-12kt SW breeze. Riccy got down to 400' above ground and stuck near Foligno but we were a little higher and able to push on into the valley of fun, following Jay Rebbeck.



It's always good to be in a start gaggle at 11,000'

I have been warned not follow Jay on marginal final glides and this was the buttock clenching example of why not. That's unfair - we went through pretty low and it was barely working but it got us home fine.

Afandi won the 18's (brilliant), Coutts got a hat-trick with another win in the standards (outstanding) so all in all a great day for the team!

Day 2

The waterboy and daughter Emma: our support superstar.

The first rule about Day 2 club is we don't talk about Day 2 club.

Lots of rain, lightning and thunder around - which Dane took excellent advantage of, and stormed (poor pun I know) around at 140kph. I blew it totally and landed out half way round. Fortunately there's only a little cosmetic damage so on to day 3.

Day 1

Gorringe teases us with his belly button again

Our resident weather guru, Dane, stuck his head out of his tent first thing this morning and declared the day would be no good as it was 4 degrees too cold. We laughed

At the briefing, the met lady took us through lots of slides and demonstrated that the trigger temperature would be 40 degrees and we'd only get to 36, so it would be 4 degrees too cold. We laughed.

The launch was delayed half an hour and initially they only threw the club class into the air, but once they stayed up we all launched.  10,300' on Terminillo,and  some 7 kt climbs to the airspace limit of FL115 later we'd done c400kms at speeds of 128 to 145kph on a 3 hour AAT. We laughed.

Hopefully Dane will forecast another naff day for day 2.

The Empire team had a good start - Coutts won the standards, Leigh won the 15's and Afandi came 4th in the 18's. Owen did bloody well with 4th in the standards too.

As for me - only in Rieti can you do 420kms at 128kph and feel pissed off that you were too slow knowing where you could have found 15 minutes of wasted time! I did however display committent by not leaving a good climb when a lightning bolt hit the ridge 500-1000m away from me. I did however turn the radio off as a concession.

Sunday: the day of rest

Rieti virgin Afandi about to lose it

A day off today, and time to walk up mountains, lounge by the pool, or linger over a long lunch. The opening briefing at 1830 was classically Italian with some impassioned voluble challenges from the floor but the implacable contest director, Franca, took it in her stride.

Practice Day 3

Our Glorious Leader and the Architect of the entire entreprise: Ben

No surprise really that the day started hot and blue with a cloudless sky. It took quite a while to cook up and the 1300hr launch was delayed until a couple of cumulus appeared over the release area.


The benefits of a big Arcus wing: more shade to sit in

 Once again it was not straightforward to get away: the first climb on Termenillo was tricky to find and needed patience to grind round in less than a knot until it built. Once up though we started as a pack of four shortly followed by Leigh and Perley. A run down the ridges and the long glide across the plain took us to the yellow ridge where there was 6kts to the cloudbase of 10,500'. Around the turn at Shittifarti we dropped the turn at Gay Orchard (Campo Grovo in the local parlance) and instead ran back to the yellow ridge and North where it again started to go more blue. A good 7kt climb back up to 10,000' at Castellucio put us on glide round the last turn and home through the fluffy valley for another 350kms day out.

The evening was filled with dinner and a show: barbequed meats and the spectacle of Coutts and the Belgian Chav trying to put their tents up in the dark. Quality Entertainment.

Excitement reaches fever pitch in the stalls seating area

Practice Day 2

Geoff Tabbner showing the way

Well I say practice day, more of a bimble round the hills with some mates. The practice days at Rieti are characterised by stereotypical Italian behaviour. To get a launch one has to purchase a ticket. This is not a simple task. It involves standing in front of a glass window while the official spends 30 minutes chatting to her mates, selling tee-shirts to the bloke behind you, taking a few phonecalls, wandering off for a drink etc etc. At the launchpoint it is similarly chaotic. The aeroclub tugs are separate to the gliding club tasks and there's a third category I don't understand. Matching the glider to the ticket to the tug is complex, but eventually we got away.
Once launched there were good climbs to 7500' above the release area but on Terminillo the climbs were affected by North Easterly wind shear again. However, we got together and set off as a couple of gaggles and ran South to Roccarsolo (pronounced Rockyarsehole ). There were good climbs to 9000' and Cu to mark them most of the way. The run North to Nocero Umbra (Italian for Night-time Umbrella) saw the Cu petering out and eventually most people turned 14kms short. Despite the NE flow the wind was a light NW in the soft and fluffy valley of fun, and we all ran through it comfortably.

Running into the final valley at a very comfortable height for once

Rieti Copa Internationale del Mediterraneo 2013



Looking South into the Rieti plain with the airfield centre shot

 
 




















Here we go then.

The team are gradually assembling and we have established base camp in the camping ground. I have to admit the addition of fairy lights has made the place so much more festive. We have a good showing this year with 11 gliders from the Empire Team taking a good chunk of the 82 glider grid with:-

Standards: Ben, Overkeen, Jay
15's: yours truly, Leroy, Dick Daninson, Coutts
18's: Geoff, The Good Lord, Afandi
Opens: The waterboy

Geoff and I flew yesterday and the 7kt climb straight off tow was enough to remind me the drive is worth it. After that though the conditions were patchy and took a long time to get going properly, and even then suffered from wind shear with a stiff NE breeze at height. A wander down to Celano and back up to Spoletto was sufficient for day 1 and we landed early-ish. Friday and Saturday are both practice days and with a rest day on Sunday the comp starts in anger on Monday. Let battle commence!

Looking North towards the soft and fluffy valley of fun