Slingers POOland continued:

OK, Friday morning and its blowing a gale and still, STILL, they threaten us with reverse launching over a fence and a touch and go, such that we are shrugging our shoulders and crying. Oh, they’ve just binned the idea. Some rocket scientist has wet a finger and stuck it up his arse. We all knew 20km winds were iffy.

Yesterday was, as we suspected, a long hard day with stratospheric highs and subterranean lows. Others will hopefully tell their stories in full as and when they feel up to it but suffice to say here and now that Tom did 2 props, missed a first stick on the slow run and didn’t go round to get it again, just carried on which he described as green first weeker numpty flying, he also tried to do the eco task with his prop flailing shards of tip in an attractively pretty but inefficient way. Tom is just such a nice genuine guy and the BEST at smiling in the face of adversity. Andrew and I landed out within close reach of the field at the end of the same limited fuel TP hunt in thermics to die for. Laura puked 4 times in the air and once more on landing so I kissed her better. Banana and choc muesli bar, confirmed. She had been feeling yucky before flying.  Andrew had a tumble collapse on very slow trim but was buzzing afterwards and got caught out expecting another thermal 3 k from base with a tenth of a ltr and it not being there for him this time. Game lad! I wove skilfully between all the lift and flew uneconomically in sink bar one 2500ft rocket. I then chose to run out of fuel 150mts from our landing field because I was so busy looking at the beautiful farms and houses and woods and smiley cows to notice my comp bottle was already running through my last ltr 15k out eeeek! I so nearly made it back. Michel flew a blinder in that eco task at 5000ft, under the clouds but ‘got a fly in his eye’ so missed a stick in the cloverleaf. He said ‘I want no rumour getting out about Michel getting ‘lost’ in a cloverleaf please’, so lets quash that one (wink).
Henry may have ‘nil point’ after landing past the task deadline of 5pm yet having cut the finish gate 30 secs early. We will argue that one if it arises.

Now, on the landouts I have some information. This may also explain why certain UK pilots often fly in Poland. No names! I landed across the road from the field and was packing up in the heat and a bloke came up spewing Polish in a friendly manner. I calmly enunciated ‘Engleshki’ with a broad Cheshire grin to which he continued spewing Polish interspersed with telephonski and drinkski. To which I held out my phone ripped from its sealed bag, and waved my water bottle. I said thanks in Polish (Gincoya as we say it) and he waved and turned to go. Obviously I had not done enough to convince him that my phone was a phone or my drinkski a drinkski. He dragged his giggling blond tanned tall slim young and coy daughter up the field to translate. I prolonged the chat as long as I could but really had to be by the road for Barny to spot my motor at least. So reluctantly I kissed her 5 times goodbye (a tradition hereabouts I am assured) and they left me happy they had done all they could. By the time Barny got to me 5 mins later I had no less than 5 girls checking I was ok. Did all the blokes go plumbing somewhere?
We continued up the road to collect Andrew a couple of miles up the valley and he had 6 girls carrying individual bits of kit for him, giggling, shy, bashful, beautiful and sweet. Just lovely helpful people, melts your heart. Andrew chased after them with a 20 Zlts note. After about 100mtrs he got the message, kit yes, sex no.

Ok my only high point. Cloverleaf. You know Ive been doing a bit of time-chomping and the true test was about to be taken. Training and comp flying is subtly different. Training is less stressy and as a consequence never quite going to be as focussed. Comp flying will always potentially bring out your best if you can get past the nerves and do your job ok. I walked up to the sticks, out in the early morning mist in my shorts and gumbies or crocks and the dew in the long grass was cold and refreshing. The meadow is undulating and the sticks were set close to a 20 foot rolling hill over which you would approach. It sounds bad but it looked ok. I placed 4 traffic cones I’d carried out at the base of the corner sticks (the organiser/director said he had none at the briefing so Michel did a ‘Michel’-- ‘oh look, found them’ rummaging in their store tent, so we stuck them out thank you. I stood on the hill, the entry direction, and imagined the view for each stick…in from here, kick, turn left (easy to remember), round, kick again then ‘ round town’ which was what I would see trough the stick as I oriented for my next turn and kick, then, ‘tents’ and kick, then last turn ‘valley’ where a gap in the rolling fields was obvious, and kick to finish. The cones were both to help see the corner sticks but also make them different from the middle stick….all too easy to mistake one for another in the fog of heroic speed.
 I spent a few minutes mentally etching that route and walked back through the white, pink and blue meadow flowers that tickled my legs. My toes were covered in grass seeds and I squeeked inside the wet rubber shoes much as I do when walking Archie before work in the fields back home. Back home…..I dismissed the thought at once.

Hey ho, the best laid plans… I didn’t really want to watch others doing the sticks, Id start thinking too much but they were entering via the planned route. I was the first to enter the sticks 90 degrees to them. The wind had come round. I took my time ahead of doing the task as 2 of us circled low waiting for the white flag. Initially I ballooned like mad, the thermals or tree rotor was working. I got my eyes arms and legs into the swing and was soon doing low hard practise turns with this other guy pootling near by. I noticed then the downwind and upwind had changed so climbed to look for windsocks. Nothing, no windsocks. Flags in town confirmed my suspicion so I crept closer to the task sticks, inbound as the marshal would expect, got the white flag and totally confused him by doing a 360 and coming in low from a new direction. My mental mapping earlier had helped and I fell back on it to get past the shit-factor of competition and this new direction. The landmarks had changed but the feeling was all there. I dived out of a ballooning bubble of lift to hit the middle stick at one stage but kept the bar on and powered through the turns and was fairly smooth I think. It felt rubbish to me time-wise and I just fought my way round the blinding series of cranking breaky speedbarishness that is stick work. Fantastic feeling to hit the last stick hard and lift the bar to climb away letting the glider and energy just swoop you away from the pot of hellfire.  55secs.   

Now that poo with the ring-tone. I needed a pee. Round the back of our big kit tent there’s a load of bushes and long grass. That’s where I went. I noticed there was a path, away, through the long grass and wondered if our tent was a security risk from the town and river bank beyond. I stepped up the path and it came to a dead end with a wider flattened area. There lay the tell tale signs of poo corner and I took a closer look just to see, you know, whether the doer of the do had the same complaint as me, It’s the food, or nerves or both. The poo promptly started to ring! Well I wasn’t going to answer it and luckily Michel dashed past calling as if to a lost love-one ‘Ah there you are’ to his poo.

He picked it up, checked for bits or grass, smiled broadly and nipped back past to tell everyone to stop searching for his phone. A relief in so many ways!!
xx N

Day 5: Task 5 - Economy distance

Another economy task, this time during a fairly thermic hot afternoon, with the aim to collect as many turnpoints as possible from a measured 3Kg of fuel. Bonus points would be awarded for the longest remaining pilots in the air. Again, this is a task that we know we can score in - fingers crossed!

Day 5: Task 4 - Clover Leaf

Launch was intended for 5.30am although it had to be postponed in order to let the morning mist clear. Clover leaf taking place as Neil so succinctly described in his narrative. Conditions were very flat to begin with, but getting a little thermic towards the end of the window. Having got so much training in on this when we first arrived, everyone was eager to get going, with Chilly leading the way.

Andrew gets his wing over on the Clover leaf.

Bullseye from Tom!

We ended up with some excellent times, Chilly and Neil coming in at around 55 sec. and Michel hitting 50 sec, although unfortunately missing one of the sticks.

Day 4: Task 3: Economy Distance

The high winds were holding out until afternoon, so the task was scheduled for a 5pm launch. Each pilot was given 1.5Kg of fuel, and the idea would be to complete as many laps as possible of a 2Km triangular course around the airfield before the fuel ran out. Landing could only be on one of three specified decks, with a 20% penalty for being caught out in between. With 4 Bailey engines on the team, this is our task, so confidence was high as we set out.

Most competitors decided to leave their launch towards the later part of the window, to take advantage of the improving conditions as the afternoon progressed. Pressure was rising, wind was dropping.What this meant, however, was that 60 PF1 pilots were battling for a place around a course that was only 2Km, with a maximum height limit of 200ft. The team quickly decided once in the air that the plans for noting lap times as they went were not wise as hands were needed on the brakes at all times purely for collision avoidance!

Rush hour in Lomza, Poland

Anyway a fantastic effort from all, with Michel the last Pilot in the air, clearly winning the task (official results pending of course) by a fair margin. After that it was back to the hotel for an early night, as the start was 4am the next day, planning for three tasks while the good weather held.

The Slinger narrative continues...

Ok so we arrived and spent inordinate amounts of time getting stressed, not eating properly, getting to grips with heat, dehydration and Slotties,Sovs or whatsits as we made phone calls to get Visa cards to work in ATM’s or suss the exchange rate at the tiny money changing shop in town. We smelt of sweat, stale knickers, had soil dirty feet and generally were learning to cope. Having said all that, the spirit within the team is the strongest Ive known. Great bunch, all ready to help and muck in. Michel handles the officials, Chilly, Barny and Tom are on laptop duty with downloads and web met researching, Laura is just great and Henry just gets on with it. I do what I can in a small way. Andrew landed into the hell fire of comp prep late on Friday night and spent hours pouring over machines and getting himself sorted. I know exactly how much pressure he was under, and he is constant, determined and a great team member.

Barny especially has worked tirelessly, although he would poof at that assertion. We owe him a massive debt. Calm, sorted, ‘on it’ and friendly. Team GB has landed.

So, the flying side of it. Firstly a bit of psychology. We are in and amongst the best ppg pilots in the world. I personally harbour secret inadequacies which are horrendously present during the pre comp period but seem to melt away once Im in the thick of it. My comp head is strong, but I have fears ahead of the game.

One of the main things that has helped me leap out of this malaise has been the training flying we’ve done. I mentioned elsewhere that Id had a scare in the booming thermals and I was rattled, to the point where I spoke to Clare saying I cant fly in this comp in this sort of shit. She advised just stepping back and chilling, see the circumstances for what they were and think about it before saying anything. I did so and we also discovered that 11am to 2pm was a no fly time. This allowed me to rationalise the comp as manageable for me, not the nightmare I had experienced over some Polish forest where I would have died as a burned crisp dangling from a power cable gently spinning as my reserve wafted in the summery breeze. No, I would be fine.

Having been through this rationalisation process I was up for some training. Sticks. Nav I can do. Sticks. OK, sticks. No matter how much you talk about them or think about them  the only way to ‘get’ sticks is to hunker on down and boogie. Hunky Boogie Vici.  I hunkered, I boogied, I conquered, well made progress by not crashing, a victory of sorts.

Nats 06 no sticks, no problem. Spain 06 sticks, I crashed into the ground at the base of stick 3 in the Jap slalom sending a spew of earth 40ft into the sky. Nats 07 first ever full Jap slalom 99secs, nice and slow and accurate. Fast slow 07, accurate at least. Nats 08 second ever Jap slalom 72 secs.
Poland, first ever Cloverleaf hmm.

So I’m a wee bit behind the team curve. Michel had fitted the ALC tip controls to my Reaction at the training weekend at Devils Dyke, Brighton and I crashed. Collapse at low level, let go of ALC balls throttle handle twisted away from my finger tips and all I could do was eat wheat and break my cage. Prop was ok. I clambered out bent the cage back into a reasonable shape albeit with a broken spar and took off to get back to the main launch field. Later doing more low stuff I decided in my over confident way to cruise downwind into the arse end of Devils Dyke sliding to a long undignified scuffed knee stop glider just bouncing this side of the barbed wire fence at the top of the hill. Cool, looking good.

With all the benfit of this experience I felt it reasonable to chuck myself into proper stick work. It works like this. You have speed bar weightshift and controls. You use all in sequences that at first take a moment to assimilate. I have been a hill pilot for 20 odd years and I love having a ground reference to fly with. Wingovers at 2000 ft and Im as graceful as an ostrich in flight. Give me ground to avoid, well at least I have something to aim at. Hitting it I can do, staying just above it, I can do too now I have the tools which are…..speedbar, essential for turns ie letting it off by degrees to carve steeper or climb slightly to avoid trouble. Controls, heavy use in fluid smooth inputs. Weightshift, not so much a concern for me. Bailey harness etc. Perhaps when Im fine tuning myself.

For any reader not sure, the Cloverleaf is a set of 5 sticks 2 m high stabbed into the earth arranged like 5 dice dots. The middle one you kick all the time the outer four you round in a set pattern. So start by building up a low speedy approach on bar and slide in to hit middle stick. If the dots were on this screen I am flying upwards towards the cluster. Then bar off as you bury the brakes positively, never jerking them, applying power and rounding that top left stick to re kick the middle one reversing the turn to the right to round the btm right hand stick heading eventually back to the middle one again keeping the  right turn going this time to round the top right hand stick. Keep carving back in to kick the middle again, then you are on the home leg with a final left cranky turn round the btm left stick to follow through and kick that middle one again to finish in the same direction you entered in the first place. Yeah, I got hopelessly lost too. I was all over the place. I had no idea at all where I was going next and would never in a million years get it right. Instead I just got into the rhythm of staying low, turning faster and kicking the middle stick in any random route that seemed challenging and after about 10 scoots my arms were burning. I put my head back came off bar climbed to 50 ft and breathed a sigh of doom. This was so bloody hard. Laura was out timing us. I had to get this pattern! My arms were in my lap blood relieving the burning triceps so I gathered right control then throttle in a particular way that felt secure, then ALC ball on that side using left hand to position everything exactly. Then the left control and ball. All other balls girded and correctly positioned.
The main problems are staying low, turning fast, and not missing the middle stick. Lowness is maintained by not climbing, but every turn, especially a cranked turn has lift vectoring to the radial point of the arc of that turn, at an angle to the horizon. Come out of that turn and that lift vector becomes vertical again and any G in the turn is no longer there so the glider says ta very much and climbs. So add into all the above sequence a series of smooth leg pushes and retractions hand control pulls and smooth retractions and you have something of it.

It is the most fun ever. You have the tools to stay up, get low, turn faster if you have bar in reserve to let off as you turn and of course a set route to follow. I got the pattern pretty quickly. Times exactly 1:08 three times on the trot. Next day down to 1:02 Progress.

Enough about me, and my shortcomings, the scenery here is beautiful. On the big nav task we did 80 odd km over the most idyllic croft type farm strips with forests and meandering rivers and views over vast distances with mist and gentle breezes and rolling telly tubby scenery. Just magical. Some of us didn’t get quite those distances with engine outs etc. But as a team we are sorted and ready for our next task. I gambolled in that task trying to squeeze out an extra TP and got pinned in a valley wind. It is a hopeless feeling when your time limit runs out but hey, I boobed and it is in the past with lesson duly learnt. 50% penalty.

Im taking up too much space with my stuff so the poo that started ringing like a phone story will have to wait.

N

03/0/08: Day 3: Clay pigeon shooting

35km/hour winds today, so flying was off. We were given the option of a number of activites to take part in, so we headed off clay pigeon shooting in the woods! A day of planning from then onwards, thinking harder about the distance economy which is planned for tomorrow evening. It looks at the moment as though a high pressure is moving in, so the weather will hopefully improve for the second half of the week.

Tom decides to level the playing field by taking out some of the competition (photo: Andrew)

Comp debrief from Laura:

Smooth silky air, visibility astounding over a panorama of meandering rivers and low morning mist hanging over the beautiful countryside....I have to keep reminding myself that I am flying a task in competition. A big hint are the paramotors dotted over the horizon all trying to fly, like me, as far as they can with given turnpoints in 90 minutes. Luckily for me, the preparation that we did as a team the evening before, and some crucial decision making in the air, mean that I fly as fast as possible and pass the finish gate with 1 minute and 20 seconds to spare. What a result for me, first big task, and along with Henry and Chilly, I score for the British Team!

We are having an amazing time. Arriving early and having a few days to prepare was a great idea. We got so much slalom practice in that my arms hurt! Mixing with pilots from 14 countries, and seeing again familiar faces from the World Championship in China last year makes me feel really lucky to be a part of such a great event again. Being asked to fly during the opening ceremony was a real honour, and I was unbelievably nervous when launching (nil wind with a damp wing). However, when a couple of the top guys failed their launch, relief, pressure off and I took off no problem.

The British Team spirit is inspiring. We have a broad mix of people with a range of equipment, experience and personalities, but 2 tasks in and believe me, we want to win! We have just returned from a trip to the firing range in the local forest (very strong winds today, meaning our first unflyable day). Despite us all scoring individually, we automatically found ourselves cheering for our team mates. The boys clearly did not cheer loud enough for me and I have discovered that I am much better suited to flying than shooting!

I was intrigued as to what to expect when I arrived in Poland. Flying some training tasks on Google Earth had given me some idea of the terrain, but I had not expected it to be so beautiful. The comp is taking place in a beautiful valley next to the Narew river. The team has been cooling off from the hot sun by swimming across the river to the popular beach in the opposite side. It really is an idyllic spot. Launch is massive. Open, flat, green floodplains that paramotor pilots would dream of having on their doorsteps! Heaven, apart from the mosquitoes that attack every evening as soon as sun sets! Myself and Barney are obviously the most tasty members of the team. The local chemist is now all out of repellent, and we are taking daily anti-histamines!

We need to stay focused and we need to maintain the relentless pace. Early starts and late nights so far have not been too much of a problem. The need and the want to fly has overridden the bleary eyes...although a forced rest day today has been well received. I am sure in the days to come there will be mistakes, problems and the odd complaint...but essentially we want to fly, we want to enjoy the competition and we want to get gold.

Laura x

Laura prepares to take off with 120 others on Task 2

Slinger’s notes on Poland...

We are gronded  wiz wezzer. A chance to put something down, this competition Tuesday in Lomza, Poland August 5th 2008.

The trip out was fairly uneventful, with a successful meeting of pilots at Gatwick last Wednesday morning all subsequently re-united with kit at the far end, Warsaw. Hmm, hot, blue skies and fair weather cloud bubbling up in an almost uniform chequer board pattern all over the sky. We headed out of town in heavy traffic via up and down bumpy streets between lorries cars and some old eastern block tenements.

The mini bus had net curtains and good seats so we tried to crash out during the 3hr trip. The main road north and east of Warsaw is partly new (EU money arriving) and part in need of replacement. Chilly was asleep in seconds on one side of the back row with me at the other end, head against the window stretching legs out over bags. Laura and Michel were in the middle with Henry,  Tom, up front, was managing the driver manfully. He started off fairly politely but was soon upping the anti following tried and trusted international translation method ‘shout loud enough for them to understand’ . And so the air con became  active and we all breathed cooler. Tom was not able however to instruct the driver in the fine art of safe overtaking. All the way we were on straightish A roads with wide bends, where the driver would overtake, lumbering past wagons that in fairness swerved off the road to let us past. Any cyclists cycled facing the traffic in the gutter so they could dive off the road as lorry X checked wing mirror to swerve grasswards mindful of an overtaker. The elastic rods holding the net curtains top and bottom were quite strong so I resorted to tucking my head under it like some window licker. It did the job and i could see the views. Tom kept whooping up front, him and the driver engaging in lively jocular banter. Now i had my head under the nets I could see why. Partly it was Tom reassuring the driver that he was in fact a life saver, brilliant over-take old chap, and part of it was naked women leaning against pine trees edging the deep and extensive forests through which the road sliced. I felt a bit obviously too keen to see these sights so came back inside and resorted to quick net twitching as scores of  ’ooh niner’ broke the transmitted burr of wheels on tarmac as I snoozed, ear against my seatbelt .

On the aircraft I’d chatted up a mum and daughter sitting with me and they taught me Polish. Via much giggling and red faces (and that was just me). Within 30 minutes I had mastered pronounciation of 1 to 10, thankyou  ( formal and informal forms), how to buy beer vodka (in fact many many things by pointing) and  ’good’, so I could enter friendly if short banter with a Polish competitor who might have done well. British thing to do you know, be nice to the locals. So when we stopped for a service station meal and fag break I was brilliant. I asked Tom and he shouted loud and they all fell into line, gave me change and handed me my goods. Ahh foreign  Johnny makes good in tundra land, in midday sun and tired from 4am start. Things were looking good.

Immediately almost we got into the swing of what was to follow, you know, competition madness. To our amusement the hotel knew nothing about us so we were roomless hungry and beyond caring. This is the well known safety valve of the competitor who has any sort of ambition to ppg. In fact anyone who ppg’s. Michel while incredulous was brilliant and we were offered rooms 3k away on the other side of town. So off we lurched in various begged lifts as our driver had scarpered with our cash without so much as a thought for our hotel angst. Cunning these Poles. Suitably ensconsed  up the road we crashed out and tried to sleep.

After various hours of whatever happened, which are all a bluur the van with all the kit driven by Barny all the way over, past naked ladies etc (well driven indeed) met us and we all compared notes on trips and got into flying mode.  Down at the airfield we met the French who were on site in strength using a big marquee which we were allowed to put our gear in during the time between getting there and the official team tents being put up on Friday.

The proper hotel is a five minute drive from the airfield but in reality just off the field a mile away from launch. It is occupied by all competitors during the comp and we are given breakfast dinner and tea as comp timings permit.  Airfield catering covers times when pilots cannot return to the hotel.The field is a massive flat river flood plain with a bridge at the east and west ends. We set out sticks 400m away from TO and built machines, not necessarily in that order. All in all be wre busy and the met was great.

I needed a poo. The Thul toilets were in a neat row side by side behind our kit area. I noted with glee that paper was plentiful.   I sit down. Someone enters the cubilcle next to me. Fine. He says ‘ello slight accent. I say nothing. He says ‘ello louder. I think about it. ‘ELLO, he says even louder. I say hello. He says ‘louder, I cant eer you’. HELLO I say. He replies  ‘Are you ok?’ Yes thanks,  I reply.  Speak up I cant eer you. YES,I’M FINE THANKS, how are YOU ?(I’m getting annoyed he’s putting me off my stride) he says,’ Leesten Stephan i will have to call you back someone is trying to talk to me  chow chow. He exits. After 10 minutes I creep out.
Ah the fun we have. I will write about my flying experiences and lessons when i can.      

03/0/08: Day 2: Task 2

Up today at 4.15am to get back to the field for a 6am take off window. The task was a cross country navigation. Having briefed the previous morning at the same time as the task one brief, we had been given a series of turn points that we could use, with the object of covering maximum distance in 90 minutes. Michel had driven us through some seriously technical pre-task preparations the night before, so everyone was armed with several possible route plans, allowing for differences in wind conditions, and making sure there were several options on the finish to gain those vital few extra K's if the timing allowed. We still needed to make some last minute adjustments that morning however, once we'd seen the precise conditions.

Sunrise lifts the morning mist off the airfield (photo: Barney)

Last minute route planning, 5.30am

Predictably, the entire comp decided that it was a better idea to take off ASAP to use the flat early morning conditions. 120 paramotors leaving a deck in the space of less than half an hour was a pretty amazing sight. The whole of our team was off by 6.15, leaving Barney to 90 minutes of peace and quiet.... or so he thought.

Heading for the start gate (photo: Barney)

40 minutes later the phone started to ring. Michel had engine trouble and landed out, so Barney got his own nav task to find him in whichever field he had ended up in. Just as Michel had been found, the phone rang again. This time it was Tom, who was being chased out of another field down the road by some irate Polish farmers, who's precious hay he had landed in after suffering the same problem as Michel had. He was only down the road, so we rescued him just as the phone started ringing again! Andrew had also landed out; he had found a taxi to take him back but his paramotor was left in a field and needed retrieving.

So... not too much luck on the paramotors unfortunately. Full speed-bar for 90 minutes is not an engine-friendly task! However, the others all scored with some good distance, so we should get a good top three scores for the team prize. Fortunately, Michel, Tom and Andrew all had spare machines so the comp isn't over yet for them. We were briefed that the next task would be a distance economy that afternoon, with a fuelling window till 2pm, so there then followed a frantic race to change engines on cages and sort out all the problems in time. We were late in the end, but it was alowed due to mechanical problems, and then we had another briefing to say that the task would be postponed due to a few large Q-nims headed our way. Pressure off, but we had to batten down the hatches in a big way for a ferocious rainstorm before heading back to the hotel.

03/0/08: Day 1: Task 1

The organisers had evidently decided in advance that their hangovers weren't going to allow them ought of bed early this morning - we had been told in advance that on the first day there would only be one single precision task. This turned out to be a precision take of leading immediately to a spot landing.This started at 3 pm, at which point it was very thermic with gusts of up to about 15km/hour swinging through about 90 degrees - not an easy launch! We were up almost first and fortunately everybody got off first time - max points for the launch. Tom pulled off an amazing recovery: he got lofted hard to one side by a gust just as his wing inflated. He had to do a sharp dodge to avoid running cleanly into Henry's machine, still passing close enough for the cages to touch. He then found one of Henry's lines wrapped around his foot, and still managed to shake it off, whilst handling the wing and moving on to launch with full points!

The gusts made the spot landing equally difficult, but we still had scores from Chilly and Neil, although unfortunately not in the bullseye.

Neil gets a photo finish into the outer ring (photo: Barney)

Comp Debrief from Neil:

OK Neil snatching a few minutes at20 ;15hrs zulu, while Michel slurps his super fantastic! soup at a team leaders briefing a few tents down. We are all smelly, sticky and finding it hard to see where to mark our turnpoints for tomorrow mornings speed nav task which will see us up at 5am for a 0600 window. Joy. High points so far....screaming round cloverleaf and jap slaloms grinding times down to below a minute and 1 ;02. I never believed in my wildest that lil 'ol me could demand and get sything wingover turns at 18 inch altitude actually climbing to get over the longer grass hitting sticks at speed at impossible angles and just loving it, It is addictive and about the most exhilerating thing I have ever done. low point definitely bottling out of a thermic training nav task 84k long I expected to do all of. I managed about 10k and bottled it, I was surrounded by dustdevils that spat wheat stubble up to 1500ft and booming off the scale lift that was weightlessness and bone-sappingly confidence knocking at the same time. I admonished myself on the way back and turned out again into another stonking violent blunderbus, That was me spent, Barny was going to be doing the comp in my place, that was the end of my flying carreer and I would do the retrieves. I was so low, Then we discovered that flying was banned between 11am and 2pm. SAVED!!!! Right got a lightening storm 10 mins away and we are (well not me yet) dashng around picking up all kit and maps and cardboard boxes and oh doom its all too late....

All motors are in and we are just awaiting the black swirling Close Encounters boiling clound to engage us with its sinister tentacles, Cant see the keys its gone so daek,

02/08/08: Opening ceremony

Everyone had another flight in the morning but then we ahd to head back to the hotel in order to register for the comp. Whilst Barney and Michel had an interminable initial briefing, the others took the opportunity to stock up on some much needed sleep after all the early starts.

We headed back to the field for the 6pm start of the opening ceremony. This turned out to be about the biggest event of the year in the Lomza calendar, with the entire town out to see what was going on. It started with two members from each team doing several circuits fly-by for the spectators, so Michel and Laura stepped up. We then had to meet up with them, and one by one all the teams did a walk past the crowd up to form a huge circle whilst all the flags did laps.

The whole event was an unbelievable experience - presumably one only to be beaten by standing at the top of the podium getting gold at the finishing ceremony! Even Michel said that in all his years of comp experience it was one of the best opening ceremonies he's ever seen.

The team on their way to the ceremony

The flags do a tour (photo: Andrew)

Laura does a lap of honour for the spectators (photo: Andrew)

The Poles had made a huge effort to organise the event, with beer tent (The local brewery sponsored the event!), food, and a live band. "He is very famous in Poland, but from the 70's - only my parents listen to him" as we were told by Meg, our translator. The night culminated in the famous singer giving his performance from a floodlit hot air balloon raised 30 feet above the crowd, and was televised by the local Polish TV station.

Chilly admires the singer in the hot air balloon (photo: Andrew)

01/08/08: Pre-comp training

Training has continued in a big way. Flying is from 6am till about 11 when its been getting too thermic, and the from about 4pm till dark at 9.30ish. On the Thursday morning we got in an hour or two of clover leaves in the still air before we headed off on a 60k XC navigation. The area is amazingly beautiful, and the maps are nice and clear, making the navigation all the easier.

Meanders of the River Narew (photo: Barney)

As the day got hotter it started to to get really quite bumpy, and by the time we all got in at mid-day it was definitely time for lunch. We got another two or three hours in that evening on the sticks, with everbody really starting to tune in and showing some serious improvements in the times.

Friday was arrival day proper, with all the team marquees being set up so that we could "move in".

Home for the next 8 days!

On Friday the story was very similar, although the wind was picking up so we couldn't go off on a navigation. We used that morning to nail the slow flying practise for the fast-slow tasks, and more spot landings. By the time we came down it was unbearably hot, so Neil decided to have a little sunbathing, while the rest of us rewarded ourselves with a swim in the river to cool off.

Neil scares the Polish ladies!

Andrew McMahon arrived that evening to make the team complete. We got back onto the sticks with more timed laps, and its clear that we're in with a strong chance in the precision tasks! Michel's been showing 44.5 second clover leaves, with several of the others close on his tail.

These extra days of training have proved invaluable not just for the practical skills gaineed from a good 8 hours or so of flight time but for the mindset of the whole team; Everybody is really beginning to work together and tune in to the spirit of the competition.

30/07/08: Arrived in Poland

We all got here in the late afternoon and sought out the airfield ASAP, to find that the French team had beaten us here! The site is perfect - its in the middle of a huge swathe of green pasture land that is the flood plain for the river Narew, which meanders through it leaving loads of oxbow lakes. The airfield is just outside of the town of Lomza, a square of (mostly) mown grass about 1k by 1k bordered on two sides by the river. We aer sharing the field with a large colony of Storks:

Our friendly local stork "Michel"

Predictably with Michel as team leader, no-one was allowed a moments respite after the journey. We hit the air straight away for some more training. The weather is fantastic - hitting about 28 degrees in the day. After a potter about to familiarise ourselves with the area, we got the sticks up and got stuck into to some slaloms.

24/07/08: Pre-comp preparation

Final preparations are ongoing, with a last training meet this weekend to get some strategy planned out, and attempt some artistic van-packing! Barney will be off on Monday to start the drive out there. The team uniforms have arrived so we should have a strong visual presence at the comp... a nice bit of psychological warfare to show the other teams that we mean business this year! Team photo will be posted asap.