"We'll Keep a Welcome in the Hillsides..........."



As we rigged yesterday under a threatening sky the sceptics laughed. But complete faith in Nils' forecasting eventually paid off. ( Though I must admit the occasional doubt)

The pressure went up and some ragged cumulus started to form, driven by the brisk 20 knot north westerly breeze.

I launched at 13.50 and soon reached the 3000ft cloudbase. Setting off to the northwest wasnt easy in the weak broken climbs as no sooner had you begun than you were back again. Eventually I broke free and on the Oxford plain things improved. A large shower area around Oxford was the biggest obstacle and after a low point from crossing a blue gap near Enstone I was finally up and away.

Base was now 4000ft and a superb street led westwards to Gloucester. Here the base was up to 5000ft and the street drew me onwards over Ross on Wye and towards the Black Mountains. It was so tempting to carry on. I'd joked with Denis in the morning about it being a good day for St David's Head in Pembrokeshire and believe it or not it was. The street carried on as far as the eye could see. But it was now 17.08 and I had not brought my toothbrush! I'd promised myself that I would turn at 17.00 so I turned abeam Abergavenny, 151 km out, for a really easy ride back to Booker arriving back at 18.38. Maybe I should have carried on, it looked really good and if you strained your ears you could just pick out the harmonious sound of the Tredegar mail voice choir;

" We'll keep a welcome in the hillsides, we'll keep a welcome in the vales......" I could just imagine Gatfield joining in on the chorus.

Monday

Yesterday was unexpectedly nice flying. Was doing a joy ride in the Duo and launched about 13:30 into an unpromising sky (raining on the ground) but cloudbase quickly rose to 4000ft with good thermals and good streeting. Flew down to DID and OXF mostly at cloudbase in 13kt Westerly.

It did look a bit showery to the North but it was clearing steadily to the West with scattered Cu at 4000ft +. A little surprised there were so many landouts at LGC Regionals. Maybe went too early?

Jim

A great day out

RASP didn't look promising:


The three sounding from the previous night all suggested completely different airmasses and Metcheck said the temperature wouldn't get above 19C.

So, with that in mind I set off to the airfield thinking that I'd ignore the forecasts and just try to figure out what was happening with the weather.

The two main cross-country indicators suggested that the forecast models were wrong (Dave-C set off on his milkrun 500km, Jim White muttered something about going on a 400km task).

I decided to err on the cautious side and set a Cat's cradle task of Booker Bridge - Membury - Buckingham - Edgehill - Booker (224km) - mindfull of the airshow at Silverstone that was NOTAM'd.

Five of us set off - me in 732, Jane in 118, Shack in A9, Jeremy in JDV and Chris in U2. U2 set off first and returned, literally minutes later, with a technical malfunction. My radio battery was flat so I don't know how everyone else went on - but Jane certainly made it as far as Membury and back and I ocasionally had glimpses of A9 on task.



A nice day out in the end with climbs of 5-6kt to 5000'.

Dave-C didn't finish his 500k because it begain to rain. I managed the 224km task, despite a few low scrapes and I thin Shack did too. Highlight of the day was just South of Banbury when the Vulcan flew beloe me (by several thousand feet!). Wasn't quick enough with the camera unfortunately.

Summer Shower

Oh to be in England now that April's Summer's here.

A damp start to the Friday Evening Group!

Mountain Man Yodels Away with Flatlands Cup

The 2009 Booker Regionals came to a close today with Serres Bimble Blogger, Songster and ex Volvo driver, Jon Gatfield, stepping up to receive the winner’s trophy.

Jon with the winner’s trophy

“I don’t know how he did it” said second placed Denis Campbell ( Starship 370) , the booky’s favourite having won the comp so many times before. “and he sings quite well too!”
Third placed Jim White, appearing in his least interesting shirt of the week was lost for words!

Jon flew his ASW 27 consistently well throughout the week in some challenging conditions. As he rightly said, when receiving the winner’s cup from Director and CFI Mike Collett; “ the competition was well directed, had outstanding met briefings from Dr Nils Wedi from the European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting and superb task setting from Brian Forrest .
All of us participating echoed these remarks. Mike Collett’s ability to direct soundly and wisely, the amazing accuracy of Nils’ forecasts and Brian’s uncanny knack of setting the right task in the right area all went to make it a really good quality event. Thank you guys for doing such a professional job. We all had a great time.

Brian, Mike, Nils and Bob

And a big thank you too to everyone who gave up their time to help. In Particular; Heggie and the maintenance team for fielding five superb tugs, Bob Davey and the tuggies for the super quick grid launches that enabled us to grab Nils’ ‘weather windows’. Julian and the cadets for ground marshalling and wing running. Shelagh and Hillary for manning the office throughout and administering the entries, loggers and retrieves etc. Steve Brown for his dexterity in the scoring department . Gary Nuttall for the chatty blog and scores of members who helped out and whom I’ve not named. But lastly thanks to those pilots who participated, for your good airmanship throughout and the friendly and sporting nature of the comp.

Booker members, you can all be proud!

Regionals - all done

No improvement in the weather, so we scrubbed at 13.00.

Regionals - Last Day - Not giving up (yet)

Briefing at 11:00 started with congratulations to Nils the Metman for geting both the forecast spot on and for getting 1000 points on the AAT in his Club Class glider by flying 289.4km.

Today's forecast doesn't look promising, with the most optimistic outlook being a gap between the showers with cloudbase rising to 2000' and 30kt South-Westerly winds. However, we're going to hold on to see if the conditions improve sufficiently as there's fewer than 80 points seperating two pilots from the top place. Rebriefing, and probably a final decision, will take place at 12:00.

Regionals - The Last Day

After a successful task yesterday with most pilots completing tasks distances of between 200-300km the weather today doesn't look so promising. The general pessimism of the met forecast is well reflected by the notice on the board which reads "Briefing 11:00 - don't rig". Maybe there's a small hope of a modest task later?

Regionals - Eighth Day - Rig,grid, brief, launch and return

Only the one update today as things happened rather quickly and I was at the front of the grid. Briefing was at 10:30 and first launch was 11:15. Metman suggested strong 20kt Westerlies with minimal changes at height and no sheer. Cloudbase likely to be up to 4500' in parts with 8/8 killing off convection later.

Multi-barrel 3-hour AAT was set -

Booker Bridge (BOB) - Ilsley (ILS/10km) - Bozeat (BOZ/25km) - Bicester (BIC/10km) - Booker SW (BO1) - Booker Finish (BF1). This gave a range of 136.0km/334.1km (214.1km).

Nearly everybody completed the task, with Steve Williams landing JDV at Thame and Jim Pengelly in 208 managing 61km before returning home.

Provisional results can be found at http://www.soaringspot.com/include/booker2009/results/mixed/daily/day4.html.

Regionals - Seventh Day - We've scrubbed

The most optimistic forecast Nils could offer today was a 1500'-2000' cloudbase interspersed with rain. No sign of improvement during the day. Therefore the decision has been taken to scrub early.

Early indications are promising for Saturday with cloudbase up to 4500' towards the Midlands and East Anglia, although we'll have brisk Westerly/North-Westerly winds to contend with. Sunday is likely to be similar but with an increased possibility of showers. Being British weather it could all change in 24 hours, so we'll see what's announced at the briefing on Saturday.