Paragliding World Cup - Celorico da Beira - Day 1 - Task1 and a day off

I am staying with Arnold and Marie Marx along with German, British, Portuguese and South African pilots.  Their warm hospitality is unsurpassed.  I feel very much at home.  If ever you plan on flying in this area you should stay here without a doubt!  Marie cooks up a gourmet storm and Arnold knows the area better than anybody.  We managed to squeeze a late flight in on Friday thanks to Arnold spotting a shift in the wind direction before whisking us up to the Linhares takeoff area for a quick 40km evening romp down/cross wind.  Saturday was windy with rain and the forecast suggested that there would be no flying until Wednesday.

The previous day's rain and forecast resulted in a fair amount of pessimism before the mandatory morning briefing.   We were bussed off to the Azinha launch where the task committee hurriedly set a task for an early start in order to get us away from the mountain to avoid the thunderstorm threat.  The race started at 13H15 and comprised of an East-North dog-leg of 66km.  The field was surprisingly disciplined at the start mostly avoiding the white room as the clouds began to build.  We all went on course in a tight-knit bunch which fractured into multiple factions within ten minutes with four main groups and dozens of loners and stragglers spread in three dimensions.  The disarray was probably the result of the fretful early thermals that had not consolidated yet.  The lead group flew a bow to the east of the course-line presumably following the clouds.  

I got isolated somewhere between groups so I flew largely alone on the task line until I managed to sort my shit out.  True to form the famous flying Belgian camera man, Phillipe Broers, was flying circles around a scrappy gaggle in some broken lift trying to get some footage when we hit the two BIG climbs which put me into contention for a flat out sprint over the last 30km to goal.  FelixR took it from me by a minute followed by JacquesF and the rest of the usual suspects.  Noriko beat Laurie and Emi into goal in the women's category.  

Chateau Marx was very well represented on the leader-board yesterday with all of the inmates posting good performances.  This made for a festive evening feast of sea-food pasta and good company.  Peter Prukl and his father Dieter Memmert were visiting having flown in on their gliders from Spain.

Dieter Memmert Aviator Extraordinaire!

Peter flies a classic Motor-Valk motor glider and his dad a sleek racing Ventus 2CM with launch motor.  Dieter has ten thousand hours flying gliders since 1953.  He has more than a dozen world records to his name including a mammoth 13 hour 2,193km distance record which he flew in 2005 in Argentina @ altitudes up to 9,000m.  He recently set a new 500km out and return speed record of 224km/h at the age of 80!! We accompanied the father-son combination to the airfield to see them off on the rest of their journey together.

Launch time (photo Pepe Malecki)

The enormous yellow aircraft in the background is a fire-fighting amphibious air-plane called a Canadair CL-215 which first flew in 1967.  There are two stationed at the airfield here.  Powered by two massive radial piston engines which generate more than 2,000 HP each, this behemoth can scoop 6 tons of water into its tanks within seconds flying at eighty knots skimming the surface of the water. The pilot on call was kind enough to show us around.