Spring Flying at Arlington

Fred Hermanspann

The long awaited spring flying is finally here and has allowed already quite a few XC flights.  The best day so far was on March 19, when Brad Hill made a 252.9 km flight (for 318.5 OLC points).  And on March 23 there was a formidable lineup of 10 sailplanes waiting for some favorable conditions.

When soaring conditions finally developed, they came with very strong easterly winds, remarkable turbulence and extraordinary ups and downs.  It still resulted in a number of good flights and Chris Young posted the best OLC flight in the USA!

So, while the distances achieved so far from AWO may not seem to be that impressive, the WBC 2011 is shaping up nicely, see below.  And with longer and warmer days ahead we can look forward frequent updates of this list.  Even more so, once all the pilots have familiarized themselves with the revised OLC rules regarding the bonus triangle.

WBC 2011 (as of 3-25-2011)   OLC rules

Brad Hill                               Apis 13                 Mar. 19                 252.9 km              318.5 pts.

Ron Clark                             LS-3                        Feb.18                  202.7 km              221.8 pts.

Chris Young                        LS-8/18                 Mar.23                  182.6 km              200.6 pts.

Fred Hermanspann         Apis 13                 Mar.23                  161.4 km              188.4 pts.

Dan Housler                       Cirrus 17.7           Mar.23                  168.2 km              182.6 pts.

Heinz Gehlhaar/ J. S.      DG-1000               Mar.23                  166.0 km              161.8 pts.

Dan Teifke                          ASW-19                Mar.23                  135.1 km              147.7 pts.