Speed practice...

Erik, Jørgen and my self had a wonderful day at the airfild today, with speed flying all day. We had 3 winches, and made 3 starts each, and then rotated. Think we got 15-18 starts each, in varying conditions. I am quite happy... Starting to get stable with my flying. 10-12 good speeds, and the other was also quite nice. We did not take any times today, just fintuning flights in the speed course. And tomorrow the nationals starts... I am ready! (I hope...)

Update on the nordic championship F3B...

Finally I got the results from the nordic championship F3B. Impressive speed flights by Lasse Nyberg (Finland), average speed 16,13 sec! (6 rounds, one discarded).
The results was:

1 Jesper Jensen, Denmark, 14787
2 Søren Krogh, Denmark, 14650
3 Jan Hansen, Denmark, 14404
4 Lasse Nyberg, Finland, 14249
5 Søren Helsted, Denmark, 14205
6 Michael Munk, Denmark, 14122
7 Widar Holmedahl, Norway, 13804
8 Bernhard Henschel, Norway, 13236
9 Erkki Arima, Finland, 12953
10 Knut Vidar Moløkken, Norway, 12815
11 Gjermund Westad, Norway, 12778
12 Heikki Astikainen, Finland, 12150

Another day at the airfield...

Got home from work at 4 PM yesterday, and headed right to the field... Nice weather. To days task was to practice task B with different CG settings, and different ballast.
Got a lot of good flights in both windy and calm conditions, and I feel that i found out of some more things during the flights... Will see in the weekend, I guess...
Later today I am gona meet my team buddy Erik at our field, and we are gonna fly speed all day... Lot of flying before the nationals!

Made a spin...

to our local airfield this afternoon, and got some relaxing task A practise. Tried out different CG-settings on my Crossfire, as I have not been to happy with cirkeling in calm air. But out with 10 gram from the nose, and I got my self a brand new plane... (Have not measured where the CG actually is now, but my guess is around 98-99 mm.) Will put in 5-10 grams in gusty conditions, and also probably in task B and C.
Nice day with good friends at the field!
My team is also ready for the nationals... I will fly Erik Morgan (as I always do), Jørgen Busk and Øyvind Ellevog. Erik is a verry experienced F3B pilot, and has also got the campionship a couple of years back. Jørgen and Øivind is relatively new to F3B, but we did fly together at last years nationals with good results. I am really looking forward to this event!

Practice...

Last weekend we went to Cirrus RC-club's field at Spydeberg, the arena for the nationals F3B next weekend. Jo Grini and my self showed up saturday, and had some nice "task A practice". And a nice evening in the club house. With a couple of bears, and some good laughts.
Sunday we where 8 pilots and we sat up a speed-course and flew 3 starts each, 12 flights in total for each pilot.
Varying conditions it was, but nice training. I still have a job to do to get my times down a couple of seconds... But some of my starts was OK. (That is why practice is so nice, I guess...).
The plan for this week is to fly as much as possible before the nationals. If it would stop raining... Autumn in Norway is rainy! The results is found at Cirrus site (norwegian...).
17 people has filled in their application forms for the F3B nationals next weekend, and that is nice!
The nationals F3J has been moved to the weekend of 23. and 24th of september, and I also think that is nice! Probably a lot more pilots will attend the F3J event, my self included... I have made a deal (late saturday night... with JoJo) to borrow one of his Supras for the F3J event... And with a Supra and a Brio, I should be well equiped for that event also.

Photo: Me getting ready with my Crossfire. JoJo's Crossfire Extreme in front. Photo by Jo Grini.

Nordic championship F3B

This weekend it was the nordic championship F3B at Søndeborg in Denmark. Have not get hands on the results yet, but the roumors talk about danish dominance at the podium... Should have been there, but sadly it was not possible this year.
I will come back as soon as I get hands on the results.

Thursday training

In our local club, (www.vingen.no, only norwegian I am afraid...) we try to make every thursday afternoon a happy one :-) We get together at our local field, an flies to it gets dark. Yesterday 7 people showed up, with DLG's, electo's and of course som e F3J/B ships.
I had some problems with my Crossfire, the elevator was not with me at all... It "hanged" and moved slovley. Had to sand the carbon joiner a little, to get easier movement. Then every thing worked fine again. Got some nice speed-tracks, and also a couple for nice duration rounds.

F3F, norwegian championship

Then the norwegian chamionship is over. Bad conditions all weekend, and we only managed to fly 4 rounds. The wind was calm and also in the wrong direction.
Jo Grini (Crossfire) got his first gold medal in F3F this weekend, congratulations! Rolf Børge Rettedal (RaceM F3F) got the silver and Jack Farstad (RaceM F3F) the bronze medal. Ny self? Finished as 12th... With only 4 rounds I got no chance at all, but my ambitions also was low before this event. But... in round 3 I came in as no. 2... Of course I was extremely lucky with the conditions, but it was a nice experience anyhow!
Next up for me is the national championship F3B, first weekend of september. Hopefully I got some training at a speed-course before this event, I need to get my speed down a couple of seconds.
Results of the F3F championship can be found at www.f3x.no

F3F practise

A nice of me flying Crossfire at Reve... Photo by Espen Torp.

Visited Espen Torp today, and got some training at the slope at Reve. 5-6 m/s wind, pretty calm, but good practice since it has been two years without flying F3F... Competition starts tomorrow.

F3B eurotour

Just have to say... No. 171 on the eurotour... Not bad after my international debut at Ørebro this year, if I have to say it my self... :-)

Club championship 3x12

Today we had our local club championship with electro sailplanes. 3x12 minutes. I flew my Brio electric. Somehow you never get to old to do mistakes... Landing in your own leg is kind of stupid... And no landing points. Unbelivable...
Jostein Myre got the championship with his 3,45 m electro Graphite. Jørgen Busk was second with Organic, and Brynjar Pihl third with his electro Superior. I think I ended in 6th. 9 competitors today, two of them flying F5F-machines. Impressing! 20-30 sec. motor-time and full flight time, the difficult thing with those planes is the landing.
A nice evening, even if the result was not to good...

National championship F3F

This weekend I am going to Haugesund (in the western part of Norway), to partisipate in the national championship F3F. Have NOT been flying F3F the past 2 years, so the podium is maybe a little far out... But it is a lot fun to fly F3F. Sadly we do not have to many slopes where I live.
I will fly my Crossfire, I guess, with the Pike Brio and an Opus as backup-planes.