Uvalde 2024 WGC
Late Report
Day 12
The party is still going on at the Grotto, the big white tent and various team houses around Uvalde. Today there were a few changes from yesterday’s rankings. Let us go over today’s results first.
In 18 Meter Class, there were a few pilots that made big jumps in the standing. You probably saw Mathew Scutter’s Great Britian) post on his page that he flew a great flight to win the day. Christophe Abadie (France) and Werner Amann (Austria) finished in third and second respectively. Uys Jonker (South Africa) moved up 4 spots from yesterday. Also, JD Barrois (France), Lukasz Wojcik (Poland), Manu Litt (Belgium), Sean Murphy (USA), Daawid Pretorius (South Africa) and Jan Hasslid (Sweden) all moved up spots. Nice job on moving day Friday!
For the Open Class. Laurent Aboulin (France) finished in third today with Michael Sommer (Germany) in second. Winning the day was Felipe Levin (Germany). However, when the music stopped, the team of Levin and Sommer finished first and second overall for the Worlds. Felipe Levin flew a great flight, but it just was not enough to surpass the German team. These three pilots flew a very consistent and error free Worlds. Very nice job!! Sylvain Gerbaud (France), Francois Jeremiasse (Netherlands) and Russell Cheetham (Great Britain) all made good moves up the leaderboard.
In 20 Meter Class, Team USA comprised of Karl Striedieck and Sarah Arnold won the World Gliding Championship. Sarah has previously won the Women’s World Championship and finished in second in another Women’s World Championship. Karl finished second in a World Gliding Championship also. The 20 Meter Class had the biggest shakeup in the three classes. The team’s of Rubaj & Matkowski (Poland) and Lutz & Janowitsch (Austria) moved up to second and third overall in the competition. Teams Bouderlique & de Péch (France), Theisinger & Frey (Germany), Pulkkinen & Teronen (Finland), Brunazzo & Acquaderni (Italy) and Novak & Krejcirik (Czech Republic) all moved up today. A great way to finish up the competition!
Tomorrow morning at 9am will be the closing ceremonies for this World Gliding Championship, in front of the ring of flags. Missing from the ring of flags is the one that represents the FAI. This flag is always stolen during the competition and is required to be returned for the closing ceremony. At the raising of the flag during the opening ceremonies, it was almost stolen in the first 3 minutes. Luckily, Andris, one of our FAI Jury Members, stopped the thief. Many safeguards were enacted to protect the flag while it was in USA custody. The flag was pad locked to the halyard, the halyard was padlocked to the pole, the pole was coated with poison ivy extract and covered in grease. The perpetrators were very smart and just removed the pole from the ground and stole the padlock and flag. You must hand it to these wily pilots and crews. I happened to be accused of stealing the FAI flag at the Pan American Championship in Canada. It was never proven but I did have coffee in lots of Tim Horton coffee shops where the flag was photographed. This is a tradition that goes back a long way. The US organizers have offered an award to the group that stole the flag, but I do not think they will come forward to claim their prize.
Medals will be given out for the top 3 competitors and certificates will go to a predetermined number of pilots in each class. There will also be two trophies that will be presented during the awards ceremony. One is the Goran Ax Memorial Trophy which is awarded to the pilot who achieves the highest accumulated marking distance in the Open Class during the entire World Gliding Championship. Also, the Robert-Kronfeld – Challenge Cup will be presented to the pilot flying the World Gliding Championship in the Open, 18m or 20m classes that have flown the longest marking distance flight during the Championship regardless of the type of task.
That is all for tonight. I hope you enjoyed the competition through the eyes of a first-time volunteer. I have enjoyed being here and working with all these fine people. Tomorrow I will thank the organizers, but now I would like to thank my compatriot on the Media Team. The past couple of weeks it has been a real pleasure to work with Paul Remde of Cumulus Soaring. His interviews and unique photography skills certainly brought this competition to life in a way that has never been seen before.
Cheers,
Rich Owen
Media Team
