JWGC 7th day of Competition

The seventh day of competition has taken place and the Junior World Gliding Championships in Elchingen are in the cruicial phase

The gaps are tight and the World Championships are still far from decided.

New Week - New Luck? After resting on Sunday, Monday was once again a truly challenging competition day featuring Assigned Area Tasks for both classes. For the Club Class the route went to Schillingsfürst then on to Eichstätt and back to Elchingen. The Standard Class flew a triangle from Elchingen to Ingelfingen then on to Treuchtlingen, and back to Elchingen. With an average of 210 kilometers in the Standard Class and 207 kilometers in the Club Class, the tasks were somewhat shorter than during the preceeding competition days. The reason were the unstable, humid weather conditions. On Monday morning, Sports Director Bernd Schmid had consulted extensively with the Munich meteorologists from the German Weather Service. Thunderstorms were forecasted for the competition area for Monday afternoon. Safety is top priority. The assessment of the weather conditions and the resulting route and distance announced for the day once again fit perfectly into the weather window. Nevertheless, a shower turned the final approach into a nerve-wracking experience for some pilots. It blocked the direct approach to Elchingen. As a result, they had to fly a detour around the precipitation area and lost valuable altitude in the process. This led to some very low and spectacular approaches.

In the Club Class, Belgium’s Michael Haemels took third place ahead of Argentina’s Valentin Pastoriza. The day’s winner in the Club Class was Czech pilot Michaela Křížová.

In the Standard Class, there were two third-place finishers from France on this seventh day of competition: Clement de Pechy and Theo Napoleon. Germany’s Max Maslak took second place, and Phillip Jonkers from South Africa once again claimed first place.

1        Jacob Bøgelund Lassen    Denmark                 Discus 2a          4,335 points

2        Max Maslak                      Germany                Ls 8 neo          4,331 points

3        Barna Hadi                       Hungary                  Discus 2a          4,305 points

The suspense continues.

One thing is already clear based on the weather forecast for the remaining week: flying will definitely continue through Friday. The coming days mark the decisive phase of this World Championship. It could thus become the most successful World Championship in terms of competition days over the past 10 years, and Elchingen could go down in gliding history as a result.