 |
 |
|
By Mandy van Oostendorp and Vincent Sprungli 
The little (summer & winter) touristic town of Bright in Australia was chosen by the Paragliding World Cup Association (PWCA) Committee to start the 1998 PWC season. Bright is located between Sydney & Melbourne, at the South East side of Australia, in the middle of the only hilly area of this enormous and beautiful country. This hilly area is covered by enormous firs and eucalyptus, the slopes are gentle with a small difference in level. Pilots had to favour thermal, confluence and flatland flights and ignore the slopes where the thermals are rare.
Monday, February the 9th 
1st competition day, the Task Director Karl Texlar suggests a 90km task with an air start at 3 km from the East side of the Mystic Take off and a trip around 3 turn points located North of Bright. Hausi Bollinger as usual attacks and leads the 1st part of the task but he is traped approching Mount Buffalo and it is finally the Swedish Airwave pilot Peter Brinkeby who managed the best one the last 2 turnpoints leading in front of the Swiss Martin Wäny (Nova) and the Austrian Christian Tamegger (Edel). The first French pilot is Claude Lemaire (Nova) who finished at the 5th position. The girls also flew to goal with Claire Bernier (Edel) who finished at the 29th position followed by Louise Crandal (Nova) and Sandie Cochepain (Edel) 31st. Steve Ham the TD of this competition weighted at least 15 pilots who arrived at goal and penalised 3 pilots for an excess of ballast.
The first Koalas hunters were Walter Holzmuller & Bertrand Roche, they finished in the eucalyptus due to a 'too flat' combe for their gliders ....
Tuesday, February the 10th It is a race to goal of 72km for the 124 participating pilots. The passage of Cirrus and a sensible South-East wind changes a little bit the appearance of the thermals and Claude Lemaire (Nova) who had earlier won the 97 PWC competition in Preddvor (Slovenia) won this 2nd task closely followed by Christian Tamegger (Edel) 3rd, the French pilot Thomas Puthod who flew with the new Tigra from APCO, Claire Bernier finishes at the 13th position at the middle of many favourite male pilots. Sandie Cochepain finishes at the 45th position, they were the only girls who made it to the goal that day. Wednesday, February the 11th 
After this day there were no more tasks despite a beautiful and excellent day on Wednesday Feb the 11th, which was cancelled by the TD after the task was launched. The TD was scared about a thunderstorm rising and some cloud developments but the thunderstorm was very far from this area and it never arrived....
Thursday & Friday, February the 12th and 13th Two very windy days which didn't permit the thermals to be correctly organised and there was really nothing else to do in the air of Bright. Saturday, February the 14th 
On the last competition day (Saturday, 14th Feb) a not very interesting task was launched very early (too early) in the afternoon. The weather forecast announced that the wind would get weaker and the inversions would disapear during the afternoon, at least 10 pilots took off and landed very quickly, the TD cancelled the task instead of waiting a while...Most pilots who still were at take off were also not really motivated anymore.
The 1st 98 PWC competition took place with 2 flown tasks only. The organisers organised, during the same evening, the prize giving ceremony with an excellent & pleasant barbecue and with an Arborigan concert. Despite 2 cancelled tasks, which could have been flown, we spent a real nice time in this country and the organisers did a good bit of work. (BRIGHT - AUSTRALIA).
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
