I had a really good year in soaring with a number of great memories.
I think my favorite for this year was watching my friend Walter Cannon fly our 1-26, serial number 2 at the IVSM. It had been 61 years since he last flew that same glider.
Priceless.
Anybody else have a great 2016 memory?
Happy New Year to all my soaring friends
UH

On Thursday, December 29, 2016 at 4:07:53 PM UTC-6, wrote:
> I had a really good year in soaring with a number of great memories.
> I think my favorite for this year was watching my friend Walter Cannon fly our 1-26, serial number 2 at the IVSM. It had been 61 years since he last flew that same glider.
> Priceless.
> Anybody else have a great 2016 memory?
> Happy New Year to all my soaring friends
> UH

One of my highlights was flying your 1-26, #2 at IVSM. Hopefully in 60 years I get the chance again :)

Others...
500km thermal flight in February
400 Mile flight to "fly home" after the Uvalde Nationals were called
Soloing a 15 yr old (my youngest student to date)
Diamond Altitude in Oklahoma

Sports Class Nationals memorable flight all the way across the Catskills. Spectacular. First day prestart and first two legs in wave above the clouds a close second. All done in the LS4 that we completely refinished as a club project last winter. Not too shabby.

P3

Bruce Taylor's Open Class Nationals day win on June 24 in my "little old" ASG29. A good comeback.
Jim

On Thursday, December 29, 2016 at 3:56:11 PM UTC-7, Papa3 wrote:
> Sports Class Nationals memorable flight all the way across the Catskills. Spectacular. First day prestart and first two legs in wave above the clouds a close second. All done in the LS4 that we completely refinished as a club project last winter. Not too shabby.
>
> P3

Ah, Sports Class Nationals 2016(also know as the bus class) were Uvalde, Tx..

On Thursday, December 29, 2016 at 5:07:53 PM UTC-5, wrote:
> Anybody else have a great 2016 memory?
> Happy New Year to all my soaring friends
> UH


May 8:
I got to watch this little piece of history: https://youtu.be/slCANaejPCM

then sat down to breakfast, rigged and watered my own ship, took off nearly 3 hours later at a leisurely 09:47 local and flew 1240K myself. Next year I'll go earlier!

June 17:
763K out of little old Post Mills, VT, including a 600K declared triangle. You don't know what's possible unless you go out and try....

All season: watching a bunch of club mates climbing the XC learning curve fast and going far.

Dessert: Hopping rides in the back of the L-19 at Mt Washington on a glassy smooth, gloriously blue (and red, and gold day). I was making 6000' tows to the summit and took the opportunity to turn a bunch of newcomers onto aviation on a beautiful New England Fall day. Smiles, all around.


-Evan Ludeman / T8

At 23:08 29 December 2016, Tom Kelley #711 wrote:
>On Thursday, December 29, 2016 at 3:56:11 PM UTC-7, Papa3
wrote:
>> Sports Class Nationals memorable flight all the way across the
>Catskills.=
> Spectacular. First day prestart and first two legs in wave above
the
>c=
>louds a close second. All done in the LS4 that we completely
refinished as
>=
>a club project last winter. Not too shabby. =20
>>=20
>> P3
>
>Ah, Sports Class Nationals 2016(also know as the bus class) were
Uvalde,
>Tx=
>..
>

What P3 meant to say was Club Class Nationals at Wurtsboro, NY.

RO

Still hypoxic from the wave.

While it's not a huge flight in many respects compared to others in 2016 I was finally was able to fly a solo out and in from IYK to Mt Whitney and back to IYK.

http://www.onlinecontest.org/olc-2.0/gliding/flightinfo.html?flightId=795369524

Got current after a few years not flying sailplanes. Took my daughter for her first ever flights. Reinstated my CFI-G. Great year for me.

On Thursday, December 29, 2016 at 5:07:53 PM UTC-5, wrote:
> I had a really good year in soaring with a number of great memories.
> I think my favorite for this year was watching my friend Walter Cannon fly our 1-26, serial number 2 at the IVSM. It had been 61 years since he last flew that same glider.
> Priceless.
> Anybody else have a great 2016 memory?
> Happy New Year to all my soaring friends
> UH

finished my gold badge with a wave flight to 13,000 feet off of a "ridge tow" at harris hill in late march!

Flying my ASK-13 "Cabriolet" convertible sailplane off of Harris Hill (Elmira, NY) at the International Vintage Sailplane Meet in July 2016. Made 33 flights taking young and old aloft to share the open cockpit experience. I had scattered Fritz Compton's ashes on the crest of the hill so every launch out over that beautiful valley was very special.

In January I finished up refinishing my 1975 Pfeiffer Trailer, then finished up my ticket at Seminole Lake in February. While at Seminole Lake I got my Bronze Badge and soared 4 hrs. I think I could have gotten my Silver but had to leave early due to family emergency. I then took my 10yo son up in the club 2-33. Took a road trip to ridge soar and ended up soaring at 5 different sites by May. Met a lot of fine people this year.

79

On Thursday, December 29, 2016 at 5:07:53 PM UTC-5, wrote:
> I had a really good year in soaring with a number of great memories.
> I think my favorite for this year was watching my friend Walter Cannon fly our 1-26, serial number 2 at the IVSM. It had been 61 years since he last flew that same glider.
> Priceless.
> Anybody else have a great 2016 memory?
> Happy New Year to all my soaring friends
> UH

i forgot a really good one!

Was on my honeymoon with my wife in hawaii. we met an older couple vacationing at the same resort. we did the standard where are you from routine, and it turns out that they are from Odessa Texas. i asked them if they ever heard of a glider pilot named Wally Scott, they said "Scott? SURE! we used to live right down the street!"

that was pretty damn cool.

Acquiring a hangar and a Stemme and, with 2 1/2 months experience in it,
flying it 643 km in the Sangre de Christo mountains of northern New
Mexico
<http://www.onlinecontest.org/olc-2.0/gliding/flightinfo.html?dsId=5086544>.

On 12/29/2016 3:07 PM, wrote:
> I had a really good year in soaring with a number of great memories.
> I think my favorite for this year was watching my friend Walter Cannon fly our 1-26, serial number 2 at the IVSM. It had been 61 years since he last flew that same glider.
> Priceless.
> Anybody else have a great 2016 memory?
> Happy New Year to all my soaring friends
> UH

--
Dan, 5J

My now 4 year old son Samuel took his first glider ride with me in a car seat in an SGS 2-33 just as I did with my dad back in the late 70's.

My twin daughters Genevieve Cirrus and Aveline Libelle Schrader will get their first rides in a sailplane in 2017. I can hardly wait to bring in the New Year!

- Chris Schrader (B2G)

On Friday, December 30, 2016 at 11:24:06 AM UTC-8, wrote:
> My now 4 year old son Samuel took his first glider ride with me in a car seat in an SGS 2-33 just as I did with my dad back in the late 70's.
>
> My twin daughters Genevieve Cirrus and Aveline Libelle Schrader will get their first rides in a sailplane in 2017. I can hardly wait to bring in the New Year!
>
> - Chris Schrader (B2G)

This soaring year was special for the people I got to spend it with.
Nephi Nats with my father and my two best friends whom I've spent my entire flying career with. Lots of good friends and happy times at both Ephrata and Nephi. And yes, some kick ass flights too. Darn near made 100 mph on a contest task this year. Fun, fun, fun.

Here's to the next year!

7Q

In 2016 I finally got a chance to use a tail chute on landing thanks to a fellow club member who asked me to fly his Phoebus C. I've wanted to do that since I first saw a picture of an ASW-12 on approach in an encyclopedia I got when I was eleven years old.

The best thing I did in 2016 was going to Albert Lea for the region 7 contest with my buddies Jim and Steve. The weather was great, but the support, mentorship and time with friends, old and new, made it very special.

Something similar to this should be published in the Janunary issue of Soaring (maybe limited to 200 characters per post)

So many great memories of hanging out and flying with many of you,
at Winter Haven, Seminole, Bermuda High, Nephi, Ionia, Uvalde, and
of course the Fitchburg Gliding Club. Special memories:

At Bermuda High in South Carolina:
Flying an entire task in wave, watching all the tiny gliders way
down there and laughing so hard I had trouble flying:
http://www.ssa.org/Contests?show=blog&id=4169
Skirting a T-storm to squeak home:
http://www.ssa.org/PhotoGallery.asp?category=contest&id=2311#31

Flying my new ArcusM around a Nephi task at 103.97mph and just
beating Uys Jonker. Used 3 thunderstorms plus a convergence line!

Introducing a few folks to high-performance soaring in the ArcusM,
at Fitchburg and during contests at Nephi, Ionia, and Uvalde.
Eyes as big as dinner plates from the intro during the above
flight at Nephi!

Happy New Years all,
Best Regards, Dave "YO"

Great memories of flying Nephi Nats standing in first place on Day 4 in my D2A. On the next day I forecasted the most AWESOME conditions of the contest, June 27th... where I then managed to land out at the base of Fool Peak, an alfalfa farm just east of Delta, UT!

On the Tehachapi Dust Devil Dash day, Sep 10th, Jim Staniforth (JS) and I made a delightful X-Country from Inyokern to Minden... spent the night... flying back the next day around thunderstorms. Had a wonderful reunion with the Minden community including dinner with Tom Stowers.

Overnight X-country O&R team fling to a neighboring soaring center is a great way to have fun!

Best New Years to all...

Walt Rogers "WX"

Driving across the country for 3 days to the Nephi nationals with my brother, Mark, retracing and sharing our path 35 years earlier to the Minden 15M nats in 1981, the year after our father crashed. Like Minden, Nephi was both exhilarating and discouraging but the road trip and experiences were priceless.

Chip Bearden

Well... This is easy: my license! :-)

--
Jacopo

> Anybody else have a great 2016 memory?
> UH

For me one highlight was getting the weather and timing to line up for a nice ridge flight with the trees at peak fall colors, getting to fly with my friend Dieter's maiden flight in his new glider, seeing 2 bald eagles and capturing a good amount of it on video. I had made the camera mount a while ago, so it was rewarding to have it work.

Chilhowee Ridge Soaring over the Autumn Colors
https://youtu.be/A2zcEt7OMts

Chris

I flew a sailplane that I designed and helped build, and it was about the sweetest flying glider I've flown.

The best part of 2016 was the part after I completed refinishing my ASW-19. It turned out great, but I sure enjoy flying it more than I enjoyed sanding and painting it!

> Anybody else have a great 2016 memory?
> Happy New Year to all my soaring friends
> UH

My week out at Moriarty for the OLC camp was pretty damn sweet, in spite of, or maybe because of, the persistent cells.

Flying 100 miles under solid overcast at Perry was pretty cool, too.

Tim
1FL

Flying a double crossing of the North Cascades in Washington State in the latter part of August in my trusty old LS3.

Ron