Thursday July 6 - it's raining

Rain stops play: Chabre this morning

8.15am: The weather's bad. Flying anytime today looks doubtful - although never say never. Scott Barrett must be chuckling under his duvet - he is leading the competition by nearly 200 points.

5pm: It's been the same all day. Some people went rafting, others looked round the local farmers' market, others read and slept. Tonight there's a free-flight film night.

Task 6: photos, blog reports

Photos of launch on Task 6 are in this Flickr set

Oz report
"Why do I start off with Scott Barrett winning the day? Because it is news! It is news because it is against type, against expectations. It shakes up our view of the world. It isn't supposed to be happening, but it is. This is a guy who has never flown here and he's flying on a glider from the smaller and less celebrated of the two Australian hang gliding companies..."

Hang6
"At less than 300ft. with just less than a kilometer to goal, I start looking at any little open area for landing options. There are very poor options..."

Video: Meet Davis Straub

Davis Straub is a US team member and author of the Oz Report, the international hang gliding website and forum. Here he describes his flight on Task 1, landing in a creek bed ... scary ... and what the Oz Report is all about. Filmed July 1, Laragne camping.

Video: Meet Andreas Olsson

Andreas Olsson is on the Swedish team and won Task 2. Here he explains how he did it, and why the flying's much better here than at home. Filmed today, Wednesday July 2.

Task 6: 26 in goal

Up early: launch opened at 12.30pm, and most were in the air within 40 minutes. Luis Achille (Argentina) gets ready to fly.

9.30am: Most of the pilots have already gone up Chabre. Event director David Owen says the day could be better than yesterday, with less chance of overdevelopment. We'll report it as it happens. Fingers crossed.

8pm: An 80.5km task was set today. 26 pilots made goal. The route was from Chabre, to turnpoint 18 at Savournon, on to turnpoint 26 at Antenne de Roche, then turnpoint 29 to Crigne, next turnpoint 24 at Le Vireuil, before goal at Ribiers.

Launching was slow at first, with paragliders showing the inversion height by soaring along the ridge and not getting up. Slowly it broke and by 12.40pm hang gliders had started to make a move. First start gate was 1.40pm, and first pilots made goal about 4.30pm. Scott Barrett (Australia) took the second start gate at 2pm, and made goal third. Results aren’t officially out yet, but it looks like he won the day. Laragne didin’t escape the overdevelopment altogether today – the stormclouds broke about 6.45pm.






10.15pm: Official results are out, but Task 6 doesn't seem to be posted on the website. Something to do with a network cable being cut and the scorer throwing his hands up in despair, apparently. His soldering iron will be out tomorrow (that's not a joke). Anyway, Scott Barrett won the day, and the overall results are:

1. Scott Barrett, Australia, 2717 points
2. Balazs Ujhelyi, Hungary, 2539 points
3. Dan Vyhnalik, Czech, 2513 points

Scott has quite a lead.

Pizza and paella - stolen by Irishman

It was the pizza and paella party last night, with tables and servers lined up in the square at Ribiers, a small village 12km from Laragne. The storms had passed, and the night was clear. It was also stolen by the Irish pilot Fran Denny, who took the stage, and the guitar, from the rather dirgy local band and played a superb set of Irish folk songs. Well done Fran. You were brilliant.

More pictures in this Flickr set.

Task 5: blog reports

The OZ report
"The rain was marching toward us from the west. As we headed out into the valley the shade came over the cauldron. Now it was looking bleak. Ali Gali, safety director, was on the radio talking with Scott, who was now at the second turnpoint. Scott was explaining to him how everything was fine where he was. A minute later Ali Gali was back on the radio and the task was stopped (the day cancelled effectively) and we were told not to go back to the campground LZ as there was a chance of a gust front there..."

Jamie Wanders
"As I was blogging inside listening to the approaching thunder and lightning, the task was being stopped and everyone was spiraling down to land as quickly as possible. Everyone here at goal managed to get on the ground before the rain and now they are huddled under their gliders sitting it out..."

Video: Meet Jeff O'Brien

Jeff O'Brien flies for the US team. Interview recorded Tuesday morning, July 1.

Dutch bloggers

Hello to the Dutch team, who are blogging at: www.zeilvliegen.nl

Task 5: task stopped

Tue July 1, 8.45am: Looks like it will be Chabre again, but with better launch conditions.

Wed July 2, 8am: Yesterday was stopped after 30 minutes due to overdevelopment. Launch conditions were better as forecast, which meant all pilots were in the air waiting for at least 45 minutes while they could have been racing. That's free flight for you... Apologies for lack of blogging yesterday. I was with Klaus Ohlmann, one of the world's best sailplane pilots, on a five hour, 170kmph, journey through the Western Alps. You can do the same with him via his club, which is 20 minutes from Laragne: www.quovadis-aero.com.

Here's Klaus flying his twin (side-by-side) seater in the Ecrins yesterday:

Task 4: blog reports

Hang 6: "Things were getting tense. The pilots behind me weren't grumbling as they could see it was blowing tail pretty well. Suddenly the streamers behind me went dead, and the ones in front were trickling in. You're supposed to ask the launch director for permission to launch, but I was so focused, I just picked up my glider..."

Oz Report: "The conditions were quite poor. Robin Hamilton came to launch and now as the pusher he had to launch or get a zero for the day. He had a little better than nil wind and ran hard down the carpet onto the scree. Soon boulders were flying every where as Robin, who had been running hard all the way, almost plowed straight into the hill..."

Jamie Wanders: And this report-from-the-hill from Jamie Shelden's blog. She is blogging from an iPhone on the hill. Where's my iPhone? I want one!

Video: Meet Bruce Kavanagh

Great Britain won gold at the 2007 hang gliding world championships, and as such are the team to beat here and next year at the world championships. They are currently in first place. Bruce Kavanagh is a longtime team member. He was kind enough to indulge us when we ambushed the team at their dinner table late last night.