News
Sep 2006 Update
Added on Sun 10th Sep 2006
Right, I'm going to finally write an update for this page, since everyone else on the committee is too lazy to do so!
This year has been fairly eventful, despite what you'd think from looking at this page! First off was freshers' fayre, which was once again very successful. We managed to borrow the Duo Disucs from Cranwell, which turned out to be a very successful move - it looks the part, and being a 2 seater, meant people could see that you didn't have to be at all experienced to fly with us.
Back in May 2005 we said a fond farewell to Four Counties Gliding Club, our host for 15 years, and moved to Cranwell Gliding Club, at RAF Cranwell. We have had a great first year with CGC, and received all the help and encouragement we could ask for. In return, we have injected a lot of youth and enthusiasm into their club. The annual Halloween party in October 2005 proved to be a great success at its new venue, with our traditions continuing in our new home.
James Fowkes went solo in July 2005, just in time for the Inter University competition (mentioned in the last news piece) where we provided the largest university turnout of any team. We co-hosted this week with Durham at Sutton Bank - achievements are all listed in previous news items. In October, Przemek followed James' lead and flew his first solo as well.
The first few weeks of flying back from the holidays were hectic as normal, and we showed Cranwell just how busy it could get after freshers' fayre! Winter saw some days rained off, although not as many as it could have been - one of the CGC members managed BOTH bronze legs on one cold December day! It also saw a new 2 seater arrive at Cranwell in the shape of R18 - a brand new ASK21. R35, the old K21, went to a new home with Four Counties at Wittering. Our gliders were put into the workshops at Cranwell for the first time for their annual Certificate of Airworthiness to take place. Around New Year, a few club members took the Astir down to the Long Mynd for some flying there. January and Feburary saw a lot of our members, both new and old, progress further in their training.
We paid a mini visit to Four Counties at Wittering in February, to see how they were getting on and just to see old faces again. They seem to have a nice long run to play with now, and now a new university club as well - Loughborough University joined them from Hus Bos.
Graeme converted to the Astir in March, which saw the first hints of soarable weather of the season, setting the scene for our annual trip up to Portmoak in Scotland. it was flyable almost every day at Portmoak, we all had a fantastic week (as usual), with James converting to the Astir and getting his 2 hours and silver height in the process, me getting my silver height, John Vodden and Rich Parker getting their 5 hour flights, and lots of other fantastic flights. We continued the traditions of a day in Edinburgh (Where we climbed Arthur's Seat in very strong winds!), an Indian in Perth, and lots of fun in the bar & cottage. We were joined by Steve Benn from Cranwell GC this year, who also thoroughly enjoyed himself, although we seemed to be the only university who went this time around, which was a bit disappointing - hopefully we can persuade more to join us next time!
The AGM followed this, with a new committee being selected - you can find out all about them on the Committee page.
The beginning of the summer had some pretty bad weather for that time of year, but we still had plenty of people going solo - Devin Giddings, Simon Atack and Sam Rickard amongst others! June saw all the students disappear for summer while we continued to visit Cranwell where possible. We took part in Bannerdown Gliding Club's longest day celebrations on the 24th June - Dawn 'til Dusk flying, a BBQ, Curry and a busy bar later on! A good day, despite the 4am start...
The latest event since the last update has been the Inter Uni's 2006. This was hosted in Pocklington by Edinburgh, and was a fun week despite the weather trying to persuade us otherwise! Rich Parker finally managed his 50km again, even if it was a downwind dash in the club's LS4! Just about every solo pilot who was there converted to the LS4 as well, and we sent Rosie solo later on in the week. We came 1st in the achievement's category, 2nd overall since we only had 2 cross country pilots in our team!
Freshers' fayre is once again upon us, so please sign up again if you enjoyed this year (which you did), and bring some friends as well! Let's hope we can continue the good relationship we started with Cranwell throughout 2006/07, and have another great year for the club!
Finally, sorry for the long update - I will kick the new committee into actually updating this next year...