Author: Sean-Verse

Thank You For Your Outstanding SSA Contest Reporting Lt. Cmdr. Richard Owen.

Rich Owen (Orlando, FL, ex Navy and Delta Pilot) deserves some serious thanks from the contest pilots and soaring competition fans of the USA/SSA for his steadfast commitment (and writing talent) in writing outstanding contest reports for the SSA contests he attends (many or most) including the seniors championships, which he also essentially runs. Rich puts an enormous amount of effort into writing the daily contest reports for all contest he attends (as well as some others I believe). Thank you sir! Your efforts and time commitments during these already time consuming contests are tremendously appreciated.

Fatal Sailplane Crash in NE Colorado USA Near Wellington just S of Wyoming.

Pilots identity still unknown as of this publishing. My friend deepest sympathy to his/her family, friends, and colleagues. It always hurts when a fellow sailplane pilot is injured in this sport we all love and cherish. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/glider-pilot-killed-near-colorado-wyoming-state-line/ar-AA1g8ag4 https://youtu.be/kPuHQRpOzhU?si=YcT-SBVUfs-kakG-

The Affirmative Action Woke Idiot Clown 🤡 Science Officer Makes a Fool of Himself AS USUAL

Neil De Grass Affirmative Action Token Science Idiot makes a complete fool of himself as usual.  Here we see the black astronomer weight in on sex, transtesticles in sports, and basic human common sense regarding testosterone and genetic sexual makeup by “saying there is something wrong about classifying men and women differently in highly physical sporting ⚽️ 🏈 🏀 competition.”  Tyson is an idiot of COSMIC proportions, similar to most democrats.  What an idiot.  What a joke. https://youtu.be/PIzFTSa5Dfc?si=DnUyX5nPCQ4oScLx .

Young Adults Meet the Reality of Liberal Democrat Anti-Growth Policy, and Utter Stupidity and Lies, At Literally Every Turn, for the Last Several Decades

  https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/western-world-about-deliver-some-very-bad-news-its-young-adults The Liberal Democrat policies of Carter, Clinton, Obama, and Biden, and Democrat Idiocy in general, finally have come home to roost for the youth.  How will they react?  Will they wake up?  Or will they call back asleep and keep hitting their bongs?    

We did it! US 18m Class National Champion 2023 Uvalde, and a “3-Peat” Completing 3 National Championships in a Row!

https://www.soaringspot.com/en_gb/usa-18-meter-nationals-and-uvalde-glide-uvalde-garner-field-2023/results/18-meter/task-11-on-2023-08-25/total The final day was just short of a 400km racing task.  As they say in auto racing it’s often hard to take your foot off the gas and not push 100%, and it throws off your rhythm.  This was probably a little true.  I took a little extra height in most climbs, especially my final glide climb, which I went to +1500 ft., and this cost me slightly in speed today as we all know it does.  But in my defense I was trying to protect against weak spots ahead of which there were several today costing a few some serious points.  It was awkward but I got the job done.  Again never really getting critically low (my theme for the contest) and keeping the flight low stress. I certainly could have pushed much harder, and it was nice to have some lead to expend.  That said it’s never fully comfortably and my closest competition definitely made a push and gained a few points, certainly more than I would have hoped.  But, at the end of the day, we got the job done and the future looks bright for team 7T. Huge thanks to the organization here at Uvalde led by Mark Huffstutler.  Mark is the man here in Uvalde and without his passion there would be no major event soaring here in Uvalde.  He has run two world championships here (1991 and 2012) and is running what will likely be his last next summer (2024).  A Herculean effort.  Thank you Mark! Running any major soaring contest requires an incredible effort from a huge amount of people who literally give up two weeks (minimum) of vacation to work hard in numerous contest support rolls.  Sherman Griffith was our Contest Manager, responsible for operations and did a fantastic job.  This was a safe, accident and incident free contest! Ron Gleason from Utah was the scorer.  He managed both winscore for the official SSA scoring and SeeYou and SoaringSpot.com in parallel in preparation for the 2024 FAI World Soaring Championship Uvalde USA next summer.  Scoring is a very time consuming role and Ron was up in the early am and late in the evening checking logs and managing penalties.  Huge thanks Ron. Rich Owen was here flying with Pete Alexander in the 20m and spent an extraordinary amount of time throughout the entire event putting together daily and sometimes twice daily contest reports that were highly entertaining and incredibly complete with info from the days winners on how each task unfolded.  He really works hard on those reports and I (and all the competition pilots, their families, friends and the sport as a whole) are all incredibly appreciative of the work Rich puts into helping the soaring community share in our event.  Rich does this at every contest he attends and has been doing this for the last four or five years.  That is enormous dedication.  Thank you VERY MUCH Rich!!! The rest of the volunteers are too numerous to name.  Tow pilots and clubs who sent their tow planes.  Line crew, social crew, registration, and dozens of other folks who donated their time to help put in a fantastic event.  THANK YOU ALL! To the other pilots and teams, this was an awesome contest flown at a really high level.  It was extremely competitive.  We are ALL continuing to improve and the level is getting extremely high!  It was an extraordinary pleasure flying with each and all of you! Finally, huge thanks to Tiffany and Vaughn for their time, their love and their patience with me! Sean 7T - ASG29

2023 USA 🇺🇸 18 Meter Nationals Results after Task 6

https://www.soaringspot.com/en_gb/usa-18-meter-nationals-and-uvalde-glide-uvalde-garner-field-2023/results/18-meter/task-6-on-2023-08-21/total https://members.ssa.org/ContestResults.asp?contestId=2548&ContestDetailId=30585&ContestName=2023+18%2DMeter+Nationals&ContestDate=8/21/2023&ResultsUpdate=True  

2023 USA 🇺🇸 18m Nationals Uvalde Results thru Day 3

Rest day today.  Results below (screenshot). Unofficial but VASTLY SUPERIOR SoaringSpot.com link here (SSA stubbornly refuses to use it): https://www.soaringspot.com/en_gb/usa-18-meter-nationals-and-uvalde-glide-uvalde-garner-field-2023/ UNUSABLE to public SSA link here (facepalm 🤦‍♂️): https://members.ssa.org/ContestResults.asp?contestId=2548&ContestDetailId=30437&ContestName=2023+18%2DMeter+Nationals&ContestDate=8/18/2023&ResultsUpdate=True  

2023 US 18m Nationals Results thru Day 2

The SSA website locks the result info (highly disappointing for those of us who want to share our sport openly) so you likely cannot see the links without paying an $80 membership fee, and they don’t use International Standard Contest Scoring Site, SoaringSpot.com, a scoring site which is well known, public, open, and highly professional…but here is the SSA results link even though you likely can’t open the link 🧐:  https://www.ssa.org/racing-results/

2023 Canadian Nationals Day 4 (Task 3) Recap

Did a video recap today, watch below.  Scores under that… https://youtu.be/pxVO06X0w2M Full results and data on soaringspot.com @ Canadian Nationals Day 3 Results Overall Results Pic of XG on leg one…       More  

Canadian Nationals Race Day 3 Morning

Looks like a convergence day in a narrow corridor (photo 1) to the west of rockton (Sosa).  Narrows more later in the day.  See photo 2 at 430pm.  As always it will be tricky and tough Canadian competitors who know this flying area like the back of their hand…        

Canadian Nationals Day 2 (Task 3) in the books

Congrats to Sergei and Jerzy and all.  Difficult day.  More reporting added here soon on the task itself.  Photos just below are approaching the top of first turn area with scattered heavy showers to navigate around…dicey! SEEYOU DATA - https://seeyou.cloud/flight/public/6iBA3secPdDgevpGEMDMfk# OVERALL SCORES - https://www.soaringspot.com/en_gb/canadian-nationals-2023-rockton-2023/results/18-meter/task-3-on-2023-08-01/total DAY 2 SCORES - https://www.soaringspot.com/en_gb/canadian-nationals-2023-rockton-2023/results/18-meter/task-3-on-2023-08-01/daily

Save from 150m 😱 – Canadian Nationals 2023

Long story short, a rain shower (moving south) split the first turn area.  I wanted the distance due to the undercalled 2.5 hour MAT (with showers limiting the final southern turn area) so I went to the left (downwind) side expecting better lift.  This was some risk as the majority of the course and the cu field was right, but this would cost almost all the available distance for the first turn area.  Unfortunately something changed as I committed to the left of the rain shower and the good clouds decayed rapidly leaving me only one option, press forward for the back side sun.  I reached the back clouds at roughly 500 agl but the gamble worked and the thermal was 3.1 knots for 3500 feet.  Lucky, but I had the distance and was able to nearly max the larger second turn area and get back on time.  Won the day!

Day 4 Canadian Nationals

Great soaring weather today but a flooded airport forces another scrub of the day.  😢 Huge thanks to the SOSA club for hosting this contest.  They are doing everything they possibly can but a glider contest on a wet field will completely destroy it, and that’s simply not worth the cost.  So we have Friday as a backup day, 5 remaining possible flying days, and must get 4 competition days in to have a valid contest.  Obviously I am a guest so no biggie, but it’s still hugely valuable for me to fly with the excellent Canadian team pilots leading up to the US 18m Nationals in Uvulde, TX in a couple weeks…

Canadian Nationals Contest Day Three ☔️🌧️⛈️💧☔️🌊

It’s still raining and the SOSA field is wet.  As you can see from the radar a huge amount of rain has fallen last night and this morning with obvious effects on the soaring conditions moving forward.  Also an issue if the grass airport doesn’t dry out before tomorrows gridding process.  They may have to call a potential great weather day if the field is so wet cars and gliders will damage the field. Enjoyed yesterdays short flight.  Learned my K2 batteries (vintage 2017 and 2019 have expired) do not deliver reliable stable power anymore as my voltage quickly fell from 13.2 to 11 in an hour.  Fortunately Dave S of F1 Corp had new K2 batteries here on site!  All set for Uvalde in August. Sean 7T  

Day 2 Canadian Nationals

We launched today (both classes) at 2pm!  But it was weak (barely soarable at first) and the days weather window was extremely tight with a forecasted collapse of soarable weather by 5pm and a minimum required task distance of 140km (to get a valid day per the Canadian rules).  Dave Springford completed the task, but Joerg Stieber had to start his sustainer motor.  So it was just barely achievable.  I flew 50km out to the first turn and headed home to fight another day despite both classes tasks being cancelled.  A good trial run but no need to risk a land out. Tomorrow questionable, then GREAT post cold front soaring weather all next week!  Fingers crossed. Sean  

2023 Canadian 18m Soaring Nationals Day 1

Day 1 - Cancelled on the grid.  FLAT TIRE DRILLS   …A bit of fire smoke, a bit of 30kph SW wind (which here just W of Hamilton and just N of Lake Erie which will eventually wash out the SOSA area of thermals so the launch window is time limited), and an approaching strong line of frontal storms described as a “squall line” by weather services, resulted in a fairly early call of the day by our expert past champion CD (Contest Director) Ed Hollestelle.  The sniffer (single pilot launched before the full launch is opened to check the soaring conditions) was seeing 30kph at 2000 AGL and was struggling to find 2 knot climbs and not be blown into the Kitchener class C airspace which guards the NW (and Toronto the NE).   To make matters worse, we had flatted our trusty main tire 🛞 (original I believe) as we pushed the glider its final few inches into our grid position creating a high pressure race against time for an expected noon launch time (around 11:15am).  We had to move the glider in front of us on the grid forward, and get our trailer positioned in order to use our trailers cradle-jack to lift the main wheel off the ground and begin the replacement process.  The German engineers who designed the ASG29 wheel and brake system received several course words from team 7T as we learned under pressure how to disassemble the main wheel/brake assembly.  Huge thanks to Jerzy S (XG) for lending us his spare complete main wheel assembly and saving us from having to change our tire and tube.  We would not have made the launch without that kind gesture. We got very wet in our “wing water puddle” which we were forced to dump in order to get the glider up on the trailer.  Some muscle from the other pilots helped this process.  Most of the process was easy, but getting the brake assembly and axle lined up and back onto the wheel fork is extremely tedious.  It’s a rubics cube of positioning 5 parts in sequence and is NOT in the manual.  Fing Germans.  😂 After the task cancel meeting we got to do it all over again.  We had to change the tire and tube on our hub so we could return the spare the XG.  That process was far easier with the experience of the grid change.  Huge thanks to TF for the help on all of this!   Todays weather looks like another cancel, and it’s already wet, and the misquotes are vast.  Hopefully it will dry out now.  More as soon as I have something to report. Follow the contest “officially” here on SOARING SPOT - https://www.soaringspot.com/en_gb/canadian-nationals-2023-rockton-2023/ (Great to see the Canadians (thanks Dave!) adopting the global standard for contest scoring and reporting rather than creating an obscure, unusable, and unfindable outdated website for scoring and reporting like the Soaring Society or America defiantly does… 🤦‍♂️)

2023 DF95 Globals Results

Finding these results is EXTREMELY difficult considering the importance of this event in RC Sailing. This post is mainly a bookmark for me on this blog. It is amazing how people are allowing corrupt, censorship and propaganda ridden social media sites to be the repository of their information. Those of us with a brain have been moving away from social media for years for these reasons, and innumerable others... Craig Richards, 2023 Globals Champ. Darn good sailor, great teacher, Bravo Craig! https://www.sail-world.com/news/262191/DF95-Global-Championship-overall Overall Results: PosNatSail NoHelmPts1GBR5Craig Richards462GBR51John Tushingham653USA142Peter Feldman1024AUS719Chris Dance1145SWE121Michael Collberg1296USA111Sean Fidler148.37USA155Mark Golison1528SWE301Thomas Enwall1659GBR87Shaun Priestley21510SWE1Magnus Bood22611GBR33Mark Dicks22912NOR190Odd Ornulf Stray24213GBR20David Potter24414FRA49Gerald Rogivue26815NED180Tjakko Keizer27016SWE93Rolf Andersson28517RSA85Roy Gardener31118GBR12Buzz Coleman319.819SWE15Peter Freden34020USA11Brig North35021AUS272Richard Fisher35322GBR84John Brierley36423GBR83Ken Binks418.624GBR214John Taylor43425ITA130Paolo Cappa46026GBR840David Fowler46827GBR330Dave Burke49328SWE58Ulf Lindberg51229NZL23David Lindsay52330RSA6Bruce Schnell52331USA101Chuck LeMahieu52532SUI43Gregoire Pilly531.333GBR358David Adams55034AUS36John Wyatt572.735GBR46Mick Chamberlain606.936AUS801Phil Burgess60937USA720Reichard Kahle61438IRL52Martin Gray61439FRA82Erwan Le Bot617.340USA466Gary Winton648

DF95 Globals Summary (After two long days)

-in short a fairly complete shitshow of many, many fouls and 3-5 general recalls every start, and a 10-15 minute delay after almost every A and B fleet race to sort out the inevitable 2-3 formal, unresolved protests. The organizers and RC are doing a fantastic job of managing the protests and running the races, it’s the sheer volume of contact, fouls, and protests that is causing me to reconsider here. These boats can take a huge amount of punishment. And with that I think the fleet takes far to many “liberties…” To put it more succinctly, this is a joke. DAY ONE, GREAT UNTIL IT WASN’T: Day one went well until a SWE sailor (121) chose to come into the weather mark in A fleet on port, in strong A rig breeze, in a suicidal effort to cross a solid line (virtually bow to stern) of 6-7 starboard tack boats (including me). It was like a Kamikazee attacking a ship really. He had absolutely no chance and rather than tacking early he dove down straight into my boat at the last second in a impossible effort to duck and hit his victim (me) nearly bow to bow creating a massive head to head collision with our keel fins. Another boat was also effected. We then, of course, locked together and drifted into the shore, with him sawing the sail winch constantly for 3-4 minutes trying to get the boats to break apart. My boats rudder, keel fin, keel bulb, and hull were all damaged as the boats banged into the sea wall for several minutes (mine of course along the wall) on the other side of the pond before being rescued by a powerboat. He then chose not to withdraw and tried to get out of the protest (went to the hearing, tried to get away with it) creating another 10-15 minute post race delay. I WASN’T ALONE: He was also involved with another protest which he lost before my protest was heard, which he also lost. Apparently that happened before my incident. This guy is a special one. I was in 7th place at that time of the foul, on a clean, conservative starboard layline. I was in a very good overall position at that point, but the redress “award” 🏆 did not save me from being driven down to the dredded “B fleet” which is even worse that “A fleet” in terms of fouls. DAY 2: That brings us to Day 2. Fortunately I was allowed to replace my keel fin (at my expense). My rudder was loose and I had to work to fix it in the morning. Somehow my boat seems to leak now, not sure why. Keel trunk seems loser. The breeze was up today and the wind slightly diagonal across the long rectangular (30 degrees right of straight down) pond creating a bit of a one sided racecourse were the best wind is on the left edge and starboard tack is the long tack, 70/30, minimum. The starting line extends across most of the width pond but the windward or boat end is considerably closer to the windward shore and sits in a slight hole essentially. This improved slightly during the day as the wind backed left slightly, but you get the idea. This creates a lot of congestion. I’ll talk more about the port end starts and the room to tack circus 🎪 clownshow off the lee sea wall which occurs every race tomorrow. FORESTAY BOWSIE SLIP: In the first race of the day (B fleet) my forestay bowsie slips slowly during the race and I end up having no forestay tension (and therefore height). I was in 6th(ish) around the weather mark and had an fairly good shot at advancing to A. Up the second upwind it began to losen and worsened more throughout the race. I fell back slightly and missed the top 6. By the end of the race it’s hard to go upwind or tack. I wasn’t really sure what was happening. As soon as I took the boat out of the water and measured after the race I could see the mark had moved ¼ inch +. Brand new rig with 120 lb line. What a PITA. BACKSTAY BREAKS: For the next B race I round the weather mark in 6th (again and easy position to advance) and after being hit by a port tack boat (who actually did their turns) fairly hard in backstay (spinning me down and forcing me to almost miss making the weather mark) while on starboard tack going into the weather mark. The wind was increasing now and was fairly close to C rig conditions. Shortly after turning downwind and with the boat just a few meters in front of me a strong gust hit and the bow went down, the boat stopped, and the backstay broke. I actually heard the “ping!” The knot didn’t come undone, the line itself broke at the crane. I wonder if the port tack boat that had just hit my backstay in full force in top B rig conditions had anything to do with it? Lots of sideload. So, the backstay dragged along in the water behind the boat. Downwind I went with the sails trimmed in slightly to provide some rig support. I lost many places. At the leeward mark I sailed to the shore and retied the backstay which took 20 seconds and that was enough to basically be last. After relaunching I did not have enough backstay, and had to again sail to the shore and add backstay. Ultimately, I was last in B fleet and sent to C fleet. What a costly foul that was on day one. Now my redress score was basically useless. Any chances of a good score at the regatta were gone. FOULS O’ PLENTY: The amount of fouls here, and recalls, has been eye opening. And the damage a foul can do to a competitor at the right time can be significant. Obviously, I am not really enjoying this event. Let’s be honest. I feel it is a shitshow. I think RC sailing has a real problem with the sheer volume of fouls committed at this level. More importantly, the sport has a problem with quantifying the net effect of the foul. It often seems the advantage is with the guy who commits the foul. He she gets the potential benifit of “banging it in there” and if it all goes tits up often can do a quick circle and be right behind (or ahead) of their victim who was playing it safe. For example, hitting a starboard tacker, knocking him into irons near the weather mark, he now cannot lay, loses 10-15 boats in the total process, doing a circle and (immediately or eventually) passing him. I’ve seen this scenario occur several times here (and I’m hardly watching any races) and nobody is calling the boat which commited the foul to relinquish an advantage over the victim boat. It’s exhausting just watching this happen and it’s really not very fun to partake in…there are dozens of other similar scenarios taking place. Perhaps 24 boats on the line is a bit too much. I’ll make the best of the rest of the sailing, assuming it doesn’t get any worse. But this is really not the most enjoyable racing. It’s more like trench warfare. And I think everyone knows it.

e-Medina 2m F3Res Maiden Flight

V and T joined me for the “maiden” flight today. The e-Medina (ARTF) was very easy to build, easy programming, excellent flying qualities. Needed literally zero trim. Slight to moderate down pitch with spoiler deployment. Needs a little elevator mix to use in competition.

2023 Soling 1m NCR

This was my first time sailing the RC Soling. Fun boat. A little quirky, but good fun. Huge thanks to Mike and Peter Feldman for offering to loan me their spare boat and to Mike for fixing it up for the event. It was perfect. http://www.suncoastmodelsailingclub.net/Regattas.html I’m #129.

Flying V Ultra Efficient Passenger Aircraft

https://www.tudelft.nl/en/ae/flying-v Flying-V Flying long distances energy-efficiently The Flying-V In the Flying-V – originally an idea of Justus Benadduring his thesis project at Airbus Hamburg – the passenger cabin, cargo hold and fuel tanks are integrated in its wing structure. The design is not as long as an Airbus A350, but it has the same wing span. This allows the Flying-V to use the present infrastructure at airports, such as gates and runways. The Flying-V carries about the same number of passengers -  314 in the standard configuration – and the same amount of cargo, 160 m3. Project leader at TU Delft, Dr. Roelof Vos: “The Flying-V is smaller than the A350 and has less inflow surface area compared to the available amount of volume. The result is less resistance. That means the Flying-V needs less fuel for the same distance.” The Flying-V is a design for a highly energy-efficient long-distance aeroplane. The aircraft’s design integrates the passenger cabin, the cargo hold and the fuel tanks in the wings, creating a spectacular v-shape. Its improved aerodynamic shape and reduced weight will mean it uses 20% less fuel than the Airbus A350, today’s most advanced aircraft. 

2022 IOM Worlds Update #2

Regatta Starts in one hour. Here we go! I have about 5 hours of practice racing under my belt. I feel fast! Lots of tuning help. I love the K2! Very comprehensive and ultra high quality. Faster in light air than has been given credit for… Wind forecast today is very light this am for the all important qualifier/seeding races. 15 boats per heat, first three go to A, last three E. 5 heats. Lots of points at stake. Will be a bit of a crapshoot undoubtedly. See wind forecast below. Yesterday Zonko (current world champ and K2 CTO) and Josip (K2 CEO) started a whats app thread sharing K2 tuning tips. See photo. This was very helpful. The K2 has a very different tuning concept where the forestay pivot height is changed both vertically and horizontally (also jib hounds position) rather than backstay and it is very effective. New concept though. i have spend an hour or so with Zhonko and he is very bright! Wish me luck! Photo of racing area at 7:30 am. Glass! Windy forecast. EO Zonkooutstanding K2 sailor message board sharing tuning tips led by K2 C

2022 IOM Worlds Update #1

New boat. Boats practicing in harbor and Worlds sailing area. View from house! Made it to Split, uneventful travel. Croatia is beautiful. It is now off peak season here and the towns are quite and peaceful

Updating SVEA J 111

Lots of items to fix and repair on this boat since its delivery. 1) no lower lowers installed.2) mainsheet broke with field repair and lost its adjustability.3) no counterweight in jib boom. 4) no gravity protection for sheets over sail winch. 5) extend mast base rail6) extend many servo wires

Follow me the US Team and me at the upcoming 2022 IOM World Championship

October 26 - November 4, 2022 REGATTA INFORMATION Dear sailors, welcome to the pages of 2022 IOM World championship. Please follow our page regularly for information about the Championship, Application procedures, Rogoznica, weather, accomodation and tourist information about Šibenik-Knin county. http://2022iomworlds.com/

2022 US Sailing Champion of Champions Regatta

https://www.ussailing.org/competition/championships/2022-championship-of-champions/ Thoughts on US Sailing Champion of Champions regatta. 1) amazing format, really cool how we used almost all of the 20 boats in a round robin format. 2) great competition. Many sailors trainer in MC scows for wee pre event. 3) My performance. It was too windy. I was third after day 1 but as the wind increased to over 20 knots over the final two days my 200 lbs was not competitive against 320 on the 17 of 20 boats with two crew!

Going for 100 Miles!

Back in my Ironman days a 200 mile week was common. That was 15 years ago. Since then the milage has slowly drooped off to almost zero although i must admit i forget to use Strava often. But this week I am finally starting to get back into it and measuring my mileage. This week was mostly mountain biking miles on a reasonably hard local trail so many would argue these miles are worth double! The only road ride last week was towing Vaughn around hilly Kensington in his trailer (also hard). So I am feeling proud this morning. Strava Summary

Study finds Michigan drivers BY FAR the best in USA

https://www.clickondetroit.com/news/michigan/2022/06/30/why-this-study-claims-michigan-has-the-best-drivers-in-the-us/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=snd&utm_content=wdiv&fbclid=IwAR3uPW98f2tTvRiS3MYPFaoLqIchfdzIBlybSIIa6FUbEEPo2JiKBMnlN7U&fs=e&s=cl

V11 IOM ready to rumble!

Heading to Newport RI for IOM regionals. All new winch, sheets, and spent an hour + tuning my rig to the mm. hope it helps. Nice to do this in my basement. At least it looks fast! thx Steve Landaue for the online help desk (a good hour or two of his time!).

2022 Region 4 DF95 Championship Regatta

Michigan RC Sailing Club is hosting the first-ever Region 4 DF95 Championship in Dundee, Michigan on June 17-19, 2022. The 11 competitors currently registered are some of the best RC sailors from around the USA and Canada. By regatta time we are expecting 20-30 total competitors.For general regatta info CLICK HERENotice of Race (NOR) CLICK HERETo see “Who's Registered” CLICK HERETo register CLICK HERE We look forward to seeing many of you at the event! if you have any questions email Sean (event organizer) here. Here is a video of our sailing area (Cabela's Lake). https://youtu.be/hxyuqpyfK4o

IOM Regatta Photos

A collection of photos from my first IOM regatta! I sailed Calvin’s beautiful orange V9 in Sarasota Florida’s annual event. Thank you Calvin! It's a great boat! Fond memories!

IOM “Gator 🐊 Roundup” Regatta Sarasota FL Jan 22-23

I had a bunch of fun and knocked some RC sailing rust off my brain. This was a hyper-competitive event. I used a borrowed boat (V9) which was great! The amount of fouls and “incidental contact” on the starting line was extreme and I did not fare well in that area. I had less than perfect boat control at this range and this was an area I’ll need to work on. That being said, it’s an awesome group, great class of boat, filled with many excellent sailors, and was tons of fun! I’ll be headed to San Diego in a few weeks for the next IOM event. 2022-IOM-Gator-Round-UpDownloading

BitCoin Denier’s 😂

An almost perfect parody of folks who can’t let go of fiat currency and the fact that classic fiat currencies such as the US dollar, Euro, Chinese Communist Yuan, or Russian Ruble are obviously corrupt (the last two are extraordinarily corrupt). Fiat currencies are obviously & constantly manipulated for political and financial expedience. Fiat currencies are tools (ATM machines and printing presses) for their increasingly corrupt central governments to use in order to controlled the weak and to serve and protect the immense wealth of the elites who own them (industries, banks, corporations, oligarchs) and who ultimately wish control over everything and everyone. https://youtu.be/b4VPBeBElYs

China 🇨🇳 to populate moon, USA 🇺🇸 issues “genderless” astronaut 👩‍🚀 uniforms

Space is the ultimate strategic high ground. This domain is divided into various zones. First there are the orbits around the Earth: low-Earth orbit, medium-Earth orbit, and geosynchronous orbit. Ancillary to those orbits are the Lagrange points, which are the orbits separating the Earth from its moon. Next up is the Earth-Moon system. If you control the orbits around the Earth and the Lagrange points—as well as the moon itself—you effectively have total dominance over the Earth below. Today, China is poised to dominate not just the orbits around the Earth, but the entire Earth-Moon system. The Americans, despite having won the original space race with the Soviet Union, have yet to realize that another space race is at hand. In 2018, Ye Peijian, the man charged with getting Chinese taikonauts to the moon, told audiences that China’s leaders viewed the “universe as an ocean.” Beijing believes the moon is analogous to “the South China Sea,” and Mars is akin to the Philippines. Chinese leaders, therefore, are applying classical geopolitical principles to space at a time when their space program is enjoying extraordinary success, all while the Americans remain firmly grounded (and as Washington is doing its best to complicate and stymie SpaceX through onerous regulations). Recently, China announced it was building the rocket system that would deliver its personnel to the moon by 2026. It’s hardly a far-fetched goal; the Chinese have either hit or come very close to fulfilling their lofty space policy goals since the turn of this century.  China’s rockets are essentially as advanced as SpaceX’s rockets are. As I wrote in Winning Space: How America Remains a Superpower, China’s space program is likely to overtake the U.S. program unless Washington embraces drastic changes. Yet, NASA has already announced that its lunar return mission—originally approved by former President Donald Trump in 2018—has been pushed back to the 2030s. China announced its 2026 target shortly after NASA’s disappointing news.  https://amgreatness.com/2022/01/03/china-to-conquer-moon-in-2026-while-america-makes-gender-neutral-space-suits/