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Team GIFCOF goes to France


Graeme_M

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All,

Myself Martin and Tony are off to Toulouse tomorrow to take part in the Pyrinees Cup.

Looks to be on St Ferriol all weekend which is apparently the better slope with a bit of an edge, I'm planning on posting brief reports on the contest and our progress over the next couple of days, hopefully with a fiew pics as well.

Graeme (team coach)

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Have fun, it is the better of the 2 slopes for sure and a good edge made of rocks :). Landing is good or at least it used to be, I'm sure nothing hasn't changed. 

Really would have loved to have been joining you but sadly work said NO :(.  Everyone is very welcoming and I'm sure you will all learn loads.

look forward to hearing throughout the weekend how you get on.

all the best of luck and great conditions 

Martin 

Edited by Martin_N
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You should have a great weekend flying at St Ferriol. Paid a visit some years ago and it left a lasting impression on me. Good edge creates nice compression, it certainly had my Whisper whistling up and down. Looking forward to the pics and reports. Don't forget to buy some Blanquette de Limoux to celebrate your success!

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Graeme (team coach)

Team coach? I don't remember this being discussed at the GIFCOF AGM but probably not a bad shout given recent performances

Cant wait, being looking forward to it for ages. Will also try and get a few pics up over the next few days

Martin 

 

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Lets hope they dont split the slopes like they did at VR2010 !

The B Slope is not great if I am honest and its a long way down to get your model if its launched badly (I know I have done the walk !).

The A Slope is nice, more of an edge like everyone has said, landing on the left is easy and generally rotor free if you go back enough.

Three things that stick out for me, The chap who built the Alliaj HM (Alexis Marchell), was doing a ballistic run and flew into the hill side (There wasnt enough carbon left to make a HB Pencil), He was trying very hard !

And the other thing is, St Ferroll slope is where the British Team were handed there behinds on a Silver Platter by the French, when we first came across the now widely used EM style turn.

I know that nearly all of the Team had never seen this kind of dynamic flying at all before hand (We were all, we fly the wrecker and fly compression, reversal, yank and bank style flying.) How wrong were we and how under pre-paired we were.

(I'm sure some of the guys who went to Rugen at one of the previous VR's would have seen EM, but the guys who went to France had never seen it !)

My first impressions, was its a nice conventional edge and when I flew my Ascot when I arrived I was flying compression and the model made the right noises !

 

Next was the Vulcers, there big things and they thermal in massive groups (I have a video somewhere with at least 12 in the thermal !)

 

While I didnt enjoy all the VR, I did enjoy flying Laurac A (Not the B Slope half way down the hill, Remember the landing area ?) and St Ferroll A.

The landing at Laurac A was in a freshly ploughed field with some very nice massive flint stones in it, nice for delicate single skinned F3B models us Brits were flying :)

Laurac A is much nicer for sports flying mainly due to the pretty views out front.

 

Don't stay in the shocking hotel we stayed at (Cant remember the name), Vic Eldridge called it 'Cell Block H' mainly as it was worse the the Blythe Travel Lodge !

The guys from Hong Kong used to like dialling into there familes at way early in the morning !

 

Oh and watch out for those Whistle kids from the Himalayan area, usually found in Rick sacks taken to town for no apparent reason (Maybe had bog paper in, I will never know ! ;) )

Edited by Spoons
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really wishing I had made the effort to go there again. Video by Ced. from a while back is a great intro to St Ferriol. Fly high on right to hit the shear, and low and tight on left to get around the more difficult corner. Oh and fly right at your toes through the middle. Its all a bit scary but a great spot.

If you end up at Laurac then fly into the small bowl part way down the hill on the left turn and high EM on the right.

Best of luck and dont spend all your time on the slope the area is lovely.

 

 

 

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Hello Graeme,

leaving tomorrow morning at 7:20 from Frankfurt and we should be at 9 at Toulouse and get the car from Andreas. So see you tomorrow at the slope :-)

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Hello Graeme,

leaving tomorrow morning at 7:20 from Frankfurt and we should be at 9 at Toulouse and get the car from Andreas. So see you tomorrow at the slope :-)

Hi Daniel,

we should be getting to Toulouse about the same time, give me a call when you arrive 07711804815.

Graeme.

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Have fun guys.  Great slopes, great surroundings and some of the best hosts you could hope for around the slopes.  The slopes are easy enough to fly, but hard to extract the best times from.  Looking forward to hearing tales from the slopes, and seeing the photos.

And watch out for Andreas's aperitifs!

Simon

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Good luck team GIFCOF and Daniel - I think that you'll have a great time on those slopes. Watch out for the safety line though - I recall losing at least 200 points due to infringements at VR2010.....

Cheers,

Greg

Edited by Greg Dakin
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The chap who built the Alliaj HM (Alexis Marchell), was doing a ballistic run and flew into the hill side (There wasnt enough carbon left to make a HB Pencil), He was trying very hard 

Yah, that still makes me wince when I think about it; a fully loaded Alliaj on target for a low thirty second run, hitting granite at full tilt......ouch.

I was so impressed that I chose to replicate this achievement on home soil a few weeks later :-)

There's still tungsten at the foot of Mickeys for the lucky prospector!

Greg

 

Edited by Greg Dakin
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