International Night ~ Revisited 
International Nite was last night from 7 to about 9 pm with the expectation of flying today. International Nite has each team bring food and drink representative of their country’s culture. We decided on a Hawaiian theme: Teriyaki meatballs with pineapple and rice, fruit skewers, and Mai Tai’s. Team USA had a wonderful International Nite!

Wildfire smoke begins to Arrive at 11:30 am

Unfortunately, the smoke from the multiple fires north of Narromine which we have been concerned about for the past few days began to arrive about 11:30 am this morning. It got more and more smokey as we approached pushback time at 12:50 pm… They delayed pushback until 1:50 pm and switched to Task B for all classes, but there was not really any change to the visibility: 15m and Standard Classes had their day canceled at 1:51 pm.

The sniffer was relaunched at 2:20 pm hoping the visibility was better aloft. It was not with less than 2 km visibility. Club Class day was canceled at 2:36 pm.

There is another daily competition on the ground: Creative Rope Award. Team USA was one of the winners for the Creative Rope Award. The weather is expected to improve tomorrow, if the cold front to our west pushes in to switch the wind direction to the west. We’ll see…

Go Team USA!

See the US Team on Instagram

WGC Australia – Team USA Page

~Pete Alexander (Team USA Captain)

No task today.

Unfortunately, the weather did not go our way today. The weather problems today are: northeast wind 10 – 15 kts gusting to 20+ and smoke rolling in from 3 fires to the north slowing the temperature rise. The temperature rise was slower than yesterday’s. This weather pattern is a very bad pattern for good soaring. If the northeast wind is not significantly diminished by late morning which it did a few days last week, you tend to get a very weak blue soaring day. This wind direction brings in ocean air from the east coast. The current weather pattern is expected to change by midweek? We will try again tomorrow.

Tonight is International Nite where each team brings food and drink representative of their country. Melissa Indrebo (89 crew) is our International Nite team lead for Team USA with help from members across the Team preparing our US inspired creations. We have a pretty cool theme. Details and photos from International Nite tomorrow. We have 4 racing days left.

Go Team USA!

WGC Australia – Team USA Page

~Pete Alexander (Team USA Captain)

No task today.

Maybe later today? Contest Management was expecting severe thunderstorms later this afternoon. They wanted to call a rest day in one of the next four days. They thought, today would be the best choice. It turns out they were probably correct when a line of thunderstorms came raging though Narromine airport a little before 5 pm with winds gusting up to 40 kts and heavy rain.

Many team members spent the day catching up on a few errands, getting some sight seeing in, or just relaxing. Most of the team members have been here for the past 2+ weeks.

Tony and Leah Condon went searching for the official Australian Akubra hats and see The Dish. The Dish is very cool! The bulk of the Apollo 11 moonwalk TV signal was received here. The Dish also spent a lot of time looking for Pulsars and Hydrogen clouds and other things out there. Others visited the Narromine Aviation Museum, which catalogs the aerodrome’s history as a WWII training base, and more. Other team members headed out for lunch at the Devils Hallow Brewery in Dubbo which is about 25 minutes from the Narromine Airport.

In the evening, there was a reception hosted by the Narromine Mayor for the Team Captain’s, Contest Stewarts, Contest Jury President, and Contest Director at the Soul Food restaurant. We had some very nice passed around appetizers and an open bar. I had the opportunity to talk with quite a few Team Captain’s about flying in the upcoming 2024 WGC in Uvalde. The Narromine Mayor gave a speech about the Narromine Airports history and the efforts which went into bringing the 2023 WGC to Narromine. They have had over 150 volunteers working on preparations and now running the 2023 WGC. Many of these volunteers have been working on preparations for the WGC for over a year. The mayor was very pleased with the efforts and results.

Hopefully, we will have better soaring tomorrow…

WGC Australia – Team USA Page

~Pete Alexander (Team USA Captain)

The weather forecast called for a low blue day, with 3-4 kt climbs to 4,000 ft (field elevation is ~750 ft), with lift shutting down at 6:30 pm. Club Class drew a 370 km clockwise racing task which took them over the notorious Macquarie swamp, a broad river valley north of Narromine known for its soft conditions. The class launched last and got on course around 3 pm, giving them three to four hours to get around.

The U.S. Club Class team, Mike Westbrook and Tony Condon, started behind the main gaggle and made good progress until their penultimate leg over the swamp, where their climbs and maximum altitudes slowed. Around 6:30 I posted myself outside the aerodrome on the primary approach vector for all classes, hoping for some good shots of the team as they rounded home. Standard and 15 Meter leaders began streaming over but there was no sign of the Club Class; another check showed them in zero sink at 1,500 ft over the swamp. A few minutes later Team Captain Pete Alexander sent a WhatsApp message: Club Class was low and selecting fields. The next report, around 7:30, was they had safely landed together about 30 miles north of Narromine.

Time to hook up the trailer, get directions from the landout office, and head out into the twilight. I followed Leah Condon and Pete von Tresckow into the outback as the sun set just after 8. We saw a couple packs of kangaroos bounding along beside the road, the first we had encountered since arriving in country. Otherwise, the flat, mainly agricultural countryside was absolutely deserted: not a car, not a house, not a light, and completely dark once the sun set. We drove for the better part of an hour, first on paved then on dirt roads, along stubble fields and a few sheep grazing in paddocks, until we finally found Mike and Tony around 9:30 on a remote dirt road (they had left their gliders and walked some distance toward the main road).

The field was pitch black, but when we shone car lights on the two gliders, great clouds of gnats gathered, coating everything, and crawling into our mouths when we dared open them. A hundred feet away from the lights, the strangely configured stars shone intensely in the moonless sky. Five sets of hands made short work of the derigging, and by 10:30 we headed for home, arriving about 11:30. Thankfully my partner Gina had made a beautiful pizza dinner which we gobbled before collapsing into bed. A third of the class landed out this day.

WGC Australia – Team USA Page

~David Hart (FY – Crew)

Greetings from Narromine, Australia!

This is your captain speaking… I always wanted to say that.

Team USA is ready to race!

Yesterday was the last practice day of the 5 day practice period. The team has been tuning, tweaking, and flying their ships all week to get them just right. We had 3 good racing days with 2 no tasking days. The team is in good spirits with all scrutineering, tuning and tweaking is now complete.

What is Scrutineering? It’s the process each pilot and sailplane go through to ensure they meet the racing requirements. To stream line this process, the 2023 WGC contest management set up a Google spreadsheet and documents drop were we have been submitting all of the required documents for the pilot, crew, and aircraft before arriving into Narromine which is a great idea. This approach was wonderful in stream lining the registration and scrutineering processes. However, it’s a little difficult to collect all of the information when you are renting a sailplane.

This evening is the opening ceremonies for the competition with 80 pilots from 21 countries. The team will be gathering for lunch shortly before heading off to the ceremonies which start at 6 pm with all of the teams marching in followed by speeches from local government officials, contest management and the FAI. The coming week is looking like good soaring for the start of the contest with temperatures reaching 100º towards the end of the week which should set up some rocking soaring.

We will be posting reports from members across the entire team to give you a flavor of the adventures and experiences of racing and living around Narromine, Australia for the next couple of weeks. We had already been posting quite a few photos on the US Soaring Teams Instagram page.

You can follow the team at:

Team News/Blog
Instagram
FaceBook
Twitter
Daily Tasks and Tracking
Scores & Tasks

We will be racing from December 3 – 15.
Go Team USA!

~Pete Alexander (Team USA Captain)

This is my first WGC, and my first time Down Under, so here are some early impressions after a few days in country.

Arriving in Sydney and spending a day at Bondi Beach was like being in an inverted, alternate southern California, with beautiful people parading along a picturesque east-facing coast and cool breezes blowing from the south.

Narromine, in the outback six hours drive west of Sydney, was more like an English country town transplanted into West Texas. White Toyota Hilux trucks with snorkels and flatbeds are ubiquitous on the local roads, and I spied one with a license plate with the logo “Victoria, Sunshine State.” Also there is the matter of the trousers crossing the road.

At the local grocery store, I struggled understanding the stock clerk’s instructions; he asked, “Do you think Australians have an accent?” No, yeah, I thought, in another case of two countries divided by a common language.

Taking an evening walk around our residential neighborhood, I was startled by enormous leathery bats winging around my head, and in the morning by the loud cries of what may have been a kookaburra bird. No kangaroo sightings yet, other than as roadkill.

Narromine Aerodrome felt more familiar, other than the flight of white and pink cockatoos beating over the tie down area. And don’t call the runways asphalt, as the local word is bitumen. Contest staff have clearly been through this drill before, and everything from registration to ground guiding to rope management to the daily briefing is highly professional. The local glider club and commercial op are posh by U.S. standards, with a large newish building, full bar, restaurant, and aviation museum.

Opening ceremonies are tomorrow, and given the prominent coverage in local media, are the biggest thing to hit Narromine since the WGC was last held here. I haven’t yet had the chance to meet teams from other nations as everyone is heads down getting their equipment and procedures ready during the practice period, but I hope to make international contacts as the contest progresses.

Team U.S.A. Club Class (pilots Tony Condon and my guy Mike Westbrook, along with us four hangers-on) is staying at a large, rented house. Last night, Tony explained cricket to us as we watched a match on the telly. Wicket!

See the US Team on Instagram.

~David Hart (FY – Crew)

G’Day Race Fans!

Today should mark official Practice Day #2. However, we awoke to rain showers, so no official task has been set. My name is Leah Condon and along with Pete von Tresckow I am crewing for my husband Tony Condon “DK” who is competing in the Club Class. This is my 2nd WGC as crew but as the first time was for a relatively small 13.5m class this is the largest contest I have attended to date.

I’d like to give you a bit of flavor or should I say “flavour” of what no fly contest days look like from a crew perspective. Tony had a nice flight in DK in Tocumwal when we picked up the glider on the 25th of November and then again had a nice flight with teammate Mike Westbrook on the 27th. As this is his 3rd time in Narromine we are not too concerned about trying to squeeze in flights on marginal practice days and have been taking our time getting the glider and trailer set up to our liking. So far, we have made and installed seals for the aileron and airbrake pushrods in the wings, sealed the gear doors, and added foam to help seal the air vent. In addition to “Operation Sealing” Pete and I took the glider trailer to get new tires after having a blow out on the way here. I highly recommend Walker Tyres in Narromine. To reduce the amount of luggage we sourced glider polish, canopy cleaner, locally and built a wing stand from a shop light. We have made numerous trips to the local hardware store already and Tony figures we only need ~ 15 more before we are all set for the comp 😊.

The atmosphere in general has been great and reminds me why it is worth taking the time off work to participate as a team member. I love getting to see old friends so far from Australia, UK and Denmark and can’t wait to make new friends. At this point I have also met everyone from our USA delegation of 16-people. We had our first full team meeting yesterday at Sarah Arnold (XBY ~ Standard Class) , Jason Arnold (XBY ~ Crew) and Pete Alexander’s (US Team Captain) lodging. Other highlights include sampling the local food and coffee scene and taking photos to share. I am looking forward to the weather improving to allow the team to fly. Just as much as the pilots need to practice, I appreciate the opportunity to practice the weighing, gridding, push back and land back retrieve protocols and am looking forward to learning team ground ops/radio monitoring and communication from Pete A. and Jason. Until next time!
See the US Team on Instagram.

~Leah Condon (DK – Crew)