The Road to Gruibingen
Or how I was going to spend 2021 flying more slope aerobatics but ended up flying thermal soarers on an airfield near Tortosa, Spain instead.
A Journey to the GPS Triangle World Masters
2020was the year where all our lives turned upside down! During the turmoil it became apparent that I could retire two years early — a purely personal decision that would halt the physical decay that driving a desk brings. Early retirement would also allow me to spend more time flying toy planes, particularly slope soaring gliders.
After the decision was made I looked around at what I would do. Initially I had some vague idea that building a new version of my slope glider from 1989 and spending many days walking up my favourite hill to fly it, that would be a good start to life without work. Inevitably I was also expecting to hoon my faster planes around in the compression zone of my favourite hills a lot more than I have in the last two decades.
I have, however, always been interested in the GPS Triangle Racing reports that originally featured just large scale gliders. A few years ago I did look at the possibilities, but they were discarded as I just didn’t have access to suitable sites for 7m wingspan gliders.
Roll on to 2017/2018 and there are reports appearing that talk about a relatively new class called Sport Class. After a bit of research it became apparent that this class was much more accessible if you don’t have an airfield with space and a runway or closely mown strip. During August 2020 I started talking to friends from my dim and distant F3F and F3B days who had taken up GPS Racing. Many long conversations later and the order for a Valenta Chilli GPS was made and I’d even thought about what international competitions I could do.
Once the calendar had flipped to October I was hooked, totally distracted — and I had not even flown a triangle yet. So hooked and committed was I that I’d even hit the enter button on the first GPS Triangle World Masters 2021 — Sports-Class planned for 18th through 21st August 2021, at Gruibingen, Germany. I knew I was retiring, I had a plane on the way and the weather from April 2020 had been incredible for practicing GPS Triangles — so 2021 would be the same.
Having read the rules, watched the YouTubes, chatted extensively with flyers whose skills I’ve always looked up to I was apprehensively confident that with enough practice I could avoid the bottom part of the leader board at the World Masters in August 2021. My biggest concern was could I still thermal soar? Thirty minutes of soaring whilst flying a distance/speed task was not something I had ever done. In fact the last time I had flown from a flat field the duration task of ten minutes was a challenge unless I was using an F3B plane and a winch. Did I mention my natural habitat was slope soaring?
During the planning for this adventure I’d reconnected with Greg Lewis over social media and the phone. We’d spent hours on the phone catching up on our lives and discussing GPS racing. Greg had dropped out of F3F racing in the early 1990s to pursue his career. He’d come back to the sport early in the 2000s and then became one of the top F5B flyers in the world. His encouragement and motivation helped tip me over the edge to commit to GPS Triangle Racing.
Much research and many webinars later I was full of virtual learning but the plane I had ordered with an expected delivery date of late October or early November 2020 had still not shipped by Christmas. Still — the weather in the UK is usually pretty horrible between January and early March — so plenty of time to build it when it had arrived.
Which it didn’t. COVID was hitting hard where it is manufactured.
Luckily, someone was persuaded to sell their Chilli and one cold wet and miserable day in February I met face-to-face with Greg Lewis for the first time in thirty years. He’d collected the Chilli from its previous owner David Woods. David had built the Chilli and tried GPS Racing but was not really using the plane. At a slope event in 2019 David and I had discussed the whole GPS Racing thing and little did I know at that time his Chilli would change hangers. So, with massive thanks to Greg and David, I was in the game. Fettling and polishing took place. New motor, speed control, GPS kit and flight batteries appeared in the workshop and took their place in the airframe.
Getting Started in GPS Triangle Racing
Before getting into this intriguing form of competition, I would suggest that you look at some of the online material. I’ll put some links at the end of this (see Resources) with my recommendations. The thing you need to consider before diving in to all the materials is your learning style. My preference is to gather, assess and question as much information as I can. The disadvantage of that approach with GPS Triangle Racing is that the amount of information can be overwhelming and in some cases even lead you down a path you may find doesn’t work for you.
Nothing beats meeting up with a couple of experienced pilots and seeing what they are doing. Luckily in the UK John Greenfield has run some excellent events where he has set out some basic information in the class room and then the participants can reinforce the learning in the air by trying out the key learning. As a community in the UK there are now several of us who will support these types of activities to help people make the first steps. Setting up the airborne kit is another area where you can work it out for yourself, which helps your detailed understanding, but it is often better to have some help so that you can avoid some of the nuances of the package.
The challenges of getting the whole GPS set up to work can burn a lot of time and having someone to help is a massive benefit.
Test Flying the Chilli
One blustery, grey day in March 2021 I was at my ‘local’ slope with the Chilli and the incredibly supportive good lady, Doctor of Chiropractic, her indoors driving the camera. As is the way, much anticipation and a little trepidation turned into a huge anticlimax. Obviously a good tool for the job, good glide angle and not twitchy to fly.
Another session on another local slope followed a few days later and this time all the GPS kit was hooked up. I flew a few triangles on the backside of the slope. Again it was blustery and the usual grey spring skies in the UK prevailed, but it was a very successful outing that allowed me to get some early understanding of the kit and the data that is available.
Finally on the 30th March 2021 Greg and I meet up at his local field with David Woods for my first attempt at GPS Triangles. The day was not great from a lift perspective and Greg only managed seven laps in the sweet spot of the day. We then flew together and he flew five laps and I managed four in the same air. Okay, this is not so bad a start. Elsewhere in the UK other more experienced GPS flyers were doing similar scores so this feels like something where I can be competitive relatively quickly. Lots was learnt during this first session, especially about high workload, and the level of information available!
Coming through the headphones are more bits of information than I have ever had when flying a toy glider. However, the ability to thermal in the plane is incredible so flying out a thirty minute task would not be a problem when the lift is there. My usual slope soaring flights tend to be forty to fifty minutes so the concentration for the task wasn’t an issue. Focussing on the audio and visual information is a huge learning curve and working out what is the most important for each part of the flight takes time. I’d rarely flown a plane above two hundred metres for over twenty years, so hitting 400m plus was a little eye opening!
When I set out on this journey my goal was 120 quality flights recorded on the GPS Triangle League site. Over and above that flying with other GPS pilots and at any event where I could develop the new skills was going to taken. You remember the plane I’d got on order? Still not made, the manufacturer was really badly affected, like many they were struggling with the effects of COVID-19 — sickness and the measures to protect their staff was having a huge effect on their operation. But, on the other hand, the importer had promised me the loan of his if my new one hadn’t appeared in time for me to fit it out and have it ready for 18th August 2021. What a fantastic offer!
Four flying sessions in April 2021 felt great. Every flight yielded some new learning and some improvement. I hit a 13 lap flight which was stunning and rewarding. Over and above that we had a GPS training event at the BMFA Centre at Buckminster. A combination of lectures, discussions and flying on the Saturday with a light hearted competition on the Sunday was fantastic. Meeting up face to face with a few more people from my flying past was a blast. John Greenfield ran the event and has been incredibly generous with his time and knowledge. He has been very successful at GPS Triangle Racing in both Scale and Sport classes so to have access to his experiences is incredible. As an aside this is one of the attractive elements of the class and community. People are incredibly open and helpful which makes this a very attractive tribe to join.
Luckily the Valenta Chilli is a well known plane here in the UK so getting a decent start point for how to set up the plane is easy. With F3B and F3F experience I was able to draw on that to get to a reasonably useable set up whilst still flying the new task. I would say though — set your plane up before you attempt triangles. Learning how to fly the task, use the technology and trimming your plane represent a very high workload. After a couple of months you will be able to draw two or three threads of information from each flight — but from day one the learning curve is pretty steep. Bear in mind also that you will likely end up with several flight modes to fine tune. I seem to have eight, although some are related, that need to be assessed and flown enough to analyse their effectiveness and efficiency. Add into that the ballast options for even more things to consider.
At the end of the April training event, where three of the four UK pilots who had entered the event in Germany were present, we had a long discussion about the logistics of getting to and returning from Gruibingen. Realistically we all knew that it was very much in the balance — but with the event being in August we had some optimism it would go forward.
Even though it was light-hearted it was still a competitive event and getting third place behind Greg and John (1st and 2nd respectively) was encouraging. It was interesting as an event because Greg creamed all of us with 1000 pts in each of the rounds. I was very happy to get within 25 points in the third round though.
Then May happened. The weather was rubbish! It wasn’t until the 31st May 2021 that I finally managed to fly GPS again. This was a competition (Challenge Cup), again at Buckminster, for the British Association of Radio Control Soarers (BARCS) Radioglide event. I had a slight technical issue with my plane and that definitely created some ripples in the force for me. However, good learning, and my preparation for events has improved as has my selection of items for the flight box. This event yielded another third place.
June was a little better weather wise and three sessions of GPS yielded some flights, but only nine that I felt worthy of being entered into my analysis tool. Analysis tool I hear you say? Well, in a competition that is about aggregating marginal gains being able to assess where to focus your efforts is important. I’ve created a spreadsheet that allows me to assess each flight for quality and identify opportunities to improve. Using the graphic on the Albatross or GPS Triangle League, the spreadsheet and your memory of the flight allows you to quickly assess and then target what you need to focus on. During June I managed to improve my indexing and didn’t have to trawl though hundreds of laps of data to see that. Additionally I was getting better at entering the course nearer the 400m maximum altitude consistently.
After a few months of flying the effort I put in early on to make sure the glider flew well showed. However there is a big take away from this class that gives you a really solid platform. Setting your plane up to be efficient and well balanced sounds obvious. In reality though it is not something that people do. One of the benefits of the tech on board is that you can work out your glide angle and speed in still air and then compare all your changes to a baseline. In addition you can take into account the turns — assuming you can fly repeatable turns at each turn point. Once you do that you can then change your control settings to maximise efficiency. Tuning out adverse yaw, excessive movements and balancing the control inputs for thermal turns is time well spent.
July was a load of saggy pants! One session and then weather and other commitments conspired against any practice. On top of that we’d had notification that the event at Gruibingen had been cancelled. Hardly a surprise, but nonetheless very disappointing. The restrictions and uncertainty around travel to and from the UK to Europe were against us.
August. Oh be still, my beating heart! Summer in the UK finally arrived and every week I got to whizz my toy plane around triangles. I hit my highest lap score in an amazing flight in lift I’ve never felt the like of before. I don’t think I’ve ever had a toy plane so high. At 800m you could hear the planes whistling. When I got home I set up a new speed flap setting, super fast! I also set my personal best for accuracy and flew an index of 114 on one lap. Nearly thirty recorded flights also brought the number of flights to near the original target per month.
With the cancellation of the trip to Gruibingen we tried a midweek event at the Phoenix MFC site. This site near London Colney is John Greenfields home field so he acted as host and we managed to have seven pilots attending and mostly seven airborne in each round. However, the weather was not very conducive and although the storm force winds failed to appear the general moistness in the air was a bit ‘meh’! Needless to say the 2016 Welt Meister (aka John Greenfield) won. Simon Thornton hit the second spot and I sneaked a third place. What is encouraging is that we had some good showings from people who have been flying GPS for a reasonable time and some really good performances from a new kid on the block. This event was a good build on previous training sessions and lots of information and coaching was passed through the community. Bringing everyone on and making things more competitive is a very good way of pushing up the standard at all levels.
The end of August brought the BMFA UK Nationals. As seems traditional for the UK this event had a forecast that inspired duvet racing rather than GPS racing. In spite of the indifferent forecast I set off for the BMFA Buckminster site at just after 0600hrs. Two hundred miles later I arrived in time for slightly moist air, low cloud and banter at 0900hrs. However, the clag started to lift and we flew. The first round at 1015hrs was not blessed with any notable lift and those of us that tried to soar handed Simon Thornton an easy one lap win, with a score of four laps.
The second round was far more interesting and in no small way due to the local farmer turning over the upwind field, which did us a huge favour. Simon Thornton, Greg Lewis and I all scored eight laps and were separated by a mere seven points. Simon and Greg took far more height, whilst I took the get moving approach. This is where analysis of data vs outcome comes into this event. If my indexing was as good as Simon and Greg’s I’d probably have won the round.
After five rounds we had a discard that, when we got to tea and medals, gave me another third place. Over and above that lots of learning about the tactics required and the areas where improved flying will yield significant gains.
Down the Rabbit Hole
Let’s be clear, at a certain level GPS Triangle Racing is about making marginal gains. However, to make those marginal gains you need to sort out a few basics. Two places where you can gain quick performance benefits in your flying are:
▪️ Getting the best start
▪️Getting your indexing/accuracy around the course consistently below 115%.
Assuming you have made your glider as efficient as it can be and can control it adequately without using too much energy the two points above are well worth practicing.
A good start in Sport Class is about your plane being as close to 400m going at as close to 120km/h as possible. Once you hear the “task started” voice prompt you then pull up to gain as much height as possible. Obviously a tail wind will not give a great zoom, but a headwind will. If you can gain 40m after the start, not stall and settle your plane into cruise you’re already half a lap up.
Indexing, or the measure of accuracy around the course, is a more difficult challenge. Your first investment is in the time you take to set your glider up. Get the glide speed right for all flight phases and make sure it tracks well. You want your plane to fly in a straight line at the best glide speed with minimal input from you the pilot. The balancing act is getting the best glide out of your plane with the best tracking and most settled handling — sometimes best glide doesn’t always mean best handling. This actually takes a fair number of trimming flights and some very accurate data analysis. Once you have that nailed your next challenge is to stick your plane on the best line between each turn point.
Even with the GPS trace showing on your ground based Android device, the audio data telling you how far inside/outside the line, and the stereo indications of on or off track for the next turn — flying a consistently low index takes practice. The main issues you will find is that you have to think about a few things whilst flying accurately to the course. They include: which trim/flight mode you need to apply; where the lift is; how you are going to use the lift; what strategy you need to apply to get the most laps at the highest speed; where the lift is going to be next lap; what the wind is doing at the altitude you are flying at and how it affects your effecting of a good course; what turn style you need for the conditions; flying your glider efficiently to minimise pilot induced losses; where everyone else planes are and what you’ve got to do to miss them and also follow the rules for collision avoidance; and whilst you’re at it — if there are any no fly zones you need to avoid them too.
So, on day one of your GPS journey that is a lot to do and you will probably struggle to put it all together. After a few flights some of the basics will get easier and for most of us the best way to improve our performance is to do enough GPS flying to reduce our workload by practicing until lots of the skills become second nature. Ultimately you need to look to maximise the attention you pay to the decision making by taking the workload of all the functional stuff down to the minimum.
Meanwhile, Back on the Road to Gruibingen
Having covered a couple of items of technique, above, it’s time to come out and get back on the road to Gruibingen. Obviously this was now route barrée. In one of the GPS groups the RC Model Flying Ranch annual Challenge Cup kept popping up. As September was yielding less opportunity than I wanted for GPS flying I mentioned the event to Greg Lewis, and with a very little planning we were booked in for the event.
At the beginning of September I managed a quick outing with my light class plane where I grabbed a nine lapper in some ferocious lift. After the flight I massively reduced the elevator travel in the GPS flight modes as the plane was extremely nimble! Life commitments and weather seemed to be stacked against me and I missed some good days. I also decided that as I was off to Spain to compete I needed to have a second plane. Luckily I was very close to finishing a PCM Elvira for GPS and as soon as the final tiny part finally made it through the post I was ready to test fly, on the 21st September 2021, loads of time before departing for Spain on the 5th October then.
As it turned out three GPS flights giving me six scores was enough. Although I was cautious with my ballasting the quality of the Elvira shone through. Nine laps on a test flight was a good start and even though I would have liked more stick time I didn’t feel apprehensive about making the Elvira my primary plane for Spain.
Taking the overnight ferry on the 5th October we embarked on three relatively easy driving days, with some light sightseeing en-route, through France. This despatched the 1400km (900miles) between home and the RC Model Flying Ranch at Roquetes near Tortosa.
As a site the RC Model Flying Ranch is best described as rural. Surrounded in the main by olive and citrus groves it is an almost perfect venue. There is decent surfaced runway and a similarly sized grass runway. A hangar and bar complex are supplemented by showers and toilets. For flyers there are tables under a sun shade. If you are looking for a fault the only one I can come up with is the tall tree that sits well within the Sport Class triangle that can obscure your glider if you are super low on the final lap heading for turn three. There’s nothing to hit but flying out of sight for quite a few seconds clenches things that a middle aged chap shouldn’t clench!
So, here we are on the 9th October 2021, standing in the middle of an airfield in Spain about to commit GPS Triangles. Although not as many as we would have liked there are enough competitors in Sport Class to give us an idea of what we need to work on for the future. There are also many Scale/SLS Class gliders at the event. Although not unknown in the UK these planes are less common, and this is a chance for Greg and I to assess them for the future. Because this is a Challenge Cup there are no defined flying slots and the trick is to fly when you can get the best scores. It is a different set of skills to racing man-on-man. It becomes apparent that the relatively stable airstream isn’t goIng to yield mega scores, but there will be times when it is worth being airborne and times where saving energy by not flying is the right thing to do. Initially my goals had been highly competitive but this changed in the run up to event when I realised that my new plane was really good. This trip was an ideal opportunity to get a winter’s worth of flying in a week so the amount of flight time would be a good opportunity to set up the plane for 2022.
Although we often get some nice days November to March in the UK they can be few and far between and if the real world interferes the chance for some quality flying can be minimal. Although I already have one Elvira as a slope soarer the set up and dynamics of the two planes are worlds apart so, here was a chance to set up and acclimatise to the Elvira as a GPS contender. As a result my goals became simple and very achievable.
Goals and Targets
One of the key things I have found with GPS racing is that you need to approach things with a clear plan and set yourself clear targets for each session. This is something that all sports encourage but this is not always seen in soaring pilots. One of the things that will help on the GPS journey is a clear understanding of what to work on and what steps you can realistically achieve.
Try to do too many things in a session and you will probably go backwards and will also lack any clear understanding of what to work on next time around. You will need to iterate as well. Taking indexing as a for instance. Your first session will net you an improvement. After a few more sessions where you may work on your turns, your flap settings and the way you use the information from the Albatross application you need to go back to indexing and spend another session making your plane progress around the course as close to perfection as you can.
Because you have improved your turns and become more instinctive with your use of flight modes you will find that you can focus more on the index and will likely improve it again. So, in simple terms, break down the event into chunks that work for you and keep focussing on them in sequence. If you try to do it all at once you will end up taking longer to improve as there are so many variables to assess.
Back at the RC Model Flying Ranch
Picking our moments to fly allowed both of us to rack up some good scores and Greg was always on top of the leader board. On day one I was cautious with my ballast as this was a new site and a plane I had yet to fully set up. One thing I took a couple of landings to get used to was the rock hard runway. So used to flying in the UK where there is a lot of moisture to soften the ground I found the glider was far less keen on stopping!
The second day’s first job was to up the ballast content to maximum and double check the CG positions with the different ballast loads. Once done we flew, and flew, and flew. I beat Greg on one day and on the final day we managed to do some still air flying to compare performance and ballast strategy. Although low key the event yielded a first place for Greg and a third place for me. We racked up a winters worth of flying and learnt some valuable lessons in seven days. A very worthwhile trip.
Next year is looking a little more hopeful, if the World Masters event is rescheduled and travel restrictions remain how they are or get easier, we will be entering and competing at the 2022 GPS Sport Class World Masters at Gruibingen. So maybe the road to Gruibingen will be the one that is actually travelled!
Stop Press
Oh no, it won’t!!! Announced in the hour I was re-reading this before sending it in is the GPS World Masters has been scheduled for July 2022 in Ulm, Germany. Watch this space for the report!
©2022 Iain Medley-Rose
Resources
Videos
- Tortosa MFR Event
- ‘In the Air Tonight’ GPS Triangle racing — Greg Lewis
- Valenta Chilli Flying GPS Triangle
GPS Triangle Racing Webinar Series with John Copeland
Useful Links
- GPS Triangle League — GPS Triangle scorekeeping website
- BARCS Radioglide Event
- Albatross — pilot navigation assistance Android app
- PCM (Podivin Composite Modellbau) — source for the Elvira
- Valentamodel or eSoaring Gadgets — sources for the Chilli
- RC Electronics or eSoaring Gadgets — sources for GPS kits
- RC Model Flying Ranch — “a hotspot for all kinds of model flying. But especially the friends of gliding will find a thermally strong area here, which invites to hours of flights in the mild air of the Mediterranean climate…”
All images by the author unless otherwise noted. Read the next article in this issue, return to the previous article in this issue or go to the table of contents. A PDF version of this article, or the entire issue, is available upon request.
