Sun 13th May

Another Red RASP day which included the South West Peninsula! The kit was readied early and training flights started. A slight shortage of members found Jules Minson remembering how to run the  LPV (used to be called the Bubble). Soaring soon got underway in earnest with the Club gliders leading the way.   
Cu forming nicely (Wyn Davies)
Wyn Davies W7, Pete Startup 230, Simon Minson SM and Ron & Daniel Johns  711 set off for Whiddon Down and Dorchester 206Kms. Pete  and Jill in OL's first outing of the year set off a bit later following the energy over Exmoor. Robert Lee DKU, Jeff Taberham 380, James Flory 877 and Tom Sides in DG1 also enjoyed local flights.
Energy over Exmoor (Jill Harmer)
The FI (S) Refresher course  with DSGC and Visitor Instructors completed early afternoon,  And Peter Smith, Lisa Humphries and Mike Sloggett were soon walking briskly to the Launch Point to find a glider and someone to fly with - with an evidently thermic sky there was no shortage of members wishing to take to the air, some for their first flights of the day and some taking advantage of a relatively short flying list to complete some flights.

Meanwhile John Burrow and Mike Fox (National Training Manager for the BGA) took the Perkoz for a flight - with maps in hand there was clearly a plan to put the glider through it’s paces, after an hour they landed having flown to past Yeovil and back to North Hill. 
Sea breeze convergence (Simon Minson)
With the cross-country task clearly underset, the Pundits all added more Kms to their flights with Club 100s etc and making use of the south coast sea breeze convergence.
Great skies even late on (Mike Sloggett)
Late afternoon John Burrow flew with Ross Pratt to complete spinning refresher flights as part of which they took advantage of the late afternoon thermals to take the Perkoz to over 3000ft competing with Mike Sloggett and David Cowley who were also having fun taking a K21 to similar heights in the late afternoon thermals.

During the day Paul Summers flew the 3 trial lesson visitors who all enjoyed the wonderful Devon clear visibility and soaring conditions. 

With over 40 flights, it was another really good Devon day (although no comparison with the great distances flown up country and into Wales). - J&P & Mike Sloggett