The 2014 Willy Burhen Cup (WBC 2014)

Submitted by Movses Babayan on Sun, 10/26/2014 - 17:59

eGlidepath

Now that the official OLC year 2014 is over it is time again to review again all the XC soaring flying in Western Washington this year. After a slow beginning due to very wet weather the soaring season started in earnest.
Ron Clark won the contest (again) with a fantastic flight that included a double crossing of the Cascades (first one out of Arlington) and the largest ever FAI triangle from the west side (357 km) for a total of 555.8 OLC points. This flight took 6 hours and went from Arlington to Mt. Baker to Stehekin (Lake Chelan) to south of Brewster (across the Columbia River) and back over Jack Mt. and Marblemount. Just a few statistics: Ron used 38 thermals with an average climb rate of 337 fpm and reached altitudes of up to 11,335 ft. This flight took place on May 12; this compares with Ron's winning flight last year on May 14 with 545.7 points, quite similar. For reference the best ever XC soaring flight in Western Washington was on May 17 2011 - 561 points, also by Ron! The consistency of Ron's winning flights and the dates when they took place is quite noteworthy.

So here are the final results of the WBC 2014:

Name	Points	Date	Sailplane	OLC distance, km	Triangle distance, km
Ron Clark	55.5.8	5-12	LS-3	487.5	357.4
Dan Housler	450.3	4-28	Cirrus 17.7	413.7	121.9
Brad Hill	417.7	4-28	Tetra-15	372.4	262.3
Kevin Finke	390.8	5-12	ASW-24	348.5	78.5
Fred Hermanspann Kathleen McCrary	375.4	5-12	Chinook	296.1	239.2
Chris Young	368.7	5-12	LS-8/18	322.5	77.9
Kenji Ominato	256.7	6-7	LS-6	242.7	49.7
Tim Henneghan	219.8	4-9	ASH-26E	212.6	148.8
Movses Babayan	195.6	4-28	G-102	173.2	97.2
Thomas V. de Velde Fred Hermanspann	196.3	9-6	G-103	156.5	49.8
Marty Gibbins	176.6	4-26	ASW-19	150.9	85.8
Dan Teifke	112.9	4-26	ASW-19	99.5	62.4
Robert Spitzer	106.6	8-8	Std. Libelle	88.5	29.9
Chris Klix	106.4	8-7	LS-7	97.6	34.4
Travis Brown	104.9	3-21	Krokus	92.8	67.0

Note - the OLC distance is based on 6 legs, the triangular distance is based on the largest FAI triangle contained in the soaring flight path and the points are calculated by the OLC distance plus 30 pct of the triangular distance (in km) adjusted for the sailplane handicap.

It is nice to see more participation from newer pilots and from our neighboring club to the South (PSSA) and one can hope that some of our newer XC pilots will contribute enthusiastically to the WBC 2015!