I was a spectator to the development, building and maiden flight of the JS1.
Apart from being well built, the maiden flight only took place in mid
December. The prototype ( which won the nationals) has flown for maybe 10
hrs before the comps.
Being a contest pilot myself, I know that you need at least 50 hours on type
to fly it well. The glider is not yet optimized (no boundary layer control,
not sealed properly, flies with a forward CoG for safety, Vne restricted,
and the list goes on.
To take nothing away from Attie, ( he is a very competitive glider pilot,
but so is his brother Uys, and so is Pieter Nouwens), but you need to have
good equipment when you win any national contest. I guess time will tell,
but I am overly exited by this glider


"Bruce Greef" wrote in message
...
Greg Arnold wrote:
Team flying undoubtedly helps both of them. However, a team is only as
fast as its slowest member. If the JS1 were a dog, would the team be
doing as well?

After flying together for several dozen hours in this contest, the Jonker
brothers will have a pretty good idea of how the performance of the JS1
compares to that of the Ventus 2c. Of course, they won't share that
knowledge if the Ventus has the better performance, and no one will
believe them if they say the JS1 is better.


wrote:

Yes, it is doing well. BUT, download the IGC files and watch it on See
you. Team flying with his first place buddy on everyday is what you
will see. Best regards, # 711.


wrote:

A very respectable start by any standards . After eight consecutive
contest days the new South African built 18 m glider is only just out
of first place in a field with many excellent established brand name
sailplanes behind . Yesterday's task resulted in a flight of over 700km
at very good speeds.
This is a Sailplane to watch .
Check out the SSSA site for complete details.

Ron (ZA).


Check yesterday's performance.

And look at relative position on IGC ranking of Uys (156) and Adriaan (67)
Jonker. These are not beginners.