A word about the 4th race 1st FAI Virtual WGC

[maymar]

Many of us had an unpleasant surprise during final glide on the 4th day of the championship. After the flight, I discussed with Witold what was the reason. I will quote Witold from his statement on Discord and paste screenshots from Condor and the fpl file into his statement.

1. Elevation of the finish was set to 0m when if fact it was 368. It is not possible to set the elevation at this point of the landscape to 0m in Condor, which means that the fpl file must have been manually edited or created in a different software and not in Condor.

FPL.PNG (27.82 KiB) Viewed 945 times

2. Incorrect elevation affected the final glide calculations in Condor PDA. Before crossing the last ridge my DDH to the finish line was 20m at MC 3.7 according to the Condor PDA. I had a very strong thermal just before crossing the last ridge (at least 5m/s at about 50km to the finish line), which I rejected as I already had a fast final glide. This decision was of course affected by the incorrect elevation of the finish and led to my land out 100m before the finish line.
3. I am sure this error in the fpl file caused many pilots to land out puzzled about what just happened.
4. I am sure number of pilots managed to get to the finish line after being warned on Teamspeak by people flying in front of them who realized that there is something wrong with the numbers being shown (DDH) on Condor PDA.
5. It is unreasonable to assume that pilots will be able to spot that elevation of finish is set to zero when they are 50km away from finish at high altitude. This led to wrong decisions, like not climbing when there was opportunity to do so, which greatly affected the results of the task.

I fully agree with what he wrote.

I checked whether it is actually possible to accidentally set the elevation of a point other than the terrain height in Condor. I checked it this way. I created a task where I placed one of the points over the sea, saved the flight plan and then opened it again and moved it to the nearby mountains. I added further point to this task - each time the height at which the turning point was located was correct.
From this it can be concluded that before uploading the task to CC and the server, the task was manually or in 3rd party software modified where both RP and FL TP's were modified by setting their height to 0 m MSL.

When I was planning the arrival, I had the MC set to 4.0 and kept a reserve above the finish line about 20 - 25 m (to cross the finish line at the permitted safe altitude of 400 m MSL). Fortunately, I realized that something was wrong when passing the RP and I pull up and slow down. I passed the finish line at stall speed to reach the required height.

After the flight, I wrote on the chat that there was a problem with the arrival calculation and something was wrong with the finish altitude (see Tim's flight on YT -> https://www.youtube.com/live/eqF6UU9m4x ... iYB&t=8441)

In my opinion, an error in task preparation should result in the cancellation of this race. As a result, seven pilots landed before the finish line (less than 4 km), because due to incorrect setting of the finish height, the calculator showed them the correct height for crossing the finish line, which turned out to be incorrect (368 m below the ground).

Antoine - I leave it to your judgement and decision as the competition director.

[witor]

Firstly, I want to express my admiration for Marcin's sportsmanship in suggesting that the task be cancelled after finishing second, solidifying his lead in the competition. It truly demonstrates the highest level of sportsmanship and character of a true competitor.

Considering the significant impact the task setting error had on the results of the race, the overall standings, and potentially the final outcome of the competition, it's crucial to address the situation thoughtfully. While all top finishers undoubtedly performed exceptionally well, cancelling the results of day 4 and re-flying the race, as suggested by Marcin and Arne (on Discord), seems to be the most appropriate course of action to uphold the integrity of the competition.

While this solution may not be ideal, I think it's important to prioritise fairness and ensure that all participants have an equal opportunity to compete. I believe this decision aligns with the spirit of sportsmanship and fairness that should underpin our competition.

[6266]

<Offtopic>
Trusting blind the instruments without cross checking against the reallity is the best way not to survive.

300 m height difference on 50 km with an 18 m superglider shouldn't happen top pilots :-X
</Offtopic>

[wickid]

We checked this in the beta team.

There appears to be a bug in Condor. If you create a new TP in Condor (right click -> new -> turnpoint) it creates a new turnpoint in the landscape cup file. Condor automatically sets the elevation of this point to 0 and there is no way to change that without going into the cup file. If you then use this turnpoint in a task, the elevation of this point will also be 0 when it is placed on the newly created turnpoint.

We think there was no manual editing of any files. Until this bug is fixed my recommendation would be to not create custom turnpoints in a landscape cup file via Condor. If a custom turnpoint is needed use an external CUP file with correct elevations. Or place a FPL turnpoint in the correct place. There is no problem with placing FPL turnpoints. They follow the terrain elevation.

[witor]

Yes, we just found this. Please accept my apologies for thinking that some files were manually edited. Nevertheless, incorrect elevation caused quite a bit of a mess...

[nicnac211]

"Oh no, I didn't place 3rd or better in the qualifiers, Antoine, please change the rules so I can be included"

"Oh no, I landed out on a task when 25 other people finished. Please re fly day 4 so that my score isnt impacted"

This is how you sound.

[Bre901]

My flight plan checking app (FPLCheck, link in my signature) can be used to detect such issues:
just add TPPosZ*>0 in the rules file

it will obviously issue a warning about TPs that are really at sea level but I dont' think there are that many

[wickid]

My flight plan checking app (FPLCheck, link in my signature) can be used to detect such issues:
just add TPPosZ*>0 in the rules file

it will obviously issue a warning about TPs that are really at sea level but I dont' think there are that many

In NetherlandsHD about half the TPs are

[Bre901]

In NetherlandsHD about half the TPs are

... as the other half is not much higher, you probably don't need the tool for that landscape

[maymar]

There appears to be a bug in Condor. [...]

Thx Wiek for finding the error. During testing, I didn't think of a use case in which a PZ is added in the scenery itself and a route is created based on it. Please accept my apologies for thinking that fpl file was manually edited.

[JBlyth]

I noticed the 0 elevation for the finish in the briefing and I confirmed the 0 finish elevation on the Condor task map. It did seem strange, so I made allowance for it with my DDH....

As part of my pre-flight assessment for races where there is a "Minimum safe arrival altitude" which is not using a zero DDH, I always do some mental arithmetic to work out the difference be the finish line height and the Minimum safe arrival altitude. In this case, the obvious answer was the the DDH for the finish line needed to be 1312ft...

Minimum safe arrival altitude (QNH): 1,312 ft
TP 4: RP (0 ft)
Finish: Cuneo-Finish (0 ft)

I agree it was unfortunate, but all the required data was in the briefing....

I would be a little miffed if I was penalised by the race being dropped, just because I read the briefing very carefully. Others may not have and so had issues at the finish. All the required information was available to every pilot, even if there were some unusual aspects to that briefing, the information was clearly there to make correct decisions..

Unfortunately, I won't be able to fly in the remaining races as I will be recovering from surgery, so I have nothing to win or lose either way.

[Bre901]

All the required information was available to every pilot, even if there were some unusual aspects to that briefing, the information was clearly there to make correct decisions.

Besides that, external PDAs (XCSoar, LK8000 or SeeYou - seamlessly if using CoTaCo) or CoMoMap allow to set a finish minimum altitude even if it is set to 0 in the FPL ...

[6266]

Unfortunately, I won't be able to fly in the remaining races as I will be recovering from surgery, so I have nothing to win or lose either way.

I wish a fast recovery and hope to read you again here soon

[JLN]

Just an opinion.

I agree that “All the required information was available to every pilot” to finish in the air. The minimum arrival hight was indicated at 400 m and so enough to arrive over the 368 m of the finish.

But it was also noted as a “Minimum safe arrival altitude (QNH)” and I wonder how it was caculated. In my opinion it has been set taken into account a zero altitude of the finish point. If I am right to think that it is by chance that the arrival point was not at 400 m or higher...
And arriving at 400 at the finish it was very difficult or impossible to land 1 km or so further at 380 m in “safe conditions” which are always required by FAI Virtual Gliding.

I also agree with 6266 in his “off topic” post.

[Bre901]

But it was also noted as a “Minimum safe arrival altitude (QNH)” and I wonder how it was caculated. In my opinion it has been set taken into account a zero altitude of the finish point. If I am right to think that it is by chance that the arrival point was not at 400 m or higher...

400m was not set by chance, but set to 30m AGL, rounded to the next 10