The Crossword Centre Clue-Writing Competition

CCCWC October competition voters’ comments
 
Clue no. 22: German car that is right on a French mountain provides air transport

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A clue to MONTGOLFIER.
2 comments refer to this clue (from 1 competitor, 0 others)
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Here is the text

Comments on the clue
1.Surface lacks a coherent meaning.
 
Comments on the competition
1.
Unsurprisingly, this month's clue word produced a plethora of anagrams, many of them incorporated into the & lit. (2, 3*, 18, 19, 26, 33, 38, 40, 43*, 52* and 56*) or semi & lit. (5, 9*, 25, 32 and 55) format. Clues which relied on a generally descriptive definition in non & lit. format (10, 11, 21, 37, 46, 48, 50, 51 and 57*) tended to be more challenging to solve than those including (hot air) balloon (1, 6, 7, 8, 23, 29, 31*, 39, 45 and 54*) or variants (47* and 58). Other references to 'hot air' appeared in 8 clues (14, 17, 20, 34, 36, 44*, 49 and 53), with 2 clues each defining by 'floater' (12 and 42) and 'air transport' (22 and 41). The remaining 9 entrants chose to define the inventor/family/pilot, rather than the invention (4, 13, 15*, 16, 24, 27, 28, 30, and 35).

The commonest anagram strategy was to combine MOORING with either LEFT (7, 8, 16, 29, 36, 38, 39 and 52*) or FELT (31* and 47*), with 6 clues using FOR LONG TIME (14, 28, 30, 32, 40 and 58) as the fodder. LIFT also featured with MEN OR GO (41 and 56*) and R GO ON ME 934). 2 clues each used GOLFER I'M NOT (10 and 49), MELTING ROOF (37 and 53) and FLOATING MORE – A (13 and 42) and there were single occurences of FROGMEN TOIL (12), GROOM LEFT IN (45), LONGER MOTIF (51) and ON ROME FLIGHT – H (55).

Surface readings with a golfing flavour were popular (10, 48, 49 and 50) with two clues featuring (Tiger) Woods in the wordplay (35 and 57). Just 3 clues included the Golf motor car in their wordplay (21, 22 and 44*), with two of these managing a topical reference to the VW emissions scandal.