Rat Race Task 4

30.5Km – WoodlLz-WoodLn-Burnt-Rabies Peak-Cemeta-Donato

Weather forecasts held high expectations for today’s task with top of usable lift forecast to be around 7500-8500ft. The inversion layer was expected to lift a little later so a long distance task was set initially  of 67.5Km. This later changed to 57.5km as the time ticked by and finally a task was set of 30.5Km as the inversion failed to lift early enough. Launch opened at 2:35 with race start at 3:15 and there was an initial panic of gliders rushing into the air as the launch window opened.

Of course it didn’t really mean a lot as most gliders were only around 500ft over launch. I launched around 2:00pm as the gliders were just starting to spread out a little.

I got up to around 5000ft just as the gate opened and headed out to the start waypoint. Pretty good really as I was probably in the first 20 pilots.  Turned around and headed back to launch. Big difference on a 2-3 making transitions as the sink rate is much better compared to a 2. There were gliders below me as I climbed up and headed out to Burnt. Again I got to Burnt around 500ft-700ft over the peak. I had  seen CJ back at launch so today she was not going to beat me!. :-)

As I got to Burnt I started hitting some big sink. 4 gliders below weren’t making much progress either.

I thought of going along the ridge for a while but was losing height. I didn’t want to land into Poorman’s Creek valley so decided to head back to Launch and get up from there. BAD CHOICE! Another tactical error. I got back to mid launch and then started benching up towards launch. Then it was yo yo’ing up and down between launch and mid launch waiting for something big to kick off. There were times when UII though I may make it and it was fun thermalling with Dave Palmer on his hang glider for a while.

As I scratched over mid launch a beige glider with black leading edge and letters AM it looked like on the center came straight towards me. After a full turn he was still heading towards me and after the second full turn he was now on my left side which was pushing me out the zero lift I was in. I shouted for him to turn left but he blocked me from turning which annoyed me. It looked as if I could see a smile oh his face and this pissed me off big time.

He headed out straight out into the valley so my pararage took over and I followed him out. When we landed he was in for a Glasgow Kiss for sure! Asshole. As I followed him out he got a little /zero lift and we targeted the house at the bottom of rabies ridge below the antennae's. Real low and the valley wind was strong so I was hoping to  just creep over and gt some lift. However the nearer I approached the tip of the ridge the stronger the valley wind got. My ground speed registered 4Kmh. Oh crap.. not good. I turned around and headed back to the slope behind the lz. At this time I was flying downwind at around 65-70kmh.

This was the peak of the day for landing in the Lz and we were warned there were dusties in the LZ and to keep an eye out for thermals kicking off on the ground by looking at the grass. Sure enough there were thermals kicking off. It took me quite a while and a number of approaches to keep up front in case I got blown back as I descended. There some big pops as I got close but eventually came down safe and sound.

I saw CJ had already landed and this I hate to say was the only thing that kept me from going into a deep depression! I looked up and could see all the gliders above Burnt getting high. What a bummer. This was the first time I actually felt bother by not doing so well. Hmm. Need to stick with some folks today I think.

Around 20 gliders got to goal including Matt Cone, Cj Brockway, Rich Hass, Arun, Mer, Chris Amonson. Awesome job by these folks. Very impressed with matt this week who has been flying out his skin and with the consistency of Arun. 3 goals this week! Very impressive. John Mann on his 1-2 Mamboo got further down the course and I think when he gets back he is moving up to a 2 for sure!