Rat Race Task 3 25.8Km

Woodln – WoodlZ -  Burnt – JVilleLZ – Cemeta – Dark Hollow – Donato

Today the pilots meeting would be held at Fiasco Winery courteously of Dave and Pam Palmer. Dave is currently the president of the local club and I met him and his wife 2 years ago and we have become close acquaintances each time I visit. I love his wine, his winery and he is a really friendly person to get to know.

I arrived with my room mate Jeff Smith to find quite a large line already waiting outside. Inside Pam was serving up the food cooked by none other than Rich Hass! Quite funny to see him flipping pancakes behind the counter. We all got pancakes, Gary West smoked Ham, fruit , coffee and  orange juice which  once again was  a great way to start the day!! Thank you Pam and Dave!

The weather was gorgeous sitting outside in the sun at the pilots meeting. However, there was a wind surge forecast for later in the day and a lot of the pilots wanted to get up to launch and get off quickly before it came along. We got to launch and very quickly a task was called that put us all on a downwind glide path after getting to Burnt. I honestly thought this was going to be a relatively easy day however it turned out not to be the case.

I setup and joined the line pretty quick today. In fact I was in line before the launch window even opened. A first for me for quite some time! I decided to get inline behind someone I knew flew well to help me get out and established. I choose Wheelie Bob, or Dave Wheeler better known to others!

The launch window opened and off we went. Tom the launch captain had a well oiled machine today and we all got off the west launch quickly. Ok..how is this going to be today I thought and I found out damn quick. Rock n Roll dude! The wind was already strong and there were large lift and sink bands with gliders wildly circling in elliptical orbits at angles of around 45 degrees. I initially got above launch and then slid off the side of the thermals. Being on the north east side of launch was not fun. I drifted back with the mini gaggle and did not like the lee side position. It wasn’t going up as quick as I liked and I knew I would be fighting a strong headwind and potentially big sink if I went too far back making it difficult to get back over the ridge.Sure enough as soon as I headed back in the direction to cross over the ridge I go big sink. Once passing the ridge.. BOOM..up again. This yo-yo effect continued for quite a while I felt. I decided to push out further down the spine and see if it was any better. Nope! Here I found myself first thermaling with Conrad and Randy and then with Meredyth and Jef Farel as we continued the merry up and down but none of us making much progress to get higher. I looked around and didn't see many people getting really high. I could only count a handful of folks getting to maybe a couple of thousand feet over launch. The wind was picking up. I quickly calculated that this would be a low scoring day and wasn't worth the effort and potentially dangerous situation of flying the route low over Burnt with a strong tailwind. I thought I woudl go and land like many others who had already decided this plan of action,

I headed out in the direction of Fiasco winery assuming I would sink soon and I could turn and go and land in the Lz. However, I found a nice lift line and pushed on into the valley on full speed bar making only 10mph!. I guessed the headwind was probably around 15-20mph! I eventually managed to land at Longswords winery and was a happy man.

it did turn out to be a low scoring day after all, only 296 points. Cliff Curry came in first and again Chris Amonson, Dave Wheeler, Frank and Meredyth making goal. I got 105 points for minimal distance and  flying to the winery so was pretty pleased. All the rest of the field either landed in the Lz or just over the other side of Burnt ridge or near Cemeta around 5-7km from the start.

Tomorrow looks like it will be partly sunny and the wind still strong with 30% chance  of rain, I expect a similar task called as today. So may be another low scoring day. We shall see!