http://ozreport.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=7147



Download these two IGC files, track logs for Jonny Durand and I on the first day
of the NSW State Titles. Run them together in SeeYou or CompeGPS. You will learn
something.



Here is the original description of the flights:
http://ozreport.com/11.024#5



Here is what I found:



Jonny took off my himself at 2:15 PM while Lukas Bader and I came back into the
start circle and thermaled up in the same thermal that Jonny had just left. We
drifted in the thermal for seven minutes while Jonny got five miles ahead of us
but got low while we were high.



Jonny had to stop for poor lift as I headed toward him much higher. Fifteen
minutes after Jon's start I was east of Jonny three miles on our north northwest
course as I entered my first thermal on the course after the start and
coincidentally Jonny found a thermal at the same time but 2,500' lower.



Fifteen minutes later (a total of half an hour after our start time) I was half
a mile ahead of Jonny at the same elevation. We were flying in lifting air. We
came into the same thermal with Jonny four hundred feet below me.



Seven minutes later we entered the same thermal and I was 900' over him. A few
minutes later after going on glide I missed a thermal that Jonny stopped for. I
glided two miles in front as Jonny climbs to 11,600', 2,000' higher than me.



An hour and ten minutes after our start Jonny and I are side by side 1.3 miles
apart with Jonny 1,300' higher.  Ten minutes later Jonny flew directly over
me 2,500' higher as I thermal up at 600+ fpm.



Twelve minutes later Jonny and I were at the same altitude with Jonny 2.9 miles
ahead. He and I were both under dark clouds and flying straight in lift (him) or
zero sink (me). He gained a thousand feet flying straight for three miles. He
was on final glide while 2,000' lower I stopped for three turns and a thousand
feet of gain.



At 15:48, one hour and thirty three minutes into the task at 10,000', Jonny went
on final glide 27 miles from the goal. He gained a thousand feet flying straight
over the next three miles. Twenty four miles from goal at 15:51 he continued a
glide that will in the last 24 miles average an L/D of 14.8, flying at an
indicated airspeed of 49 miles an hour with a ground speed of 71 mph (there is
an 19 mph tail wind). He arrived at goal 1,800' AGL.



At 15:53 twenty four miles from goal, two minutes behind Jonny and at 10,000' or
1,000' lower than he I went on final glide. Over the next 24 miles I averaged an
L/D of 14.3 but at an indicated airspeed of 30 mph and a ground speed of 54 mph.
I had to stop for two minutes of thermaling and came in with two hundred feet
AGL at goal eleven minutes after Jonny.



If I had been able to maintain the same L/D at 49 mph instead of 30 mph I would
have come in only four minutes behind Jonny. Jonny was successful staying high
and flying at a much higher speed than I on final glide. I didn't pull in to fly
as fast, but it was doubtful whether that would have been a successful strategy.