Blue day with light winds, cool temperatures and plenty of
thermals

The flight and task



Dr. Jack's version of the RUC calls for 15 knots north wind. The FSL version
calls for 5 knots. The local forecast (NAM) calls for 6 to 8 mph. Dr. Jack's NAM
displays call for light north winds. We come up with two tasks, one for the RUC
forecast (Dr. Jack's version) and one for the NAM and FSL version of RUC.



We are hoping for light winds of course, and call an out and return, west,
south, north and east, of 45 miles. The forecasts also disagree on the height of
the lift, Dr. Jack calling for 3,200' and the FSL says we will get to 5,200'. So
we don't call a task that is too long for weak conditions.



The winds don't appear to pick up in the field here at the Florida Ridge so we
call the out and return task. Three pilots get off first into the blue sky and
hang on for a good long time, before two land. They don't get that high so there
is no hurry to get into the air (although there should be). Finally Kevin wants
to get going and I line up behind him and Campbell. Everyone else scoots quickly
into line.



The lift is good right away, much different that what we saw from the three
earlier pilots. The last start time is 2:45 PM, and I launched right after 2 PM.
Some folks are not going to get into the air until late.



I work a bunch with Paris as we move our way slowly west toward the edge of the
8 km start circle and the first turnpoint at La Belle. Everyone leaves at 2:45.



We get a good thermal that averages over 500 fpm, the best so far, by far, to
the highest yet (4,300') just a mile into the course and this sets my feeling
about the day a little too early. Five miles later I'm working less than 200 fpm
from 1,500' while the guys behind me slow down for lift that's better than 200
but not as good at 500 fpm. They are able to catch the three guys in the lead
gaggle at the turnpoint at La Belle while Paul Tjaden and I work out of our self
dug hole. This puts us in the continual position of chasing the lead gaggle,
which now has about ten pilots.



After slogging our way out we head for the airport at La Belle and head south,
again not finding lift until I'm down to 1,500' just south of the orange juice
factory where I spot the birds which are the main thermal indicators on such a
day. We're getting low but finding good thermals. I hear later that Paris who is
out with the lead gaggle will get down to 900' three times.



The net glide is 6 plus miles around the southern turn point. The lead gaggle
goes under us (and we aren't that high) as we approach the turnpoint. I work
light stuff down to 1,100' when Paul calls me to the east to find his 200 fpm. I
find the core and it goes 600+ fpm. I'm thinking that maybe we can catch these
guys now.



It is not to be as I come in low to the airport after a six mile glide and have
to scrape it out from 1000'. Paul stays back, finds a better spot to the west of
the airport and gets 600 fpm while I work 200 fpm. Anything to get up and keep
going.



The lead gaggle is now a few miles to the east and heading toward goal. I get up
and head to Steve Larsen who is high in his Exxtacy and see a bunch of birds low
in tight spirals over a cul-de-sac. They are in 600 fpm. I join them to 4,400'.
I'm nine miles out and I go on glide. Paul says that he is hitting lift 6 miles
out from goal so I just keep gliding and arrive with 1,200'.



Most of the pilots make goal on this short task, with better lift then we
expected. There should be clouds from now on, but it has been great flying on
blue days.



I've been doing the weather, the Task Committee and the Scoring, as well as
writing the Oz Report. I'm using SeeYou for down loading the GPSes and getting
the start and finish times, as well as the distances. I would have the scoring
done in SeeYou also, but I haven't got OzGAP 2005 working quite right in SeeYou
(one line in the program as a wrong value). So I'm adding an hour a day to the
work load to use Race (with OzGAP 2005) to score the meet (with input from
values determined by SeeYou). Maybe I will be able to fix this bug soon.



You can find the results (in Race output format) here:
http://ozreport.com/2007usnats.php.