Open flex wing results, Rigid wing results, Sport Class

Blogs from here: Jonny Durand, Jamie Shelden, Tom Lanning, Ben Dunn, and Linda Salamone

After the difficulties yesterday getting many pilots to goal, the task committee, me, Jonny, and Pete Lehmann, call a shorter task, even though yesterday's goal looks like the ticket, given the northwest winds. We decided to go forty miles to just at the edge of the Salisbury airspace.

The forecast was for good lift, but so had been the forecast for the day before. But now we could go down wind and wouldn't have to fight the cross wind component. It looked like there might not be any clouds, but perhaps a few wispies to mark the active thermals.

The cu's did start forming as we launched a little after 1 PM. I was off about fifth and once again I hit strong lift at 700' at the end of the runway. The tug pilot was not turning  even though my vario was reading 1,700 fpm. I can't just hang on and get out of this lift with the tug pilot. I pinned off once again low and climbed out.

I was early so I just stayed in the lift and drifted waiting to get high so that I could go back up wind and stay in the start circle until a later start time and start with other pilots. It wasn't long before I hooked up with Kevin, Dustin, Jonny, Sunny, Paul, Greg, Konrad, James Stinnet (the only rigid wing), and others. We were hanging out at about 4,200' and just waiting for everyone to get together and go.

I noticed right from the get go that while the thermal were large diameter, there were multiple cores and the cores were much stronger than the surrounding lift and very small. In order to climb well it was important to really put the glider tip up and turn tight. I must say that this was very easy to do with the Wills Wing T2C 144.

Of course, when there were lots of pilots around this was a little more difficult as no one else seemed to think that tight circle were the ticket. I just found the little cores off by myself as much as possible and climbed higher. In some cases I would just turn in front of other pilots that were making big circles, but far enough away from them to not cause a safety problem.

At 2:15 Kevin and Dustin and a few others who were a bit higher headed out and a bunch of us followed. I was at 4,500' so I figured it was time to go. Larry Bunner thought he would outsmart us and take the next start time. He landed in the start circle.

When a bunch of good pilots leave its a good idea to go with them. You can use them to help you find the lift. And the better the pilots, the better the chance of finding good lift.

There was a pilot circling 3.5 miles out just past Denton. We raced to get there and found lift that averaged over 500 fpm to over 4,800'. There were about ten of us in this lead gaggle.

We were right on the course line and when we topped out a few pilots headed out to the  right of the course line toward a forming cloud. I didn't want to go in this direction but I didn't want to go off on my own after the first thermal along the course line so I followed along. Still I didn't like the idea opf going there.

I took one turn under the cloud and then followed James Stinnet on the Aeros Phantom who was heading out along the course line. I found some weak lift at 2,700' and worked it pretty much on my own until I saw some pilot who got around me heading toward a forested area with a small cu forming over head. I raced ahead and found 300+ fpm to 4,700' with about ten pilots. Including the Bobsy twins, Sunny and Paul Tjaden on the line green Aeros Combat L 15's.

It was a real race now. I left the thermals whenever the lift backed off. We were crossing rivers and sloughs with little cu's ahead and lots of farm land around. Coming up to a big rover I got under some nice clouds and found a small thermal that I had to competition for, at least at first. Dustin was just out ahead. Kevin and Jonny had not gone to the clouds after the first thermal and had stayed along the course line. They were just out ahead.

The thermal was good but I left it soon and raced to the cu's on the south side of the river. There I came in under Jonny about 100' below him. The lift was good, but the goal was close. Still with lift averaging 500 fpm it was hard to leave.

At 4,100', seven miles out I pulled in and I flew as fast as possible given all the lift I found along the way. With ground speeds over 70 mph, I was quickly to goal, coming in fourth.

Konrad was just below me, but I could pull in and fly faster as I had more altitude. Jonny, Dustin and Kevin were now just boating around launch as we came in.

The goal filled up with even Jamie on her Moyes Lightsport making goal. All the rigids wings made it in, with Jamie Stinnet the first one in. Twenty pilots made goal.