Wow 4 for 4 with another challenging day again with plenty of wind to deal with... Really a fun comp so far with the weather forecast looking even better for the next few days... Tomorrow calling for light and variable winds at 12,000 feet!
Today was a 89k race to goal with 2 turn points along the way. Some top pilots sunk out and had to relaunch when the start window opened and the day didn't start out all that well. Boy was I glad to have launch priority and not have to wait in the launch que.... We went south and fortunately, the TFR which had been keeping us from going in that direction was reduced to only 1 nautical mile around so we were able to call a task and avoid the restricted area.
Spent lots of time close to the terrain today.... several of my valley crossings had me low so that I had to ridge soar my way back up to where the thermals were organized and large enough to turn in. The field was very widely scattered and I flew with many different pilots at one time or another through the day. I was in the air for 5 hours and 25 minutes and we were all quite exhausted when we finally loaded up for the ride back from goal. Our vehicle which was remaining to retrieve us broke down so we had to wait awhile for another van to come get the 5 of us still in goal. I landed at 7:10pm and had to look around for sink to get down...
On my final glide things didn't seem like they were going to come together enough to make it the final 8k. I was over the valley floor and not looking good, so I made the last minute decision to pull a 90 degree left turn and head into the front of some small hills on the edge of the valley. I had enough altitude to just head into the terrain and just make a wide "C" and then land. I'd finished most of my "C", had my landing area picked out and just below and in front of me what do I see? A large hawk getting centered into a ripping thermal. He was flapping his wings rather aggressively to keep him self stable so I prepared myself for a wild ride and thats what happened a few seconds later! I was less than a 100 feet off the ground so the thermal was completely unorganized and amazingly strong for 7 in the evening and the sun angle quite low. I hung on and spiraled up until I had an 8 to 1 glide to goal and headed out to finish the race. As it turned out, once again most of the air was going up and I climbed most of the way to goal! Crazy!
We stopped for fast food on the way back to HQ and after getting our instruments downloaded we arrived back at Pete's house at 11:30pm.
My 6030 Flytec totally bit the dust today so I flew with a helmet chirper and my old Garmin. I must admit I enjoyed not having to monitor lots of stuff and focused more on my flying which was good. It was interesting flying such a long flight and never even seeing an altitude or a vario readout....
Gotta reset for another big day tomorrow....
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