Today was a little more challenging than the 2nd day. I flew 570 km at 120 km/hr according to my See You.
It looked like we might have a sky full of cu again, but as we were about to launch the clouds started to thin out and go blue. An ambitious 4.5 hour area task with a 560 km nominal distance was called for the 15 m class. I decided that a start around 2 pm with a projected finish time of 6:30 would be about right.
I started at 2:05 with a group and with a couple of other groups already ahead by 5 -10 minutes. This worked well as we were able to catch some of the earlier starters. I had a little bit of trouble coming out of the first turn area and got down to about 3000 AGL and had to work some less than optimal thermals to get back up.
I didn't fly with any particular group today, but met up with various groups along the way. On the 4th leg, I met up with a group of 4 other gliders just as we were about to enter the hill country to the north. In the almost blue conditions, it was great to have a group to fly with. As it turned out it was a pretty good group to be with as the day winner LBL was in that group.
Coming into the last turn area, I was concerned about being under time, so I extended a little further north into the area than LBL. As it turns out I was 15 minutes overtime, and I think that slowed me down from about 122 km/hr (the winning speed of the day) to 119.
The final glide was a little touchy. Joerg who was 20 km ahead of me said he was getting lots of lift on the way home, but I seemed to find the sink. I was able to maintain no more than 300 ft below glide slope, and then in the last 20 km ran through some lift that put me back over glide slope.
All in all a good day, but a long one and a tough one!
Dave
It looked like we might have a sky full of cu again, but as we were about to launch the clouds started to thin out and go blue. An ambitious 4.5 hour area task with a 560 km nominal distance was called for the 15 m class. I decided that a start around 2 pm with a projected finish time of 6:30 would be about right.
I started at 2:05 with a group and with a couple of other groups already ahead by 5 -10 minutes. This worked well as we were able to catch some of the earlier starters. I had a little bit of trouble coming out of the first turn area and got down to about 3000 AGL and had to work some less than optimal thermals to get back up.
I didn't fly with any particular group today, but met up with various groups along the way. On the 4th leg, I met up with a group of 4 other gliders just as we were about to enter the hill country to the north. In the almost blue conditions, it was great to have a group to fly with. As it turned out it was a pretty good group to be with as the day winner LBL was in that group.
Coming into the last turn area, I was concerned about being under time, so I extended a little further north into the area than LBL. As it turns out I was 15 minutes overtime, and I think that slowed me down from about 122 km/hr (the winning speed of the day) to 119.
The final glide was a little touchy. Joerg who was 20 km ahead of me said he was getting lots of lift on the way home, but I seemed to find the sink. I was able to maintain no more than 300 ft below glide slope, and then in the last 20 km ran through some lift that put me back over glide slope.
All in all a good day, but a long one and a tough one!
Dave
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