Dave's Day 4

Today was the first area task for the contest after three days of racing task. The weather again was very good and only a few small blue areas to deal with.  The task took us north into the hills, then SW to Carrizo Springs, SE to Callaghan, NE and then E towards home.

  Jerzy and I were 6th and 7th to launch today into a developing sky, but fortunately, the CD held the launch until 1 pm and were were able to climb immediately to 6000 to get into the cool air. Our start gate was in a blue area at the time of the start, and most people hung back around the airport where there were cu and only ventured into the gate area to test the lift.

We had a good start with lots of gliders out in front of us (I was surprised looking at the start times that we were amongst the later starts today).  The run to the first turnpoint was only 20 km and then we turned the corner into the hills.  I had some trouble connecting and ran along low until I finally connected with a good 6.5 kt climb to get up into the good air.  The clouds didn't really align with the leg and once into the second area there was a blue hole, so I turned a little early and headed south.  On this leg I was able to line up a few runs down streets.  The next leg SW had some great streets that I was able to follow almost to the back of the southern most cylinder.  I tried to line up some streets  going NE, but it required a few jumps.  The central and eastern part of the last turn area was going blue, so I worked a few clouds on the west side and ran as far as I could along that line.  I thought that I needed to get more distance to avoid being under time but I could only do this by turning more easterly and the conditions just didn't make it worthwhile.  I maxed out the line that I was flying and then headed home arriving only 21 seconds early.

Best climb of the day was 6.9 kts and overall average for the task was 5.2 kts.  My longest run was 116 km and I was able to keep the thermaling down to 13% of the flight for a speed just short of 144 km/hr over 647 km, good for 13th on the day and leaving me in 13th overall.