Don’t follow me!
When we got to the Ranch this morning, I stopped at my glider to see how it had
survived the night. I found one of the ribs (second to last at the tip) had
broken from the back of the spar. We sped off to Walgreens for some 5-minute
epoxy. By 9:00 am I was ready to go again (if we ever went).
The weather was predicted to be better today: 40% chance of showers, mostly to
the north; winds out of the SSE; cloud base at 4800; top of lift at 3500’ with
lift between 200 and 400 fpm. The task was called for an out and return to
Gator, 53.5 miles round trip. The first start time was moved up to 12:30 with
the launch window open at 11:00. I was in the odd line, which is on the north
side. The wind changed a little and they turned our line around. The even line
stayed where they were. A lot of pilots grabbed up the launch carts and put
their gliders on them, even though they were not ready to go. I was in my
harness, helmet on, and ended up carrying my glider to my place in line. The
ranch hands keep saying, "don’t get on the cart unless you are ready to go". And
I thought they meant it.
I was towed up at 11:53. It turned out to be a good time to go. I pinned off
early; we were in lift and I wanted to give the tow pilot a break (Rich later
told me that in light lift like today, take the entire tow). I headed to the
closest gaggle I could see. I worked with them for a few minutes then saw a
better gaggle a mile to the south. On the way over to this second gaggle I found
some good lift so I stopped to work it. I was going up at 200 fpm. Now I know
what a gaggle magnet is. Within 60 seconds there were 15 more pilots in my
thermal. I believe this gaggle turned out to have 40 or 50 gliders in it. I
noticed we were drifting toward the turn point, which was good, but we were past
1.5 miles from the Ranch. I found out after I landed that the start circle is a
3 mile radius. I thought it was a 3 mile diameter. So, don’t follow me. I headed
back to the Ranch, got low, but managed to cross the 1.5 mile radius at 12:30. I
thought I had a great start. The lead gaggle was gone.
I got lower and lower. Everyone was way above me on course. I was down to 500’
AGL and finally found something. I worked this for a long time (50 fpm). At
1500’ I saw two other gliders a mile away circling. I was back to 1200’ there
and with no lift. Again I spotted a glider circling. I joined it at 1000’. It
turned out to be Clair Vassort. We worked together for quite some time (I talked
to Clair after landing and thanked her for marking the lift for me. She said
after I got up she'd followed me as well). More and more gliders joined us. The
lift got better, sometimes 500 fpm. I left this gaggle behind and caught up to
another one further ahead. About 2 miles from the turn point I saw the lead
gliders passing me for the trip back. The lift was very good to the turn point.
On my GPS I tried to keep the distance to the turn point less then .25 miles for
30 seconds to make sure I got the turn point. The scorekeeper said the software
does not support Mark, Enter (creating a waypoint). I hope I got it.
Rich Sauer reported on the radio that he was 5 miles ahead of me. All the way
back, gaggles would form and break up. At one point I was above both Carlos and
a Swift. The Swift quickly left us behind. The cloud bases were up to 4800’ and
I was climbing to 3800’ before leaving. Six miles out the clouds were close
together and the ground was shaded. About 12 of us were heading for the Ranch
with me about third. We started working 100 up. I thought with all the shade on
the ground, we would never find enough lift to get us to goal. I spotted some
raptors circling ½ mile to the west. When I got under them I was going up at 600
fpm+. The rest of the gaggle came in under me. At 3500’ my vario said I had
goal.
I went on final glide. I have my final altitude set for 800’, just to be safe.
My vario kept changing back and forth between making goal and not. Since I had
set goal at 800’ I thought I would be fine. I kept looking for the Ranch. I
thought I saw it, but 3 miles out I realized I had the wrong place. The Ranch
was much closer. I stuffed the bar to my waist the last 3 miles. I crossed goal
at 500’. I made it. First completed task in my first timed comp! I was ahead of
all the gliders in my last gaggle. Unfortunately, we were one of the last
gaggles to finish.
A note on landings. Unfortunately almost all the bad landings I saw were Atos’.
One Atos C crashed into the goal post. Another Atos broke a down tube and the
keel.
Several things went wrong with communications. We (Rich, Steve Rudy, and I)
could not hear our driver and he could not hear us. He tried a couple of radios
with no luck. After I landed he realized he'd lost his cell phone. Steve landed
out (1.5 miles behind a locked gate) and had been trying to call. We got hold of
him on my cell phone. By the time we arrived he had already carried his glider
to the road. Someone found Bob’s cell phone and turned it in to Malcolm, so Bob
has it back.
Thermaling in my first death gaggle was nice. It was like being in a tornado
with lots of gliders sucked up. I noticed that most pilots make much larger
turns than I would normally make in a thermal (maybe the rigid wings turn much
better than the flex wings ;-). Steve mentioned the same thing. I never felt
unsafe or had any close calls. I felt like today was a survival day as opposed
to a race day. After my low save, I felt very uncomfortable under 2000’. The
lift was really poor under 2000’. I stopped to thermal a lot just to make sure I
would not sink out. Rich had similar feelings.
It started raining hard here about 6:00. My glider is getting another bath. I
now have to recharge all my batteries, upload my waypoints back to my GPS, fill
my water bag etc. Gotta go.
Vince
PS Rich took the second start time, so he did well.
My vario trace for the flight.
(click on it for a larger version).