Redemption
Today a nice and decent task was set - 6 turnpoints and about 40k's of distance.
I launched relatively early and boated around the sky which was filled with nice puffy cumulous clouds. Soon everyone in the competition was surfing the clouds, waiting for the start to begin.
I tagged the first turnpoint relatively easily but the second one was trickier as I got low on glide. But hell, I stuck with the shitty climb I was in and it took me to base. Next turnpoint was back at launch, and there too I was nice and high.
The next turnpoint, Rabies Ridge was where I struggled as I was there all by my lonesome. With fierce determination, I somehow managed to stay in a weak thermal and as a hang glider pilot came to join me, he showed me where the thermal got stronger. That took me back to base, which was great.
Back to Burnt ridge where again I got low, and noticed other gliders also struggling. I managed to find a climb in the valley and a low Boom 5 soon joined me. That climb also took me to base, and off I glided with the Boom to the next turnpoint.
The next turnpoint, Cemetary, was bouyant along the way, and I tagged it with the Boom and another Boom without a problem. Our next destination: Goal!
From Cemetary, goal was approximately 11 km's away. The two Booms got ahead of me quite a bit, and I was left to my own devices. I aimed for a ridge that was just behind another ridge which was where goal was. As I watched the two Boomers ahead of climb out no problem, I thought I had goal in the bag.
When I arrived at the ridge, the cloud that had been above it dissapeared, and all I could find where broken patches of light lift. I searched and searched, but it was soon game over. I landed 4.5k's short of goal.
It was nice to be congratulated when I arrived at headquarters, and I ended up winning the day in the women's class - yay!
Four hours in the air today was a looonnnggg time. I obviously flew the course very slow and remained very conservative throughout. Maybe I could have pushed it a bit harder on my way to goal - perhaps I should not have bothered looking for the climb and just pushed forward instead. But whatever, shoulda, coulda, woulda, didn't. Next time.
The competition is over and tomorrow looks good for flying. My urge to fly isn't especially strong, but setting my own task tomorrow at one last day at Woodrat sounds good to me.
I launched relatively early and boated around the sky which was filled with nice puffy cumulous clouds. Soon everyone in the competition was surfing the clouds, waiting for the start to begin.
I tagged the first turnpoint relatively easily but the second one was trickier as I got low on glide. But hell, I stuck with the shitty climb I was in and it took me to base. Next turnpoint was back at launch, and there too I was nice and high.
The next turnpoint, Rabies Ridge was where I struggled as I was there all by my lonesome. With fierce determination, I somehow managed to stay in a weak thermal and as a hang glider pilot came to join me, he showed me where the thermal got stronger. That took me back to base, which was great.
Back to Burnt ridge where again I got low, and noticed other gliders also struggling. I managed to find a climb in the valley and a low Boom 5 soon joined me. That climb also took me to base, and off I glided with the Boom to the next turnpoint.
The next turnpoint, Cemetary, was bouyant along the way, and I tagged it with the Boom and another Boom without a problem. Our next destination: Goal!
From Cemetary, goal was approximately 11 km's away. The two Booms got ahead of me quite a bit, and I was left to my own devices. I aimed for a ridge that was just behind another ridge which was where goal was. As I watched the two Boomers ahead of climb out no problem, I thought I had goal in the bag.
When I arrived at the ridge, the cloud that had been above it dissapeared, and all I could find where broken patches of light lift. I searched and searched, but it was soon game over. I landed 4.5k's short of goal.
It was nice to be congratulated when I arrived at headquarters, and I ended up winning the day in the women's class - yay!
Four hours in the air today was a looonnnggg time. I obviously flew the course very slow and remained very conservative throughout. Maybe I could have pushed it a bit harder on my way to goal - perhaps I should not have bothered looking for the climb and just pushed forward instead. But whatever, shoulda, coulda, woulda, didn't. Next time.
The competition is over and tomorrow looks good for flying. My urge to fly isn't especially strong, but setting my own task tomorrow at one last day at Woodrat sounds good to me.
posted by Veronica at 11:35 PM
1 Comments:
hey,nice read (this and a few prior posts). keep them coming :) and congrats to the womens' winner for the day
-arabind
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