Skyport Wednesday

[Tyrone]

Eagle van headed up from Parma at 10:15 with a crew of 8-10. Forecast called for east wind aloft. Leeside Lee was the first to launch since he was on call for work and had to get down. He launched at about 11:15 and hooked one in front of launch, cruised out front east of the antenna farm and hit the east wind at about 2500 feet. Not too much lift out front. Marite chucked off next, got some light lift out front, but hit a headwind as she headed for the roundhouse and ended up low at the monastery and had to bail for St. Mary's. Kelly, an Eaglet from Oregon chucked off next and pretty much had the same outcome as Marite. She had a super sweet launch and is stoked to be getting some airtime! Next was George who connected on launch with a nice thermal that took him 200 feet over launch. George ended up heading south of the Thermal Factory where he got boosted to 3900 feet, where Bob Anderson told us the inversion was going to be. Bob, can you please predict a higher inversion tomorrow? or none at all? Next was Marge and by this time, cycles were ripping through launch at 7-9 mph. Marge chucked off and connected on launch too, ended up making some circles with George over the Antenna farm. Kev followed...same result. Seth, who trained with Dave Verbois in Washington is in town visiting and had a tough time getting a good cycle as the wind started to circle on launch. we were getting some straight east cycles as we were setting him up. He finally got a good cycle and chucked off, but as the east was getting closer, the line to the antenna farm wasn't delivering, so he ended up behind the roundhouse and scooted around into St. Marys. I went next for the maiden voyage of my new Peak 2 I got on Monday. By this time, the cycles ceased. I sat around for about 15 minutes waiting for something to come up. I had a tough time getting off to as my first pullup resulted in the glider turning into a northeast cycle. A light cycle eventually came through and I took it to the house thermal, but only got some weak high pressure bubbles. Started on glide to the antenna farm and worked some more light bubbles that didn't really pay off a whole lot. intercepted the roundhouse spine between the roundhouse and the antenna farm and was in zero lift, so i took that to the antenna farm and ended up working some lift up to 2800. glided out past the riviera to check the glide on this new glider, played with speed bar. really light speed bar pressure on this glider. I guess the Peak 1 had higher pressure, so it is one of the improvements Niviuk made. All in all, today wasn't great, but it was good enough for some out-of-towners to get some airtime and for me to check out the new glider. Zippy did an instructional tandem and Jay flew his hangie. they both landed at lower parma. hoping for lighter winds tomorrow, but the winds aloft forecast is calling for wind. Hoping for a better forecast during a cup of coffee tomorrow morning