Big Spring update #2 from Tony DG

[Skippy]

Big Springs Update #2

The flying out here has been just fantastic. Smooth lift in the 100 to 400 feet per minute range with sweet clouds for the most part. We have been swapping first place finishes for the last four tasks.

Greg Brown made goal for the first time the other day and he was totally stoked. It was our first goal task and he was the only one to make it. Unfortunately for me I lost patience and thought I would pick up a thermal on my way to goal and didn’t landing 1 and a half miles from goal. I didn’t think it would be that big a deal but we are being scored by GAP and I lost a ton of points not making goal. David Duke made it quite a ways and Anne-Odile just missed catching a thermal early off her first glide.

For me it seems that the first glide from the airport I always get really low and have been lucky to catch a thermal with not much altitude left.

Spurred on by our good flying the next morning at the task meeting we wanted a tougher task. Then Gerolf Heinrick shows up and suggests a seventy-mile task for us. Now, when Gerolf sets the bar how can we back off? So Greg and I walk outside to talk about it and Greg wants to learn about turn points etc. so he suggests a 60 mile task with a quarter mile turn-point at the forty plus mile mark and a dogleg of another seventeen or so miles with a one mile radius finish. Yah, Gerolf likes that. Unfortunately the winds didn’t cooperate and we realized we had a quartering or worse tail wind the whole way. Not so hard on a topless but a hell of a task for a single surface glider.

The flying on this day was awesome. Still, I found myself getting low off the first glide and went well off course downwind to catch a thermal going up to a sweet cloud. Soon I was at cloud base and diving for the next good cloud and whom do I see there but Anne-Odile. She had not been catching that first thermal off glide on the last task and really wanted to make something happen and she did. She was climbing really well on that Icaro Relax and I was just trying to keep up. She made some key upwind moves that put her in a better position as Greg got real low and was in jeopardy of landing. I was skied out and looking straight down on Greg and then I saw him turning and climbing. I left lift at 8400 thinking we were going off course but should have topped out. Heck, I learned that on these low gas mileage vehicles you always want to top the tank before you head out.

I tried to make a major upwind push and I got too low. Delegated to working small dust devils I accelerated my drift off course. Here, in Big Springs, they have a reverse wind gradient were the wind accelerates the closer to the ground. Plays havoc with the last glide calculators for the open class pilots. For me, I was now drifting off course low at a right angle and was toast.

Greg came cruising past me as he topped out at 9500! Still, Anne-Odile was flying the flight of her life and was staying high, less wind with a better direction, and was constantly making upwind tacks to keep her on the course line. Anne-Odile tagged the quarter mile radius at the turn point and was working the final leg. Since Greg was more downwind of the course line he finally had to beat his way upwind to catch the turn point. This caused him to lose a lot of lift and he only got three miles passed the turn point. The only problem was that Greg actually missed the turn point. So Anne-Odile who didn’t want the small turn point got it and Greg who asked for the turn point missed it.

I was with our driver and we kept getting updates as Anne-Odile kept moving upwind and drifting off course in thermals and to our complete amazement finally made goal at 61 miles out. In the evening we checked her track log and she pretty much flew the perfect flight.

Today was our first blue day and there was a lot of wind with it. Lots of toplesses and rigids were coming back to the airport and a lot of people were struggling. We struggled too and we all bombed out on our first glide except for David Duke who caught one of the few thermals after glide to make it seventeen miles for the longest SS flight of the day.

So we all have won one task and it’s getting to the end and is pretty tight. Still, we all will have great memories of flying here. If any other pilots can make the trip I can’t recommend it enough. Sweet clouds and lift and challenging tasks await. The people of Big Springs couldn’t be any nicer. Today, we were each offered rides, beer, help carrying our gear, offer to go fishing and most are the landowners!!

See ya,

Tony

[BobA]

Killer flying guys !!! And having just got back from a weekend at Pine, I can ensure you, you haven't missed anything special here. Even the meteor shower was a bust. Wish I was there.
Fly with you soon.