Pine XC Friday

[Pipkin_Tom]

Rumor has it that our favorite Texan Riss Estes bagged a 50 miler in rowdy conditions landing along side Hwy 138 in the high desert. Greg Knudson and Marty Devietti also had notable flights.
Come on guys, we need a report from someone that was there. Anyone?

[Chris G]

Riss really should be the one to post it but he's too humble. I ran chase for the small group of go-biggers. Left NHS at 9:30, arrived at launch around 10:30. Cycles were building rapidly but nobody was in a hurry and while the day looked like a 10k day, that's not actually that good at Pine. GK was off first in a BIG cycle and scratched to the left for a bit before joining Marty who had launched and was starting to climb over the spine. Riss followed but the altitudes were 9500ish at best. They decided to go OTB anyway and found decent climbs ahead of the badlands. GK pushed out front and left Marty in a light climb. He kicked himself for it later as he landed at the head of Lockwood Valley. I arrived just after he landed and Riss was another 1/4 mile ahead of us getting ready to land. We encouraged him to scratch it out but lost sight of him behind a small ridge seconds later. Marty was on glide to lockwood near 12k, having made the best of that light climb and had no problem pushing on. We got GK in the bag and looked up to find 2 gliders near 12k. Riss had pulled a spectacular save out of the bag and was back in the game. The two of them made their way toward Frazier but Riss took a deep line over the top and Marty followed the road. The peak was the ticket and after nearly saving it a few times, in building wind, Marty landed just short of the truck stop. Riss bounced across the I-5 and having had a discussion about the most consistently good track logs of the past, decided to take the Southern route rather than up the Tehachapis. He pulled another low save or two along the 138 but the wind down low was now gusting into the 20s and he had apparently gone weightless a few times so at about the 50 mile mark he put it down just north of the road. Spectacular flight on a day that was not epic on paper. Really fun day with 3 of the nicest guys you could ever hope to go XC with. We were back in Ojai by 5:30.

[BobA]

Right on! Nice flying! Pine season has officially begun! And I would love to see Rhonda back in action. So hey Rob Milley what will it take to bring Rhonda back to her Pine perch?

[Chris G]

She's in my back yard. We're waiting on parts for the repair.

[DeVietti_Marty]

Thanks Chris for chase, and OJ for the 'Ride'.

Kudos to Riss, and his gutsy, 'search and employ' attitude that found him thermals when he was all alone on several occasions as his patience and perseverance paid big dividends in altitude gains for transitions. It was such a pleasure to fly with these guys, and hang with Greg and Chris in the car, watching Riss blow by on the flats to watch him stand up the landing that would have blown most of us @ss over tea kettle. Nice!

Thanks for dinner too, Riss. You Texans do yourself proud. You are like the Chuck Norris of Paragliding.

Cheers,
Marty