28.4km Race to Goal. Absolutely beautiful conditions today. Made the 28km goal again thanks to lots of nice climbs, plenty of speed bar, and one low save 100m about the Rabies ridge...
Like yesterday, I took my time to climb up right to the top of the lift at 2200m. It was difficult to stay high however with 40+ people wandering around until the start. There was a lot of lift available, although not very organized and quite bumpy, as Woodrat mountain has a number of converging ridges and spines so there is dynamic ridge lift interacting with thermal cycles. The Sprint event gaggle was even more hectic than yesterday, where the wind really spread people all over the place so they didn't stay together. Despite yesterdays mentoring class about how to enter thermals in big events, it was more like controlled chaos than a beautiful synchonized ballet that these things are supposed to be. There are 95 pilots in the Sprint race alone, so that's quite a few people to watch out for.
At the start we all bolted for the Squirs turnpoint, which we had to tag and then come straight back from to top up height before the first valley crossing. Some people went direct to the house thermal, I took the route back up the ridge and got high much more easily with only half a dozen people around now.
From 2200m I easily knocked off the two valley transitions, half to full bar most of the way. I was surprised to find myself right in the top 5 at that point, but there was no lead gaggle per say - I guess it was so easy to find lift people were just out on their own. A rough but strong climb past the Rabies ridge turnpoint took me up to 2555m, with fantastic views of Mt Shasta (4322m) over 120km to the south and the perfect volcanic cone of Mt McCloughlin (2984m) 60km to the East.
Then we followed the ridgeline around and down to the fourth turnpoint. I'd got more height along the way, so took off on a long crosswind glide after the turnpoint, to avoid going the long way around the valley. This turned out to my worst decision of the day, as the 5km glide burned through 1000m of height through the dreaded 'China Gulch'. I got back at the Rabies ridge to see a glider in a small tree just under the ridgeline, pilot unhurt, but not a reassuring sign. In fact, it was very close to where the reserve toss was on the practice day. Down the ridge I went with about 100m clearance and that 'oh well, I guess I'm not making goal today' feeling. Just when it was nearly time to dive over into the lee-side for the Hunter landing field, I found a huge thermal just triggering from the ridge. The first turn was 2m/s, the second turn 4 m/s, the third turn I stopped watching the vario and just cranked my glider as hard up on the wingtip and held on....It was a monster thermal. Super smooth, going more or less straight up, from 890m to 2450m in about 5 minutes. According to the Google Earth analysis (see the embeded picture below) - 9.3 m/s was the peak climb rate. I looked at the track log later and deterimined that every full rotation was a height gain of almost 120m.
After that I just blasted across the valley with a tailwind to tag the last turnpoint over launch, and then on to one of the vineyards in the valley for the end of speed section. In hindsight, if I had been more competitive, I would have only needed half the height I gained in the monster thermal to get to goal. However, most people landed at walking speed into the hot gusty valley winds, so it would have been a harrowing into wind glide over forested spines without height to spare.
As it was the biggest issue I had at the end of the flight was how to get down with 1000m of height! I was too tired from two hours of full-bar flying to spiral down, so took a scenic tour over the river and vineyards to end a successful flight.
Landing by the Vineyard
Leonardo Tracklog
Results on Flyxc.org - 11th position in todays race
Like yesterday, I took my time to climb up right to the top of the lift at 2200m. It was difficult to stay high however with 40+ people wandering around until the start. There was a lot of lift available, although not very organized and quite bumpy, as Woodrat mountain has a number of converging ridges and spines so there is dynamic ridge lift interacting with thermal cycles. The Sprint event gaggle was even more hectic than yesterday, where the wind really spread people all over the place so they didn't stay together. Despite yesterdays mentoring class about how to enter thermals in big events, it was more like controlled chaos than a beautiful synchonized ballet that these things are supposed to be. There are 95 pilots in the Sprint race alone, so that's quite a few people to watch out for.
At the start we all bolted for the Squirs turnpoint, which we had to tag and then come straight back from to top up height before the first valley crossing. Some people went direct to the house thermal, I took the route back up the ridge and got high much more easily with only half a dozen people around now.
From 2200m I easily knocked off the two valley transitions, half to full bar most of the way. I was surprised to find myself right in the top 5 at that point, but there was no lead gaggle per say - I guess it was so easy to find lift people were just out on their own. A rough but strong climb past the Rabies ridge turnpoint took me up to 2555m, with fantastic views of Mt Shasta (4322m) over 120km to the south and the perfect volcanic cone of Mt McCloughlin (2984m) 60km to the East.
Then we followed the ridgeline around and down to the fourth turnpoint. I'd got more height along the way, so took off on a long crosswind glide after the turnpoint, to avoid going the long way around the valley. This turned out to my worst decision of the day, as the 5km glide burned through 1000m of height through the dreaded 'China Gulch'. I got back at the Rabies ridge to see a glider in a small tree just under the ridgeline, pilot unhurt, but not a reassuring sign. In fact, it was very close to where the reserve toss was on the practice day. Down the ridge I went with about 100m clearance and that 'oh well, I guess I'm not making goal today' feeling. Just when it was nearly time to dive over into the lee-side for the Hunter landing field, I found a huge thermal just triggering from the ridge. The first turn was 2m/s, the second turn 4 m/s, the third turn I stopped watching the vario and just cranked my glider as hard up on the wingtip and held on....It was a monster thermal. Super smooth, going more or less straight up, from 890m to 2450m in about 5 minutes. According to the Google Earth analysis (see the embeded picture below) - 9.3 m/s was the peak climb rate. I looked at the track log later and deterimined that every full rotation was a height gain of almost 120m.
After that I just blasted across the valley with a tailwind to tag the last turnpoint over launch, and then on to one of the vineyards in the valley for the end of speed section. In hindsight, if I had been more competitive, I would have only needed half the height I gained in the monster thermal to get to goal. However, most people landed at walking speed into the hot gusty valley winds, so it would have been a harrowing into wind glide over forested spines without height to spare.
As it was the biggest issue I had at the end of the flight was how to get down with 1000m of height! I was too tired from two hours of full-bar flying to spiral down, so took a scenic tour over the river and vineyards to end a successful flight.
Landing by the Vineyard
Leonardo Tracklog
Results on Flyxc.org - 11th position in todays race
Huge thermals out of the Rabies Ridge, including my flight saving monster thermal