Day 4 Mark 2 - updated

Weather was difficult to call today. It did do as I expected but the organisation was slow to rebrief and slow to get us away so we ended up on a no hoper 158K to CHN and NOW with a 16:15 start line.

I was unable to get any height before the start without dropping my water; water that I was going to need on the 20kt into wind leg. So I started at about 2k and worked my way down a street to BIC. Unfortunately and despite the fact that I could plainly see that NOW was impossible, I kept racing and rejected a 1.5kt broken climb at Upper Heyford and continued on .... to a little past Enstone then to the ground at Enstone scoring 56.1K for third place and 195 points. The winner got 214.

UPDATE - A5 obviously got his trace in late last night after I posted and won the day. This puts me 300 behind and 97 off a medal. I am not sure it will now be possible to get this back - see below - but I will try.

Jim

Day 4 Mark 1

Back to normal competition routine: Tea, breakfast, rig, ballast, grid, brief, tea, squat, tea, squat. rebrief, squat, momentary terror as tugs begin to warm up, scrub, drop ballast, tow back, derig, more tea.

Back tomorrow.

Day 3 result

We did launch quite late after the blue class which had mostly fallen down. The climbs were poor and we had 107k to go so I decided to start early rather than tactically in order to maximise the chances of getting round. The winner took a chance starting much later at 16:54 but it paid off. I flew most of the way to DED with a group of 18M gliders but got there low and had to dawdle a bit. I set of for a good looking cu to find it in the Hinton penalty zone so had to take a climb off the gound at Turweston. After that a brave glide over MK to get a poor climb, then another, then another onto a thin glide in.

Not too bad. 140 points off the winner for the day but I made up some points on the overall lead. Now lying 265 points off the lead with plenty to do. Can't wait!!

Day 3

This morning I was pretty hopeful we would get a task into East Anglia but this is now looking remote. The 12:30 briefing has been postponed to 13:30 as it is now raining and the satelite picture is not great. On the grid with fingers crossed.

Day 2

A better day today!

The blue clss didn't launch leaving William sitting comfortable in 2nd place (and in the bar).

Tricky this biz. I got up early this morning to do my own weather as yesterday the weather man was clearly out by a mile. I thought the day would be best between 1500 and 1800 but the weather man said at briefng that the day would end at 1500!

Well when we launched at around 1300 the sky looked awful. The director obviously decided to get some of us away on a treasurer's before it went completely tits up. I was on the back of the grid and was persuaded to launch by Watty who was flying Bob Kings 27 K5 today.

Just like yesterday I couldn't get to start height in the start zone so whilst everyone else made a start I trickled up to the sunshine at MK where I got a good climb to 1000ft above start height. This gave me the confidence to wait for the dark bit to clear and the good weather to appear - there was no point going as I thought I unsoarable at the first turn. It did.

I started pretty much last after burning off 1000ft getting back into the start zone (and staying there for 2 mins). Another trickle into good air at MK then on to the best looking bit of sky at Santa Pod before turning for GRW where the sky looked OK. There I started to catch earlier starters and the rest of the flight was a case of finding climbing gliders despite it going a bit gloomy around Calvert.

Around Olney I caught up with Watty and then just sparred with him onto a generous final glide and home. It looks like I may have won the day and made up a few points on the leaders.

Trace on the Dunstable Comp site and the ladder.

Thanks to Glyn for the pep talk and to William for listening to me gripe at breakfast.....

Day 1

They say that pride often comes before a fall. I fell right down today! If rule 2 is "do not land out", rule 1 must be "do not land out before the start". That is exactly what I did. I went for a climb a bit downwind as the sky became overcast with cirrus. Unfortunately I got  myself out of range of a relight and faced with a 6k glide back with 300ft in hand and a 20kt headwind, I chose to land in a field before I had even crossed the start line. Bugger!

Before launching I had a chat with William: "Today," I said "is not about winning. It is about getting round and not losing". I think I set my fate at that point.....

William did a fantastic job and did go round the task ending in 3rd just a few points off the lead.
Hopefully just a big zero for me and no penalties....more tomorrow.

Jim

Off to the Dunstable Regionals

So we are off to another competition. Hopefully we shall have some weather that we can fly in this time!

William Parker and I are representing Booker at the Dunstable Regionals this year. William is in the blue class flying his Discus LC and I am in the red class with the 27.

Although I will not be able to post before and during tasks I hope to put up a report of each day's flying after we land / get back.

Scores will be found here: http://dregionals.onglide.com/current-day.xml

Positive comments welcome.