Things have been a little quiet on the flying front since driving down to Mt Beauty from Forbes last week. We managed one task in windy conditions on Tuesday but the remainder of the week continues to look questionable. Fingers crossed he high level winds back off despite the forecast.

The lack of flying though has given us plenty of opportunities to catch up on the social side of the sport  that we just didn’t have time for back up at Forbes.

We’ve been to wineries, the Bright Brewery, Fishing and Falls creek to be snowed on. Will post some pics after the 12pm briefing today.

An out and return to Tomingley was called 185km. Conditions start off light in the padock. Eventually he usual cantidates assemble at the start gate over the quarry tto the north of the strip. We are in a good place for the start at 9500ft. The usual start gate games are played and a group of pilots leave at the first start. Most of the guns hang around for the second or third starts.

I take the second with Lucas, Noma, Pedro and Guy amonst others. We scream all the way to the turnpoint. I tracked to the east of the Nth Parkes mine and get a great run to Peak Hill before catching the guys from the start gate in front. Some of the real quick guys from the last gate catch me in the same spot on the way back after the turnpoint.

At this point Jonny, Blinky, Balaz and I get a nice little gaggle happening and cover the next 50km very fast despite the 20km head wind.

Wow it’s fun to fly like this with Jonny. I have learnt that one of the biggest differences in our flying style is the speed in which he cores a climb. We glide in at 90kph and with only minimal deviation he has found the core and in one movent it’s VG off and we’re rocketing up at 4m/s. Pretty to watch.

The fast run continues back to within 20km of the airport where a change of gears it required. It takes me 40mins to cover these last few kms. Damn I was scorching too.

After eventually making it in I find that my story of woe is a common one and we get into the beers to drown our sorrow.

Dave was also really moving around the course after taking the last start with Jonny. At one stage it looked like he was going to catch me but unfortunately he landed 40km short. Barnsie, up to his usual tricks of staying in the air forever landed just 10km short of goal. Great work Dustys!

Forbes – Grenfell – Eugowra – Gooloogong was the task for today. Given the stronger than expected westerly winds for the day it was thought that a triangle would be too tough. This zig zag task called provided a neat way of staying within a short drive of Forbes but meant that we would not have to punch straight into the headwind.

The day provided some awesome flying with all the guys in our car making goal.

The Dustys, making quite a habit of this whole being in goal thing.

Results are also in with me picking up a 16th and Dave coming in only 6 mins later in 22nd. Great flying by the whole team. Let’s see more of that sort of action tomorrow guys!

Results so far

Flights in Leonardo

Well yesterday was an interesting day with a few of the guns down early. The manditory start proved to be a bit early for a few of the top 20 that were not organized enough to get in the air early.

Being in 21st, I took the last gate but I still had not managed to get high by then.

Tony G, Noma, Len and I struggled for the first 20k before finally stumbleing into a 3.5m/s to 7000ft.

Today we’re off to Marsden (near West Wyalong), then back to a point along the Henry Lawson Hwy about 25km north of Grenfell. 130km.

Forbes > Grenfell > Caragabal > Len’s Place

150km triangle. With light winds out of the NW makes the first leg down wind, the second head wind and cross wind home.

30 mins to launch. Good luck everyone!

I had the perfect start to the task but then managed to get low for 20k either side of the turnpoint. I struggled around but was pretty slow. Pete and Barnsie got close to goal but were sucked tothe ground by a blue hole on the way back.

After making goal I climbed back out take a whole lot of photos of Forbes and the surrounding area… I’ll post these up when I get a chance. in the mean time here’s a pic of where I eventually landed in town.

Off to Grenfell and back today. Cross wind out and return. High chance of ODing today so hold on to your hats.

Earlier start also launching at 12pm start gate opening at 1:20pm

Sitting here with Davis in a padock near the town of Frogmore. Why did we end up 20km off task? Well after making it to within glide of goal we got scared, then the task was stopped… Then we bacame more scared.

The entire task we were avoiding areas of rain but eventually, after I had glide to goal, we hit a bit that was impossible to go aroud. At this point, the task was stopped. The right move in my eyes.

Another fun Fay out though. Let’s see how the stopped task
rule pans out this go after the controversial implementation in Canungra.

What a day! So much fun it was almost like we were flying at Forbes. The day started off topping out at 5500ft through to the turnpoint at Carabal. After that thing got real fun with base lifting to 9000ft. Fun.

For such a big day, almost 200km, it was a pretty easy day. All our team made it in to goal. Out of us Peter won the day with Dave, Barnsie and I all coming in with similar placings.

Over all it looks like Jonny won the day with Zippy (Zac Majors) in second and Attila third.

All up there would have been about 50 pilots in goal. Awesome for such a long task.

The pic is of Dave landing at goal.

Results for yesterday:
1. Zac Majors.
2. Lucas Bader
3. Attila Bertok

17 in goal

I ended up in 15th and Barnsie in 20th.

Today we’re off to Bookham vai a TP at Caragabal 194km. Northly wind so it should be a fun day heading down wind.