GSSK Day 1

Well, we finally made it to Florida!

We got slammed the day we were supposed to leave with 18" of heavy, white, cold, disgusting snow and single digit temperatures. Two days and about 24 hours of driving, and we made it to Quest!

10 hours of shoveling and heat gunning, finally leaving..

The first day we were there we all decided to take a tow up and do some flying- after no airtime for 5 months. I took the first tow up in front of Ilya and Max, got about 40 minutes of thermaling, my shoulder had enough and I landed. Max and Ilya got about 1:20+ a piece. It was a fun day. I only took that one flight and decided to give my shoulder a break before the first task.

Day 1 of the GSSK 2018 was a 39.8km task South down 33 x-wind to the first turnpoint, then  to goal at Wallaby. Our team mentor was Christian Ciech, and he's a hard man to keep up with. Even in a kingposted Orbiter. We lined up to launch - Christian, Ilya, Max, Crystal, and Asel. Dana wasn't able to fly due to issues with his rental U2.

Left line - Day 1



Ilya on tow, Task 1

Ilya and Christian got to base fairly quickly, Max and Asel weren't able to stay up and went back for re-lights. I got down around 1,000ft and the scratching was well underway. My biggest motivation: not landing in mid-day conditions in a field in front of 100+ people. If you've ever seen an albatross land, that's about what I look like when it's buoyant..

A turkey vulture saved my skin and marked a thermal for me. It went from about 150fpm and turned into a consistent 900fpm all the way to 3,700ft and past several other competitors. Christian and Ilya began their run to the South for the first turn point, and I gave chase and ended up catching up with them a short time later. We were battling a strong cross wind. Early on we were watching people landing left and right. About 10km into it we ended up passing Bill Gottling, flew with him for awhile, and moved on. He said he stopped to do a bit more climbing in a thermal and by the time he decided to continue on course we were gone and he couldn't find another climb after.



Task 1 - Crystal and Ilya

We had thermals here and there. It was strange, with some lift being scratchy and others being bullets. About 20km into it we were getting blown downwind and off the course. Christian was a ways ahead of and a bit above Ilya and I and we were on our own at that point and down to about 2,600ft. We weren't finding anything, and ended up leaving a scrappy 50fpm thermal to head upwind for stronger lift near where our mentor was. By the time we got there, it was gone. We went back for the lift we flew through, and that was gone. Then the flush began. We scratched and hunted, and hoped for a trigger off the highway or fields underneath us but nothing lifted off for us. A short time later we were on the ground. We landed in a cow field near a gate and road. From the air we only saw about a half dozen cows, as we were walking towards the highway and gate I looked back to the hill and there was about 50 cows... RUNNING down the hill towards us. Visions of Tom Lanning's encounter with them licking and trampling his glider were flashing. I radioed to Ilya and we made a run for the road. We got out of our harnesses and threw those and our fully assembled gliders over the fence before they could get to us and trample our gear. It was like the walking dead, but with beef..

As we were breaking down, I looked up and saw about a half dozen gliders flying over using the thermal that we and the cow stampede had probably triggered off. And amongst them was Max in his green machine flying over us. He could see our big shimmering tears from 3,500ft. He ended up catching up with Christian and making goal. The only Sport 2 to do so that day!

It was a fun time, good experience. And the best things of that day were I got my mid-day tow, mid-day landing, and XC flight in (haven't since 2016). My shoulder also held out a lot better than anticipated, the glides in between the thermals helped give it a break.

Total time in the air 1:10

Distance: 21.86km

Tied for 13th place with Ilya, and the furthest non-goal Sport2s for this task.
Task 1 Results

Task 2 has been called off due to thunderstorms and high winds..