The first task was 158km dog leg. The forecast was for 7000' top of lift but 5000' turned out to be closer to the truth. The lift was disorganized with brisk wind made it hard to stay around the air field. The launch order was randomly generated today and I was third in my line. I thought I was dropped off in a good thermal but couldn't get into it. After 25min I landed for a relight. Along with Tyler and 20 or 30 other people. Waiting for my second tow the pilot in front of me didn't pull in and ended upside down in front of me, breaking his keel, and perhaps his helmet. Swearing in some language I didn't understand. Well I won't finish last today at least.
I managed to climb up on the second go around and tangled with the death gaggles. Thermaling with 50 other people isn't so much thermaling as it is flying through general areas of lift and trying hard not to run into any one.
I ended up waiting for the third start time which wasn't really my plan but ended up following the wrong gaggle that was waiting for a later start. Finally after getting a bit of organized lift I headed on course with Tyler and one other pilot. We glided for a long way before I hit some thing and stopped to turn. Down to 2000' I should have dug in here and worked at getting up. When I wasn't really climbing well. I charged forward to three other pilots low ahead of me and arrived at 1000' just below them. Never really connected with any thing and soon was on the ground.
About 50 pilots made goal. Impressive given the difficult conditions. Would have been a good day to stick with a large group.
The spot is working great. Mike has an Ipad with spot buddy and our links to our spots. They update every ten minutes and shows our three track logs each with a different color. Hit the OK button when we land and send a text just to confirm we have landed. Every one was picked up before the glider was in the bag. What a great retrieve tool.
Hoping for a better flight tomorrow.
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