Day 9: Monday 5th March

Just when the weather looked a little more promising for the week, mother nature decided once again to send storms through the region. There was a small chance based on the cloud, wind and rain patterns in the morning that a gap in the weather might appear after midday. Teams were asked to be at Mt Borah at 1.30pm for a re-brief just in case. A large storm cell that quickly developed in the south at lunch time was on its way. The day was cancelled. To be valid the event needs 4 tasks. There have been 3 tasks so far and there are 4 potential days left.

Team results - NZ is now in 7th place. If team results were based on the best three pilots, rather than the teams best three flights for each day, then NZ would still be in 5th position....

Results!

Just checked the results, all the Kiwi's are on the first page.

Task 3
Middy 27th 788 points
Thomas 32th 748 points
Harmo 71th 550 points

Overalls
Middy 12th
Thomas 24th
Harmo 27th (2nd Women)

Team placings not up yet!

Middy

Sunday 4th March.
57.2 km task via three turn points to Tamworth…yes Tamworth, first time ever to have a task go into the town with the airspace open especially for us ( sat and Sun only). So they really pushed for it for the publicity etc despite it being an into wind task. Race to goal exit start gate started at 14.30. Window was open at 13.15. A very sweet climb to base in a 2-3m/s was pretty quick so it all got a bit congested waiting for the start.

Just after start, on glide over Manilla

In the distance the direction in which we were heading a Cu-nim was setting up just to he east of Tamworth. Once into the flats the climbs were so difficult and slow (the slowest day yet) with an inversion around 1100m, which took forever to get through, but eventually we through to around 2200m. The pilots had separated at this point into two distinct groups, heading in slightly different directions. I’m not sure of the results yet but I suspect that a lot of pilots decked it around this 1st T/P about 15km from the start.
At this point a managed to avoid a collision between two gliders by about 15m, when a woman flew into the top of another pilots wing in the congested thermal, she was freed quite quickly but her impact on his wing send him spinning with many line twist and eventually threw his washing and drifted past the power lines below and apparently is quite ok.
2nd T/P was another 24km upwind and was pretty slow but straight forward. At the T/P however pilots were super low Middy gravelling around 20m off the deck but managed to get away with it and make it most the way around the course just missing goal by about 544m. Thomas we never really saw much of through the day but landed at the end of speed section 1km from goal, both a very good effort as it was soooo hard. I decked it with around 25 others at around 15km from the goal. Bummer!!! It was nearly 6pm when I landed and still 30deg!! Thomas somehow ripped out a few lines from the attachments which he is currently fixing down at HQ.
The cu-nim eventually had a gust front once everyone was safe on the ground and driving home there were heaps more spotted all over the place. We are tired as it was around 4 hours in the sky traveling very slowly and was mentally draining.

On glide toward Cb beyond goal

Harmo

Day 8 : Task 3 : Sunday 4th

Day 8 : Task 3 : Sunday 4th : 57kms - Mt Borah to Tamworth.
The forecast was for isolated thunderstorms and variable winds ... another hard day for task setting. The winds on the balloon flight showed some NE-NW. A 57kms race task to Tamwoth City goal (in the middle of the Tamworth CTA !) was set via the special event airspace corridor. Most blue conditions and light climbs greeted the 150 pilots on course after the 14.30 start gate. A wall of Cu-Nimbs sat 150kms to the south all day long and kept pilots carefully watching the sky ahead. 13 pilots made goal and 15-20 were just short. Petra was in the top places again - she will now be leading the event after 3 tasks!Brian Webb's tracklog (Thanks Brian!)

Day 7 cancelled.....

The forecast looked promising with light and variable winds but a fast moving front to the south proved the weather bureau wrong. Pre-frontal northerly winds were racing across the region most of the morning. By the final Team Leaders HQ re-briefing at 12.30pm there was no change and winds at Mt Borah were averaging 30km/h with gusts to over 40km/h. Perfect skies but too windy. The day was cancelled....

Results from Day 6. Middy came in at 18th, Harmo at 39th and Thomas at 68th. New Zealand is now 5th in the teams competition! The next team with only three members is Denmark - and they are in 16th position. Overall Middy is in 8th, Harmo in 21st and Thomas in 35th. Harmo is currently third ranked female!!

Day 6 Task 2 Friday 3 Mar.
After three days of rain it was a relief to be greeted with a clear blue dawn. The ground was very damp and when some Cu’s did start to pop, the base was very low, and the development was scraggly and weak looking.

(Photo by Brett Hardin “Behind launch” - click on photo for a larger version)
A 60.7Km elapsed time race to goal with three start gates (14:15, 14:45, & 15:15), via three turn points was called. Launch was open at 13:30 but conditions were still very fickle and the wind techs had difficulties staying up.

A few brave souls took off (including Thomas) but the thermals were very weak and broken. They found themselves at the bottom of the hill shortly after. No one else was so keen to take to the sky for quite some time. Thomas was back up ready to launch before the next pilots launched.
Eventually a few cycles started to come up the face of the east launch. Two wings were seen starting to climb of the North launch and pilots started to take to the skies. It quickly became congested in front of launch and launch was suspended for a short time. The gaggles slow started to climb out and launch was reopened. By the time we reached cloud base the last start time had passed and we were straight on cause, the first turn point, Tarpoly, was 14.4km to the north along the Borah ridge. Then back 29km south past Mt Baldwin to some large chicken sheds. The last turn point was 6km East of Manilla.
By the time we reached this point conditions had started to weaken again. The climbs has slowed to around 0.5m/s. We had to change down a gear and take every thing available. We could no longer get above 1100m now and many snuck into the last turn point. At this stage there were gliders littering the ground beneath everywhere you looked. I left with four others and made in with only five metres over the line the others were not as lucky! Harmo was not too far behind but had to go on final glide with goal closing at 18.30pm, she didn’t have the time to top up to make it in, she and 6 others landed within the 1km mark from goal, and narrowly avoided power lines that were difficult to see in the low setting sun!! Thomas landed at the same time as Harmo 2.8km from goal.
Overall a wickedly slow and demanding day. We are shattered!!!
Middy


60km around Manilla, STARTG, TARPOLY, CHICKSTH, NAMOIPK, MANILLAE (caravan park goal) with about 35 in goal.

Day 5 and Manilla floods.....

The Kiwis are definitely rain gods! It rained in Manilla like nothing the locals have seen for over 10 years. Storms with tropical downpours causing flash flooding developed in the afternoon. The day was cancelled at the 12.30pm Team Leaders Briefing.