12 August 2011

Day 6

This morning there was a high overcast of cirrus, and that is not normal for Uvalde.  According to our weather guru, it was left over moisture from the T-storms off to the north and west yesterday.  By about 9:30, the cirrus was still there, but now the typical low level stratus was overhead as well.

The launch was originally set for 1245, but delayed until 1325.  The open class went first and they stuck, so the launch continued uninterrupted.  The thermals were weak when first off tow, and didn't get much better before the start.  I was one of the first starts, along with Joerg, and we  were able to run along reasonably well and take a few 3.5 kt climbs to stay between 3-4000 AGL.  I maximised the first turn area as the sky looked better than in the direction of the 2nd.  By the time I turned, the sky was looking better to the south and I was able to bump along some good streets.  For the task my thermal time was 16% of the flight.

I flew 342 km on task at 125 km/hr.  In the last turn area I may have made a tactical error and deviated around a thunderstorm and gained only marginally more distance.  I finished 13 minutes over time, and had I turned 5 minutes earlier, I think my total speed would have been better.  I need to look at that on See you tonight.
Dave

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