Given the chance that the next five days may be rained out the
task committee called a long task (214 km) downwind to the north northwest to a
farm airfield. The lift looked like it would be strong and that there would be
cu's up high.

I was first off right after Bruce Barmakian on his ATOS as a wind dummy. I got
pulled way to the south as there wasn't any lift nearby. Climbing up to 4,800',
as Bruce got low heading off to the east upwind, I drifted quickly to the west
to the edge of the start cylinder. After seeing what happened to Bruce I wasn't
all that interested in going back upwind to Quest but I had another 33 minutes
in the start cylinder to kill.

Back at Quest at 2,800' it took a few minutes to find half the rate of climb of
my first thermal, but I was going to stay in it until I got high again. Of
course, with the 10 mph east southeast wind I was drifting quickly back toward
the west side of the start cylinder.

As I climbed slowly up and got near the top Larry said he was going back up wind
to find better lift. Since I had already done that, I decided just to wait where
I was going up slowly and getting close to the edge of the cylinder.

Fortunately it all worked out well even though I had to come back to get the
1:30 PM first start from 0.4 km outside the start cylinder and at 4,300'.

I ran off to the north northwest on my own and found 200+ fpm next to the
nursery and 250 fpm a little further north. The wind varied from 12 to 17 mph
southeast. Northeast of Center Hill I found 466 fpm to 5,200' and the day was
improving.

A couple of 450+ fpm thermals and I caught everyone in front. I was climbing
fast just south of the Turnpike/I75 intersection with Cory and Alan Arcos and we
could see Jonny far below.

Behind us we could see the shaded area to the southwest and over the southern
part of Lake Panosofkee. The clouds above it were thick, but not very high. We
couldn't tell if it was raining there or not.

Together we found 560 fpm to 7,000' and then headed over Marion Oaks to find 500
fpm. 580 fpm on the northwest side got us back over 7,000' as we approached the
8 km turnpoint centered at Dunnellon. It's there just to easily guide us around
the Ocala airspace.

Jonny now left Cory, Alan and I getting a bit ahead of us and not providing any
further clues as to where the next bit of lift was. We were disappointed for
that.

Another 400 fpm thermal and then they were quieter in the 200 to 300 range as we
stayed upwind of the course line. We lost Cory before Williston and I got below
Alan north of Williston. Still he hung with me.

Getting down to 2,800' northwest of Archer I found 330 fpm and climbed up to
Alan again. We were 70 kilometers out from goal. There was a layer of light
cirrus making the sky milky, the ground shaded and the thermals weaker. The
thick cloud behind us had been chasing us and almost catching us until we got
near Williston, and there we finally outran it. But the higher cirrus was now
causing us trouble.

For the next forty kilometers I only found weak lift and continued to work
whatever I could find. The wind was 8 mph out of the east southeast. I crossed
the San Fe River at 900' feeling the quarter tail wind. I could see Alan just
ahead of me and about a thousand feet higher.

I landed 30 kilometers from goal. Sixth for the day. Alan landed thirteen
kilometers further north, the closest to goal. Cory landed a kilometer behind
me.

I had been on the radio with Larry Bunner and Zac Majors. They took the second
clock and we greatly affected by the cu-nimb that we saw to our south. They
often had to fly over shaded ground while we stayed in the sun light until the
high thin cirrus slowed everyone down.

Jonny at goal.

John Simon. Photos by Mike Degtoff.

http://www.onlinecontest.org/olc-2.0/para/flightinfo.html?flightId=-1128887972

http://www.onlinecontest.org/olc-2.0/para/getScoring.html?scoringId=319

http://www.paraglidingforum.com/leonardo/flight/1404575

http://wxc.fai.org/module.php?id=22&l=en&date=20160324&contest=INT&gliderclass=hg1

http://www.xcontest.org/world/en/flights/detail:davisstraub/16.5.2016/16:30

http://www.xcontest.org/world/en/ranking-hg-open/