http://skyout.blogspot.com/

http://www.jonnydurand.blogspot.com/

http://naughtylawyertravels.blogspot.com/

http://hang6.blogspot.com/

http://gottafly.blogspot.com/

http://lucasridley.blogspot.com

Results here (will not be fully updated until the morning):

Open: http://soaringspot.com/rkm2009/

Rigid: http://soaringspot.com/rkmr2009/

Sport: http://soaringspot.com/rkms2009/

The easterly winds were forecasted to back off a bit today going down to ten mph overall over the Ridge and less to the west. It turned out that the winds were still reasonably high near the Ridge and about ten to twelve mph to the west.

We called a task to the northwest again, but with three turnpoints that forced pilots to head straight north on one leg and thereby requiring that they fight an easterly wind. Anything to spice things up a bit.

Jeff O'Brien was the first open class flex wing pilot to launch and I was right behind him. It was one of the most exciting tows in my life. With Kerry piloting a 914 powered tug, it was pure bucking bronco with strong lift powering us up and down until the weaklink snapped and the bridle went flying. Fortunately the conditions on landing were reasonable given the strong winds and I got back into the line quickly.

Rhett towed me up next behind his 582 powered tug and it was a smooth ride. I couldn't help myself and I pinned off again not at the top of the tow but at 1,800' when we first hit lift. Fortunately unlike the day before I was actually in lift and just stayed there. It was only 100 fpm, but I wasn't complaining.

Jeff O'Brien, Jeff Shapiro, Andre Wolf, Dustin Martin, and Jonny Durand had been hauled up and were near the edge of the cylinder while I was working my way up slowly after my second launch. They took the second start time while I had to wait and take the third one as I was too far behind.

I started low (as does Jonny) at 3,000' and got lower heading for the first turnpoint to the west northwest of La Belle. I was down to 1,500' hanging in zero sink when Phill Bloom came by just below me searching around for better lift and found it a quarter kilometer to my south. I joined him and we climbed out of this hole and got going on the task.

There was an area just to the northwest along our course line that would make for difficult retrieval and we were headed right for it. There were a good number of pilots around now and a bunch of us headed out over this area, getting low quickly. Fortunately we were able to find 400+ fpm lift after getting down to 2,000', which made it possible to get across this area without too much concern. One pilot, Mark Fruitiger, had to land just past the north edge of the area.

I got high and headed out on my own to the upwind side of the course line under good cu's and they produced. There was a turnpoint just south of Arcadia and with the good cu's it was easy to make it staying high.

I was down to 1,500' just east of Arcadia and found 600 fpm to 6,400', the highest climb of the day and the best lift. The next turnpoint was to the north just south of Wachula right up highway 17. We had to fight a east wind to stay near the course line. About half way up this leg we spotted four stragglers from the first start time, including Jeff Shapiro. We were able to catch them before we got to the next turnpoint.

There was a strong thermal just downwind of the turnpoint which a few pilots were marking and it was easy to get high enough to get the turnpoint back into the wind and then headed downwind toward goal. Shapiro and I flew together now that we were next to each other.

Getting to goal was a breeze given that it was downwind and the cu's were lined up for us all the way to goal.

Jonny was first in, followed by Andre, Glen and Dustin. Jeff O'Brien came in twenty minutes later.

Updated scores in the morning. The Dream Team is quite a bit in front of the USA team. More scoring soon.