http://soaringspot.com/2010bsn/

Larry Bunner finished first at the goal at the Lamesa airfield, far ahead of
anyone else including Zac, who was second in.

Given the return of our standard superb Big Spring weather with fluffy cu's and
south winds, the task committee chose a secondary task, a zig and a zag to
Lamesa, which became the primary task when Larry felt that the wind was too
strong to return to Big Spring.

I was off first once again at 1 PM, with the first start time at 2 PM. I climbed
to 6,000' over the airfield, but given that the lift was broken and weak at 50
fpm, I went downwind to a cloud just north of the airfield. It was worse at 31
fpm. I was beginning to feel pinned up against the 10 km start cylinder as I had
27 minutes to wait and was half way to the edge with a 13 mph south southwest
wind.

In desperation I dove toward a cloud over the town and down to 4,200' found 150
fpm. I just wanted to get up to cloud base still inside the start cylinder so I
hung on as I climbed to over 6,000'. From that elevation I could see the nice
cu's setting up in a street from the south southwest and I was in the street. I
pushed forward upwind, found better lift. I kept working up wind and finding
better lift as the clouds formed and climbed up to 8,700'.

Now I was in the perfect position and I thought I was and I was but I really
didn't know it. I had changed the task on the Fytec 6030, but it had not taken.
The new task was there and the 6030 knew that there was now a 10 km start
cylinder but it didn't know about the new waypoints, well it sort of did, but
the task as presented to me had the old waypoints from the previous primary
task.

A few pilots saw this bug in Italy on the last day of the pre-Worlds. I can just
barely make out the screen, so I didn't catch the fact that the first turnpoint
(12T) was not to the north of my position (11T), way on the northeast side of
the start cylinder, but straight to the northeast, just in the direction that I
had been drifting.

I was right at cloud base, in fact I had to keep going to the edge of the cloud
to stay out of it, right at the edge of the start circle. When the clock ticked
over, I pulled the VG cord and raced as hard as I could to the clouds to the
north, missing completely the fact that the first turnpoint (12T) was to the
northeast.

Twelve kilometers out, for some reason I realized that something was wrong. I
had been at cloud base with Mitch and Mark and Zippy was 1,500' below me
circling. I had raced as hard as I could, but then I wondered why no one was
around me when I found a nice thermal and beamed up. I looked at the 6030, saw
that it had the wrong turnpoint, hit the route button again and got the right
one, and saw that I was fifteen kilometers west of the turnpoint and needed to
fly cross wind to get to it.

Zac had circled up for a couple of minutes after the start time just outside the
start cylinder to get to almost cloud base before heading off in the right
direction. He made the turnpoint on glide and then went west three kilometers
where I came in under him having run as fast as possible from the west.

Both if us climbed up and I headed for the first turnpoint as he climbed to
7,000' and went toward the second. Coming back to the spot where we had climbed
out I didn't quite get there as I was low and had to go searching. Drifting
downwind to a cultivated field I found zero at 300 feet.

Climbing at an average of 18.8 fpm, I hung on to the broken thermal for thirteen
minutes, before I found a thread that at 700' AGL was going up at 200 fpm. I
climbed back up to 8,600' as I drifted away from the next turnpoint to the west.

Zac was making slow but steady progress with the south southwest flow going
cross wind. The wind was just slightly off of south at 10 to 15 mph. The
turnpoint was southwest of Lamesa, and 60 kilometers from the first turnpoint to
the northeast.

After getting high and seeing all the clouds around me and climbing in the last
thermal at 600 fpm. I headed west for the clouds and the chance to catch up. I
kept searching for lift under the clouds but they formed and disappeared in a
few seconds, it seemed. I found broken 100 fpm, but kept searching for better.
My searched ended with me on the ground, working -52 fpm hoping for it to turn
on.

Zac was working 200 to 300 fpm lift but then he got down to 500' and thought
that he was landing. He found instead 230 fpm and climbed out of his hole, but
that slowed him down. He was able to get up and then make the turnpoint and with
a couple of climbs make the last leg into goal.

He was the second pilot in, but when he got there Larry was already broken down,
having come in 20 minutes earlier.

A number of other pilots made goal, so it was a good, if difficult task. Cross
wind.