http://soaringspot.com/2011bsn

We call the last day as there is too much wind for the spot landing contest at
9:00 AM (20 mph gusting to 29 mph), and then the wind doesn't lay down until
after 12:30, when we decide that it is too windy. Yes, it mellows out to
what we launched and flew in the day before (when it was quite a bit lighter
in the morning), but given the prospect of too strong winds, no cu's (until an
hour after the task was cancelled), six days in a row of outstanding flying, and
the need for a smaller task to get back in time for the awards, it is a
reasonable call.

Everyone was stoked about the flying here at Big Spring. They were just so darn
happy with what they got to experience. Owen Morse was feeling discouraged about
his flying, it was quite a blow to the old ego when he didn't make goal. Larry
ran through his flights in SeeYou in the morning of the last day and found the
problem. He was thermaling way too fast, having gotten used to that style in
southern California, he would put his wing up on a tip and twirl around three
hundred and sixty degrees in under ten seconds (you can download any of the
tracklogs at the URL above)

There are bullet thermals in the mountains out of Crestline apparently and
that's what you have to do to stay in them there. In Texas the thermals are big
and fat and you have to flatten out your thermal circles and you have to extend
them to climb the hill of lift to find the highest mountain top. Owen was just
not used to that idea at all and so he had a much harder time climbing than the
rest of us.

He was feeling bad that it wasn't until the last day that he got straightened
out on that aspect of his flying. He was also astounded on Thursday by how fast
Joe, Alex, and I ran away from him going out on course. Although I had told him
at the beginning of the competition that you needed to really really pull the
bar in, seeing it happening in front of you is a whole nuther story. He was at
cloud base with about ten other pilots so got a good view of what it takes to
fly hard and have a chance of getting to goal quickly in a competition.

Here's a shot of our 206 km FAI triangle which we flew on Thursday:

I'll probably have more to say later about how things went for me and others at
the 2011 US Nationals, but I can give preliminary credit to my good result to
the outstanding glider than I am flying. The aspect that made it better for me
than previous gliders is the ease with which I can pull on the VG and how that
encourages me more than any other feature to pull it tight, drastically reduce
the bar pressure and fly as fast as I possibly can given the conditions.

As far as I'm concerned the 24:1 VG line ratio is a miracle. It is like gaining
an accelerator, adding a little nitro. I just hadn't experienced what pulling
the bar in really means (as it was too hard with too much bar pressure) until I
got this glider. Now I can keep up with Joe (and Alex flying a Moyes glider). By the way I have not changed my sprogs from the stock settings as there is no need given the light bar pressure.

I'm going to make sure that any other glider that I fly has this feature and why
don't all pilots demand that their VG lines be as easy as possible to pull on
tight? I swear that the easier it is to use, the more it will get used, and
using the VG is the key to speed.  And you have to fly fast if you want to
win.

When conditions get uncertain and the lift a little weaker I know that I have a
tendency to slow down a more than I should. Zippy doesn't do this. It
just comes from experiencing the bad feelings of landing out. Sure you have to
get into search mode and fly best L/D in circumstances where you are low and
haven't found lift in a while, but this is not true when you are still high and
haven't found lift in a while.

I hope that all the pilots who came to Big Spring this year will bring along a
friend or two next year. David Glover doesn't really promote the US Nationals in
Big Spring because it is a lot of work to gather the tug resources to handle all
the pilots that would want to fly here. But if many came (this is the best place in
the World to fly) then he will be forced to gather more tugs and tug pilots.

Next year there will be two tow competitions in Texas in July. One in Luling
(not just the Single Surface Shootout) and right after that the US Nationals.
They will be timed so that pilots can then go to the competition in Brazil (and
Brazilian pilots can come here before their competition). The dates for the
meets (tentative) are:

Luling: July 15th through 20th (Saturday through Friday)

Big Spring: July 22nd through 28th (Sunday through Saturday).

I don't have the dates for the Brazilian competition yet.

The results: