Thursday, October 30, 2008

Day 5 Classic

Today was looking good, we decided on going to Flying fox launch and set a task that would take us deep over the Great Dividing Range. Our first turnpoint was at killarney then we turned and headed north along the range for 30 kms to a small town on the Cunningham highway called Maryvale. Climbing out above launch.. I pushed on lunch and dove off the 300m high hill and was rewarded with a 500 fpm climb to base 5 mins before the 1st start. I was not alone there was a gaggle there and we all left me out in front and I tried not to stop for about 12kms before hitting a good climb. I was a little in front and kept charging for new forming clouds in front. Before long Attila has caught me and there was now about 5 of us climbing on the hills north of Rathdowney. Attila was on top now and headed off for Maroon and Curt also above me followed. I stayed with flocky and we climber higher before making the long crossing to the next hill. I hit a good climb on top of Mt Maroon and Attila turned back and came in below and straight away I headed down the valley along the big rocky cliff faces and hit a solid 900 fpm climb and Attila and Flocky raced in below and started climbing fast.the caught up to me on climb and later reported in goal that they had 11-1200fpm climb.. looking south along the Great Dividing Range.. We all flew together in towards the Great dividing Range just near a big fire that was burning. I went a different direction to Attila and Flocky and hit a good climb which put me a few kms in front and higher. Now 20 kms out from turnpoint we are all together again and I head out first with Atilla just below me glided over the range and about 5 kms short of the TP we topped up with alttitude. I then rounded the turnpoint with Attila just below and headed tail wind now to the north towards goal. I stopped for a light climb that Attila missed and watched as he got lower in front of me.he hit a light climb too so I headed over towards him but kept going to a ridge a few kms past him and hit a good 500 fpm climb. I took this one to 5,200ft and headed for the next ridge and topped up 17kms out from goal thinking I had final I left and got drilled about 10kms out and did not clear the last ridge and had to find one more thermal. It took me a little while to find it and eventually it kicked but I could see Attila coming so I had to do just a few more turns to make sure I clear the hill and off I went. I managed to climb all the way to goal and arrived at about 3,000ft.. I was 1 minute 20 sec in front of Attila and he was about 1 min in front of Flocky. The next pilots arrived some 30 mins later and kept arriving with 21 making the 117kms task. There was so many happy faces in goal after experiencing such a flight like that one. Scott who was leading landed early and Curt in 2nd landed before the turnpoint on top of the range. Blay who was in 3rd also landed 8kms short so there will be big changes in the scores. Attila will now be leading with Enda in 2nd and Missy in 3rd. I will moove to 5th after getting the first 1000 points for the comp.