CD Day 1 Report

Hello race fans,

Today proved to be a challenging day to call. I turned in last night fully expecting to wake up to a dreadful overcast sky with rain in the hills, which would make for an easy call to cancel day 1.  However, we awoke to plenty of sunshine and a fraction of the cloud cover in the forecast.  The winds were forecast to be light on the surface for a relaxed launch, but the forecast still called for possible overdevelopment and isolated thunderstorms in the contest area. 

It was clear to me that we would have a soarable day but that calling a reasonable contest for a national contest would be a challenge.  At the 10:00 pilot meeting, I was un willing to make a decision so I punted to an 11:30 meeting for another look.  It seemed to me to be improving so I decided we would grid and make a final decision no later than 13:00 and set 2 AATs with large circles to allow for the dynamic conditions. 

By 12:30 it was clear to me that I had over thought the day and that we were  at least 30-45 minutes late.  We meet at the grid, passed out the task and announced the lunch would start in 25 minutes.  The standard class pilots did a great job getting the tasks entered and pulled into line.  The wind had been picking up steadily for the past 2 hours and was now reported 19 gusting to 26 and 40-50 degrees from the left.   The launch went off without a hitch and I opened the Standard class task 15 minutes after the last glider launched. Soon after I heard CZ start and I was reassured that the day was actually better than it looked.

The 20 meter class was launched and as I was about to open the task, I looked up to see over half of the class struggling.  What just happened?  It was looking so good 15 minutes earlier.

The next thing I know is that we have 3 relights and my hopes of opening the task were getting dashed.  I knew I had make a decision by 14:30.  I asked a few pilots for their status and decided enough of the class was high enough for a decision to open the task but change to task B which dropped the Wright lake turn area.

There, I did it.  Now all we could do was wait and see how the pilots do.  The score sheet tells the rest of the story.  We recovered most of the landing pilots from the runway in moderate to heavy rain which continued well into the evening.  We did land 2 pilots off field safely  in the north end of Butte Valley. Congrats to the pilots who attempted the task and my hat is off for those who completed it.

Day one is in the books.

Rex Mayes CD