Hump Day

Before addressing Wednesday, contest Day 2, it must be said Mifflin is quite an experience and a wonderful task area offering ridges and big, flat, landable valleys. Please, please put this site on your “must visit” list. Being the 30th or 31st R2 contest, the Mifflin Soaring Association is a well-polished machine. Pick any department … OPS, to weather forecasting, to task advisors, to retrieve desk, to scoring they are all top tier. Only missing piece is a loudmouth CD and I resemble that remark.

We enjoyed a good first day then stood down Monday and Tuesday. Early on Wednesday was considered a washout with expected early overdevelopment and rain. We stayed with the program and had two different 1:30 tasks to pick.

To my surprise, the day held on and all were launched. Relights were required by some. By now you could see the thunderstorms bearing down but task advisors advised to open their respective task. Now it truly was hump day and in form they were big, black, and crying.

As it turned out the thunderstorms washed the day out not once but twice. SPORTS and FAI COMBINED did not have a contest day but 18M had 2 non-zero scores, one of which exceeded SMTD, making it a contest day. Congratulations to first place Erik Mann and second place Tim Welles.

The “never say die” award went to John Seymour (SM). Having had two early launches, rain forced him to land back at Mifflin. With patience, he waited two hours planning to have a late try. At 5:00 another line of storms was ominous causing SM to throw in the towel with prejudice. KI would be proud.

Karl Striedieck appropriately summed up the day … “weather forecast was spot on, we launched in the earliest sustainable window, and we took 100% of what the day offered. You cannot expect anything more.”
Respectfully,
Marshall McClung, CD