Kilo report day 1

 

Mitch and Bif's Pilots meeting was efficient and we all made it to the runway for the early grid time at 11 AM. My grid buddies for this contest are JT McMaster and Michael Marshall. I'm no longer the young guy at glider contests and to be honest that is kind of nice! 

 

Weather briefing from local wizard Gary Osoba indicated some clouds, unlikely chance for OD and East/West streeting thanks to the 15-20 kt wind from the East. The task was set up to take advantage of expected convergence over the Manzanos and Sandias and provide an opportunity to run streets across the valley.

 

By 11:30 the entire area was covered with cu and Steve Hill the sniffer had reported several good climbs. Launch started at 11:45. I don't think anyone had much trouble and soon we were all loitering at around 11,000 MSL waiting for the gate to open. Didn't have to worry about the 12,000 ft tag up altitude today!

 

By opening time we were already seeing rain showers parallel the first leg as well as rain falling in the second area.  Most of the cloud cover was going vertical. No one waited long to start. Mike Westbrook and I were close to last and still only 15 minutes after opening. 

 

First part of the first leg was very good using the line along the rain to cruise at 100 mph. Then Mike and I encountered a big hole before the clouds over the mountains. I angled right for the closer approach. He went straight. We never really saw each other again.

 

On the grid Mike Marshall had been very kind to those around him to point out that the second leg came very close to the Albuquerqe Class C aispace which is off limits for the contest regardless of your altitude. As we worked up the second leg it became apparent that this was going to be a problem. The entire mountain was in shade, there were some climbs available but kind of weak, and a band of rain had developed just to the east so we were going to be sandwiched between the rain and the airspace. From the I-40 pass a dive through rain/virga was required to get back on the right side of the weather and away from the airspace. Even then any thermalling resulted in a 20 mph drift toward the airspace. Most pilots were highly stressed here. Several bailed out to the Albuquerque side of the mountain, three landed at ABQ International Sunport, more clipped the airspace either on their way to a landout or just trying to continue on the task.

 

Sylvia and I got together just before the second area and I think we were both happy to have a friend. Shame we couldn't communicate and work together. We found a good smooth climb along the face of another rain band while we watched Keith Eyler make his first off airport landing below us. We surfed up to 12,500 and I think both were relieved to be flying away from the mountain and back over the valley.

 

What awaited us was a blue hole all the way to the third turn area. I found myself really wishing I could call my crew and get the status of the competition to decide how bad I really wanted to Leroy Jenkins across the hole. The entire valley was perfectly calm. There was a rain shower down by the Moriarty airport. I had just enough altitude in the Cirrus to make it across the valley and into the third area with 2000 feet to spare. Patterson Ranch runway was right there and Mark Hawkins excellent database indicated that it was a good place to land. So off I went through the smooth at best L/D. 

 

I arrived with some altitude to work and back in bouyant air but was unable to connect in the torn up lift before I had to land. The runway was rough but fine and the people very friendly.

 

A few pilots were able to tip toe around the rest of the task by making huge deviations, delaying to wait for more rain showers to clear, back tracking to make a low save over the airport, and other maneuvers not usually associated with making maximum speed in a glider. Bravo to them, we all continue to learn how to deal with these sorts of days!

 

The scoresheet is pretty chaotic with somewhere around 8 airspace violations and a highly devalued day. In the end, competitively, it was a survival day and most pilots did reasonably well at that. The poinst spread is close enough that anyone can still move up. Hopefully we have a little more tame conditions today!