Okay, last day of the Quest meet. Task 5- Saturday
No one seemed to want to fly. Wait- I seemed to not want to fly and I was projecting it onto everyone else! I was tired, sore, and still flying HIGH from the flight yesterday. The forecast today sucked, and it seemed rude to try to have a task today…. But of course, we all set up our gliders after the task was called, and even though the wind was so strong it was making the set up difficult, it did lay down a little as we staged. A bunch of rigids launched, and landed. Campbell Bowen snuck off though, so maybe this would be a racing day after all. A few flexes launched, and landed. Then a few more and a few more. The main part of the group was still hanging around on the ground, wondering if this day was worth flying. A few people never set up, and a few who did, took a launch and landed at the set-up area to break down. I got in line like a sheep (or a lemming, depending on your view) and got towed up late. The tow was really rowdy off the ground, and got smoother with altitude. I got let off near some turning gliders and found some lift but was having a horrible time staying in it well enough to climb. I got pushed downwind, but finally found a corker that I could take to 4500’. I told Mark I was going to try to get somewhere down courseline and he said he had to bag it since his harness zipper blew out. I think I had two more measly climbs and a glide over the swamp that had me panicking. I was tempted to follow another glider deeper into the swamp towards some low turning gliders but chickened out when I saw the terrain. I pointed my glider back towards rte 33 and it just pretty much got parked there. Nowhere good to land, getting drilled, yikes I think I see a sort of clear area ( no swamp trees) and I try to make out the foliage. I pushed up my visor to really see that it was just a sea of bushes, not really a field, but it really was the only thing going so I tried to make a decent approach as I sank out. It got super ratty since there were trees just upwind of my target and I almost got turned around some, but when the ground came up to meet me I just flared on the top of the brush and came down with a soft thump. Well this crap was like chin high, but at least I was safe on the ground. I called Mark, I was only 9 miles out from Quest so this should be a quick retrieve, and proceeded to consider my options of breaking down the glider. After a bit it was apparent that I would be able to do it easily by myself so I called mark again. He said he would stop what he was doing (breaking down his own glider) and come help. Well I walked through the brush (bushwhacked) and found a little road around 50 yds away. I went back to my glider and started moving towards the sand road. That required lifting it way up and pushing it forward to bend the bushes over. Like 3 feet at a time. Well what else did I have to do? I had shorts on and it reminded me of another glider retrieve long ago at H-port…. I was scratched and dented but making progress and I was so incredibly pleased with myself when I made to the road! I figured Mark would be there any minute and congratulate me on my tenacity…. I broke the glider down and still no sign of Mark. I got all packed away and started to walk down this road and stopped when I saw either a big cat like animal (or a coyote) cross the road ahead of me. I went back to my glider and called mark. No answer now. Shannon called and told me I was pretty deep in the swamp and they would be there in 20 minutes or so. An hour goes by and I start thinking about spending the night in the swamp without bug spray….
Into the third hour and I heard from Mark, now my cell phone battery was dying so we switched to radios. They were 2 miles away, as close as they could get, and walking towards me. I started walking south, dragging my harness behind me on the sand road. A few tenths of a mile up the road, I see a truck pull out of a side “road” and turn away from me, followed by a sheriff car. Uh oh, someone’s been looking for me…. They stopped when they saw me, and got out of their vehicles. They put their heads down conspiratorily as I approached. They were saying – I found out later- “Look, there’s a homeless woman”… and the sheriff replied, “looks like it’s ‘moving day’”…. As I dragged what looked like all my worldly possessions behind me.
I thought I was in huge trouble, but they smiled and said how lucky I was that I came down that piece of road when I did. The landowner had called the sheriff since a new lock was preventing him from getting onto his land. They were out checking the property and cutting the lock. They drove me to the gate where Mark and Shannon were- just discovering as unlocked and a direct route to me. Well so no night in the swamp for me! Thank God! We got the glider as the landowner and the gate lockers collided opinions about property rights a short time later.
We got back to Quest and tried to pack what we could as the sun set. Then we proceeded to do the glider shuffle- ours into the Quest West trailer, the Freedom onto the car, the search for Oded’s glider….pack the car tight, hit the showers, socialize a bit at the awards ceremony, leave like thieves in the night to avoid all those long goodbyes, then the 20+ hour drive home! I still didn’t know for sure if I had the Florida State or the East coast distance record (women’s) so I had that to look forward to when we got home. And when I read it in the OzReport the next night, well, I KNEW it to be true…
Wow, what a great couple of weeks of flying. 26 hours and 44 minutes total…..

Quest Task 4 Friday

All I can say is WOW.

No, not really. I can say a lot more!!!!!
When the task committee didn’t come up with this 127 mile task yesterday, I was surprised. When they put it up on the board today I was pretty psyched. I had seen the forecast and it did indeed look pretty stellar, but we would have to get up early to get that far. I was praying not to do anything spectacularly stupid to blow this one. I know how it feels to get to goal, and I know even more intimately how it feels NOT to get to goal. When I was in the launch line Lauren told me that she had wanted to do this for a long time- it would break Kari’s Florida record- and although she wasn’t flying, she wished me luck. The first climb off tow ( I got behind the Greybird tug for a wild ride) was sweet- 6000’ and above the clouds on the horizon. I was on the radio today with Mark, Paul Tjaden, and Peter Kelley. I was asked to keep off the freq we used the day before- I guess we were a little chatty…But Paul was great reading off his position throughout the flight, and it really helped get me moving along. Mark’s mic even worked the whole time, and his input was really helpful. Right in the start gaggle, the view was so spectacular and I knew EVERYONE was up there seeing it as well. I just had to make note to my flying buddies today to just say WOW! All those gliders, that blue blue sky above the inversion, the clouds on the horizon- we were so stinking HIGH!!! And driving around with impunity waiting for the start of the race.
The first few thermals I did near Mark and Rob Clarkson. His maple leaf glider is very easy to identify. I saw the only other woman in the meet-Maki? Myuaki?- during the early part of the flight too. Each climb was pretty decent once you found the middle and we just raced along from cloud to cloud. Rob kept heading to the right of courseline, where the clouds were thinner, I stayed to the center of the line- ready to race to the edge if it OD’ed. The first 30 miles- all good. The next 30, all good. Then I got to thinking while I was all out there on my own now- what if I made it? Oh no, don’t start thinking that yet- too early. I still had 67 miles left to go. What am I doing counting my chickens??? But the lowest I got was 3300’ and since the whole flight was spent at 5-7K, it felt scary low. Once I got back into the freezing 7K altitude, I vowed to not get that low again. 3300’. Treating THAT as the bottom! Funny that it was 4000’ later!!!! It started to get really thick now- center of courseline. I was worried that the overdevelopment would shut down lift- it it’s not a true convergence, then it could happen, I guess. So I stayed by the edge of it and flew over all those towns and airports that I have driven by a million times on rte 27. Mark and Paul were 20 and 30 miles ahead, so I pushed some more. Then Zippy (Zac) came by and we climbed together once- then he went on a glide that never ended. I watched as I followed and he just dolphin flew for miles. I stopped a couple times in the really screaming stuff to stay at 7K but it was incredible to eat up the miles that way. But when Paul thought it might be getting “soft” 30 miles out from goal, I got more conservative. At this point I knew for sure I had my own personal best beat so I was pretty psyched about that. I kept thinking about Kari’s record. And then told myself to stop that and keep flying smart. Through the shivering and numb body parts, I just kept trying to stay as high as possible. I started to see a few more gliders here and there behind me. Mark started calling out his final glide and how low he got before the Florida Ridge. I started to look at my final glide numbers and they started getting positive. But not enough- especially if there was sink before goal. When it finally said I had it by 2K, I went on glide. I had 13 miles to go, a canal to cross, and still I had no visual. But I know the field well so I wasn’t worried about landing there. Except I did start to worry about the goal line I had to cross. I had a used the GPS coordinates that were in my vario, not the new ones Davis gave us this morning. Ah well, I hope I cross it okay. When I crossed the canal, I saw that Mark hadn’t landed yet- too much lift over the field. My first pass overhead I failed to get the cylinder and went looking for the line way down t here. I crossed it just when I tried to lose some altitude to land and watched Jack come screaming in underneath. So there was a point when I wondered if I should keep going. It was still soarable- we’d been flying since 1:30, it was 6pm now, and there was that convergence line of clouds (much much thinner now) extending past the Ridge. But exhaustion and the lure of the easy retrieve and all my friends on the ground….. I landed. Jeff OB grabbed my glider and I just laid down. EVERYONE was at goal! I called Raean Permenter and Todd and we all celebrated at the Gator Bait Pub (Karaoke night on Fridays, you know) when our driver Shannon arrived. Long drive home! I was really hoping I had the record for Florida (women’s flex, obviously) but I wouldn’t know for sure for a while. It was pretty cool to see Cheryl and Steve again, too.
Back at Quest, I felt like someone had been punching my shoulder blades for hours, and we didn’t even shower- we just hit the hay. I’ll write about the last task later….

Quest Task3 (Thursday)
Mark and I started the flight off together, getting high, staying high, going sorta fast. Tom said that TP2 was at the end of a huge blue hole so we tanked up before trying to cross. Lift was great, big ass thermals, climbs to 5400' agl. We got high and headed to TP2 and I tagged it fairly high, like 3K, but soon after was grovelling alone in the blue. I got a climb that seemed like a good one and got to 2500', then lost it, pimped off some other people, trying to catch from underneath and it just wasn't working. A few lakes were in the way, but not even those could stop me. I saw Mark high overhead and called to him to try to direct me to the core of this gnarly climb. No answer, down to 1600' and thermalled in weird lift right over the center of the lake. The second lake was too much a challenge to fly over and although I thought the lift would be okay, I didnt want to get wet. I looked for a field to land in. Well, none of those around, so I travelled a little south and tried to pick a line in an orange grove but none were wide enough. A piece of scrub land, right on the lakeshore, would have to suffice. There were trees and bushes and tall weeds- a dry swamp. My approach stuffed my heart in my throat but the landing was just fine, thank you very much.....
Mark made goal in 4+ hours, Jack was wicked fast, Jeff OB was fastest US pilot.... Great flying day- I was just over 3 hours. I hope today is as good.

Quest Day 4 - second task
Wednesday, that is....
I got a B-day card from my daughter this morning at the pilot's meeting. She's a week late but at least ONE KID remembered my birthday. We get cards of encouragement from my teammate Raean and her husband Fred- at comps and even throughout the year- and after Tuesday's lackluster performance, there was another card from them at the clubhouse. It's hard to feel alone when when people leave comments and send cards! Sometimes it seems like I am writing into an abyss but that all changes.
Anyhow, yesterday, Campbell thought we'd never get a task off. It was dark and nasty and even rained a little on us in the staging line. I need to stay away from the naysayers because the wind goes out of my sails so to speak, and I forget how much is possible until after the first 20 people make it to goal. So I got into line a little early, pilots behind me getting pissed that the weak-link-breakers got back in front of us, and Russell Brown took me to a small group of turning pilots and pointed (duh!). When I got off I found decent lift and climbed to around 5K with a growing group. I let it drift me out of the park and in the right direction- mostly. There was the lead gaggle ahead and I kept an eye on them while I figured out the lift. My start clock never went off so I didnt have a clear direction (had to follow the 'shaded' arrow) and I was worried about tagging the first waypoint. I caught up with a glider that was turning way down low when my climb petered out, and I had about 2K on the guy, but when I tried to get in over him- there was NOTHING. I had few options close enough by and he was climbing a little, then I recognized the glider. I called to Mark and asked him where he was and after I lost around 900' looking for his crappy lift, he matched my distance except for altitude. So the two of us are all alone, in a bad climb and for a while we tried to make it into something. Now down to 2.5 K we leave and look around. I got something decent enough and continued on, keeping an eye on him. He just looked LOW. I caught up with other gliders and even had another good climb, but ran out of luck before the lake and didn't dare try to squeak out a climb over it. I had a great landing just behind another pilot named Jim (with a beautiful glider- purple) and Paris joined soon after. The landowner was a bit pissed off, and drove over his field to tell us so. His concern was that our retrieve drivers would drive onto his field ( we were right next to the road) and three other trucks that were with him drove over the field to intimidate as well. Whatever. So this reconfirms my belief that Florida landowners are weirdly protective and offensive and we should all just fly in Texas.....
So I didn't get the first TP but there were a few people who made goal. That just blows my mind. I mean, at the outset, it seemed possible. But the day was just a crappy flying day- probably a day when we would all go do something else- and like 11 guys made goal. Just makes you see what is possible. As long as you are still in the air, anything is possible as far as reaching goal. I am in good spirits despite being close to the bottom of the stack. I think the pressure from last year has taught me to never let it get to me that much..... Plus, Mark and I are having a great time and great food (Carrabbas last night!) and my dog is very happy. I am starting to miss my kids however, so it's a good thing this is coming to an end. Today looks BIG, even epic, and we are due....

Quest Day One and Two-
BLOWN OUT
Quest Day Three (Tuesday- I need to be told what day it is lately- it's all a blur...)
High pressure, no lift, high-ish winds..... so let's call a 74 mile task! No one launched right away but a few rigids. They weren't climbing at all. For once, I was in no hurry to get in line. Neither was anyone else for a while. It was comfortable temps on the ground and slowly people meandered to launch. George, Mark and I were like dead last to launch. I had a great tow and got off to the west of Quest (upwind) and quickly climed to 3600' or so. I was mostly alone so I waited for others to join in. They didn't. I could see the lead gaggle- 80+ gliders sandwiched into 1500' of altitude, two thermals away from me and on courseline. I waffled on off and had two gliders nearby, and we just kept pushing west into the wind and looking for lift. It got rocky and dicey and the thermals were snaky and disorganized- once I got below 2300' I just couldn't seem to climb above that altitude. So I just followed the stringy lift, and since I was upwind, I could let myself drift a bit with it. I watched gliders land left and right and below. When I got even lower, around 1500', I began to stress out about landing again at the Bronson Ranch. The terrain was getting a little more unlandable downwind of me and with such little altitude, my options were diminishing. I started to think about landing when I was at 1100'. I think this is the first time I actually just gave up during a flight. It just seemed pointless and of course after hearing that people actually made goal, I wish I had some of my previous tenacity. Oh well. Hopefully tomorrow will be more soarable, more enjoyable air. My retrieve was really fast (we were all very close to Quest) and we got Mexican food with Bellerby at the Supermercado afterwards. I am tired again, so the enthusiasm is lacking in this post, but I am pretty optimistic about tomorrow. Scores will be pretty whacky after today!

US Nats- Day 7 Task 7
I wind up in 22nd place- out of 27 pilots (two of whom got sick and left....) BUT, I must say, I flew my ass off and did way better than I ever have, with the exception of one day. I just keep telling myself the field of pilots is just very experienced..... But the last task was a weird little jaunt across to LaBelle, and south, then back north to a little airstrip. It was designed to keep us away from the lake effect since the wind was easterly, and the forecast strong. Ron carried my glider to the staging area, in a good position, so Mark and I started packing up our tent. When it came time to launch, I realized just how weary I was. All this flying and I was just beat. But I got into position and towed up, again behind Rhett, and he pulled me to a group of turning pilots who scattered when we approached. I got dropped in the bits that were left and left it almost immediately. I ran back upwind to the field and thankfully got a little climb all by myself 900' off the deck. It turned into something decent but I had company that was making thermalling a bit challenging and when I finally got high enough, I just left. I went on course and things were great at first, but I wound up getting stupidly low and thought I was going to land just 8 miles out. I waited in some zero sink and it turned on. When I got high enough to relax, I swore I wasn't going to get low again. And I didn't. I flew mostly alone until the first TP and then George and I hooked up. We were on the radio together and bailed each other out repeatedly as we made the next TP and headed to goal. .At one point we got above 6K and goal was looking probable, but we had to work some stuff along the way. My glides were sucky but when I knew I had it I could hardly believe it. We landed and some very late guy comes in and lo and behold it was Mark, who I had thought was a couple thousand feet below us earlier buut I couldn't be sure. Lots of people made goal but it didn't matter- it was a pretty sweet flight and a good way to end a really good meet.
Mark and I got a room later, blowing off the festivities at the Ridge. He was making plans to fly the Freedom towards Quest so I would be driving the next day. I needed a day off. but once I started the chase, and saw those big juicy clouds all the way up Rte 27, I wished I had flown. You can read about Davis' and Campbell's and Mark's flight on the OzReport. Just a note- Mark landed .86 miles behind a locked gate.... guess it ain't just ME who does that!
Anyhow, we are at Quest, just waiting for the storm to pass and the 50+ mph winds to die down so we can start the meet. Day one is cancelled but we have regrouped and are ready to fly. Dustin is here getting us all psyched about the Arizona meet, so we will be staying in "comp mode" for a while. The Jeffs are here and a whole bunch of other people that I really like hanging out with. More tomorrow...

US Nats Day 6 Task 6
The weather got ugly in the morning, but cleared up in time to change the task for the day. It was now a 70+ mile run past the goal from yesterday, where we would fly beside the lake in a cross wind. I towed up a little early, and had a weak climb for a while with an increasing number of pilots. We drifetd out of the field, near misses with the tight shitty climbs- the phantom was particularly tough for me to thermal with. When we drifted out of the start circle, finally we got a decent climb. Once I topped it out, I see everyone run back towards the Ridge. I radioed to Tom- where is everyone going???? Start clock he said. Well, screw that, I think- I fought hard for this altitude (4K) and I ain't giving any up to play THAT game.... So they all come back low and I go find my next climb. Tom caught up to me a few thermals later (two, maybe) and Jack was around. The climbs were a little finicky but sometimes really good. At one point, 38 miles out, it got really good and I got to base at over 5K. A bunch of other gliders joined me just below and when we left we all fanned out and searched. The clouds were fat and juicy and pretty lined up. I could see the airport where I landed yesterday and just glided along.... along... along... a long long long long time.... found no lift and landed facing the lake. Well, talk about lake effect shutting odwn the lift! Good reason to not have a flying site right next to a lake like pretty much ALL of ours are!!! Well, the farmer was a bit pissed, I was the second one there. I apologized and said we'd be gone in 10 minutes since Ron was on his way. Well I was just about broken down, and it started raining gliders in this guys field. 6 more pilots saw this as the best spot before the town of Okeechobe and this farmer was just NOT happy! But he did open the gate and let us all out and just said that he was having problems with trespassers all the time. Oh well. Mark and Tom landed about 10 miles further along and we went to get them. Another pilot was int he field but we left him behind due to space issues in the car. Mark left him his phone, but I hear he was in that field til pretty late at night. Oh man, that was awful. We also gave him a beer but I think that wasn't quite enough....
Okay no scores yet but I am desperate to have Lauren to compete against (she was sick yesterday) so I set up her glider and put it on the line so she could just show up and fly.....I feel like a Swift pilot now... .

Task 4 and 5
Well task 4 was a bust- we launched but got rained on in the start circle. Flying a couple miles back was a little nerve wracking- I always seem to doubt my judgment and I was concerned that the task would continue without me. My mom and my sister had arrived during the pilots meeting, with a cake and cards, so when I landed just before they got in their car to leave (they live in Naples), it was nice to at least be able to say goodbye properly. Things get so crazy between pilot meeting and launch sometimes- especially when they move it up an hour. So we spent the day messing around until it rained and watched Raizing Arizona in the tent. Mark and Ron returned the UHaul and brought back some good munchies.
Task 5
Shitty forecast according to Davis. I only look briefly at Blipmaps and FSLs and Accuweather here. I thought that there would be storms, but decent lift because of them.... So we wait and wait til someone launches into a yucky looking sky. But hours later only a couple people do. 3 of 4 fall down but Jack Simmons stays up a while. I finally just get in line since I figure I should go fly on my 29th birthday at the very least. So I get behind Rhett and get a great tow (with a slack line at one point) and the task is just 45 miles downwind so my plan is to just keep turning and pushing slightly west if I get any lift. I thought for sure we'd all just wind up on the other side of the canal waiting hours for retrieve. But the first climb I got was good- and I let it take me across the canal. I got 4K out of that and was soon flying alone, with a small gaggle to my west. I was tempted a few times to go join them, but I really liked the line I had. I just played it really conservative, wven when I had goal by 1000' I kept stopping for lift. At the last climb, I was just 6 miles out and when I left it at 5K, I kept climbing FAST and realized the edge of the cloud was actually below and in front of me. I thought I might wind up going into it, and right over an airport, and even I know that's not a good idea.... So I stuffed the bar and went. I had 3500' to burn when I got there and there were a lot of other pilots already, but my landing was good, I didn't crash into any airplanes, and it was just all good. Mark called a minute later and was just a few miles away. Doesn't get any better than that! But wait, it does! He has ice cold fake champagne! Awesome retrieve. I thought he was in the air all that time but apparently he had to land at the Ridge field in some turbulance and re-injured his shoulder. I heard from Paul Tjaden that Lauren never launched. I guess the towing got dicey just after I left.
So making goal for the first time in a LONG time, and on my birthday to boot. Pretty sweet. Mark ran out and got Gaitor Bait food (kind of grows on you) and we grabbed the cake my mom left in the office and had a little party. This morning we awoke to Lauren yelling about an approaching storm and it looked like the freaking apocalypse on the horizon. She and I got busy turning gliders around on the line (no time to break then down and Mark's was one of them) and just in time, too. The storm totally raged for like 20 minutes when I ran back to my tent and my dog was too stupid to get inside with me.
Looks like today might shape up, regardless of th drenching. We'll see. I would love to get another chance at making goal so I won't feel like it was just stupid luck! Maybe I can get a little faster- or even better- learn when to race and when to go slow.

Nats, Day 3 Task 3
I need to call this post WHITE TRASH FLYING.
Big task set with the Ridge as goal. Really windy on the ground at times, and the task was upwind to start (by mistake, I am guessing- the forecast was OFF). Rhett tows me up, and I am surprised when he starts circling over the field in lift at 300'. It is drifting us past the field ( or it will) so I start pointing upwind. He sees me at 900', pointing like I am, and he turns all the way around to look back at me and points south. I affirm that direction with another pointing, and Rhett IMMEDIATELY takes a hard right, putting a nice long loop in the tow line, that results in a little SNAP as my weaklink breaks. Pretty funny. So I land, and get to the end of the line. Others are re-lighting so I am not alone. I get Neil next, and he tows FAST so I prepare myself and now the wind is light on the field. Obvious large thermal over the orange grove.... I am 30' off the deck and Neil hits t he thermal, doesn't climb, and I hit the thermal... and climb. Now I am looking way down on him and I know I'll get the rope soon, so I give it to him. I turn and land in the gust that is blowing through the launch line now. Third tow... I get Rhett. And doesn't he just fly straight upwind, never taking a turn.... sweet! I climb out to almost 5K but I am back downwind of the field. It's blowing 16mph and I yoyo out of the start circle. I see a glider down early on and spend the rest of the time making just a mile or two progress with each thermal. I got stinking low around 5 miles before the first TP and at 500' I was waffling around with some brownish birds over a farm. I vacillated between 800' and 500' and kept chasing these damn birds until I was almost back over a swamp. I then see a large white bird, off to my right, going up FAST. I calculate the risk of following it at my 500' and decide to try. I move under it and hit the lift hard and it almost pushes me out. I grab a hold and try to stay under the "bird". As I climb, I realize it's climbing better than me, and that it is NOT a bird, in fact, it is a garbage bag. White trash. And it is outclimbing me.....Which reminds me of Lauren Tjaden.....(gotcha, Lauren).
Well I had a 5000' gain right there and wound up tagging the TP. But it's late, the sky has shut down, and I go basically on a long glide towards the next TP. Nice to not be fighting the wind... I have a nice landing and a nice long wait for my retrieve (gotcha, Ron).
I saw Paris drive by while I waited, he musta landed behind me. Wow....
Great flight, lotta work. We are getting kind of tired. Don't know how I did yet but soon...

US Nats, Day 2, Task 2
Well Easter Sunday began cold with lighter winds. Two tasks were called since the forecast was varied. I saw just light wind so I wasnt surprised when they stuck with the first task. 3 pilots launched when the window opened, but two fell down. Only Jack stayed up and once it looked like he was climbing well, everybody got launched. I was up and climbing okay, and left with the second little gaggle, and I stayed high and glided well and fast for the first leg. Lauren was right on my heels the whole time. I had 900fpm on my averager for one of the climbs- very sweet- to like 4700'. After tagging the first TP, I saw George go way left of the course line and I told him I had a good line right on the course and a big gaggle ahead of and below me. So I was headed for them, and George stopped for a climb. He said someone had been keyed on their radio annoyingly for a long time and I said since I didn;t hear it, well, it musta been ME! He tried to radio back to come over with him, but I was headed for that gaggle. They looked low enough to catch and be on top but when I looked at my altimeter I was only at 2K. They were LOW. And upon further inspection, I realized they were turning, but NOT CLIMBING. Uh oh, hard left turn over to George's thermal.... too late, they are leaving and I just get the farts they left behind. Lauren comes in high over me, and we waffle a bit, and then leave, me at 1000' and desperate. I did find a puff of lift, at 280' and I turned a few 360s in that until I drifted over the woods. I dove into the field and barely had time to unzip or stress about the landing. Well, I know for sure I am like DEAD LAST today, so that sucks. Then Mark flies overhead high and waves, and I see Lauren a short time later high and headed to TP 3. Ah well, tomorrow, I hope, is a different day. The one thing that I did do right was- I flew fast. I was doing 48-50mph on my glides and getting the best part of the climbs and leaving right when it petered out just over 4K. It got higher later, unfortunately, I wasn't in the air to see that firsthand. Ron had a hell of a time getting me- poor guy was about to go fly when I called- I was the only one who landed out so it screwed up his day.
Can't think of much else to say except I could use some well wishing and a little mojo if anyone's got any to spare.... It was a really fun flight afterall and I did have a really good go of it just one climb or two behind t he lead gaggle.

update- i replaced my vg cord with the help of a bunch of eager engineers....

US NATS and other stuff
The ride down to Florida was uneventful, except for the snowstorm we encountered after picking up Bellerby in Buffalo. It's just hearsay... I was sleeping.
Dropped Steve off at Quest, said hellos at Wallaby, and proceeded to Sebring where we spent a rainy night. Got to the Ridge Friday morning, with 2 practice days ahead of us. Well I decided not to fly since the tows looked pretty rowdy, and set my sights on a calmer tow in the morning. We set about making our campsite liveable and greeting everyone as they arrived. A few people flew, and they did pretty well for a while, but the field was too active for me. Around 5pm I saw a gathering at the pool, so I joined in. Turned out to be a pilot's meeting. I was thinking that it was a little silly- they would have to repeat all of this the next night after ALL the pilots arrived for the start of the meet on Sunday. But it was good to get a gander at all who were here already and chat about thunderstorms.
After the meeting, I heard some talk of calling a task on Saturday. Well, who ever heard of a task on a practice day? Hmmm. So I asked. And that's when I found out that the meet was starting on SATURDAY, not SUNDAY. Suddenly everything seemed to be a rush. Mark figured this all out at the start of the meeting. Took me til AFTER the meeting to catch on.....
Saturday DAY 1 NATS:
Took a tow at 8:30 am even though it was blowing 30mph up at 2K. I made just two turns and still thought I might wind up in the orange grove. Tow went well, the two turns went well, the landing was okay. Ready to compete!
Task was called to the south with pretty high wind during the pilot meeting. While we were getting ready to stage it looked like the safety committee might have a problem with the wind. I just went about as if we were going ahead and I was ready when it looked halfway decent to go. Tow was active, and Lisa dropped me off in a decent thermal. I had a tough time for the first couple of thermals just figuring out the snaky lift, and I was drifting pretty well and not getting high- like 2800'. After an aborted attempt to get back to the field, I just left kind of low. I went on a death glide, or so I thought, until i hit a little ratty thing at 1100' and got to 3700' or so. Mark got in there with me, and a couple of others, and they left way high and went pretty far east. I left and took a more direct line on course and got to the turnpoint just after they left. Oh well, straggling like I usually do. But I thermal a lot better without other distractions so I made my way toward TP2. I heard Mark talk about a ton of sink on his way so I stayed in whatever I could find, which wasn't much, on this short leg of the task. I saw where he went down, just as he was going down, and he radioed NOT to land there. I was low, getting desperate, and he said the police were on their way to the field where 4 of them landed. It was such a nice field, and the only one around, and there I am at 600', 500' coming in to land. But I saw two birds climbing out and I followed their lead, and wound up climbing right over that irate farmer's head. Funny. But it only got me the TP and another mile or two to have a pounding in between two rows of 10' high sugar cane.
Ron was making his way to get us all (I guess we all called at the same time- Tom and George at goal, me and Mark short) and the spanish speaking cane workers were very nice when they saw that I wasnt afraid f their pit bull, nor was he afraid or pissed at me. The first guy to me said, "are you okay?" and I replied, "yes, but more importantly: are YOU okay?" since I didn't know if I was at a "nice" farm, or a "mean" farm.... He was fine and even brought me some ice cold water while I waited.
So day one ends on a decent note, fun flight although I doubt I would have flown at all on a non-comp day due to the wind on the ground.
This morning, I set up my glider to find that the VG cord was snagged hard between the pulleys in the sail. The cord is pretty frayed but I think I can get away with it for one day. I have new cord but it will take some disassembling to replace it. During my flight I did have some issues with VG. A good preflight this morning (as always) caught the problem. The worst that can happen in flight is no VG at all so I guess I will risk that today.

Friday March 30th at Mossy Banks (again)
I say "again" not only because that's where we flew, but because I already posted this flight report but lost my internet connection before it got published. So I will try again!
I was headed to Hammondsport since the forecast was PERFECT for there, but on the way down Doug reported a 90 degree cross and they were headed to Mossy. It took some convincing for me to settle on Mossy, since the flag was very NW (Mossy is due N), but finally we headed up top and set up. Jamie launched first and got up pretty quickly. Todd was right behind, and he was just a bit above when I got ready, and again, I didn't look over the edge and took a few steps running off the steep edge. It took a little to get above but soon Todd and I were duking it out. My glider had decided to be more like the brat it had been the day before rather than the pussy cat it handled like at Italy Valley. Definitely a preference to turn left and once I got a wing lifted close to the terrain and I thought I was going to impale myself on the flag at the lookout. Coming in for a landing later I experienced the same thing and almost wound up 180 degrees off my intended path. Litespeeds- do they ever just fly straight??? Anyways, the flight was nice, pretty smooth at times once I got to around 6 or 700' over and then we were all able to stay around a thousand over easily. I finally got a chance to check out that other bump of a ridge to the east and soar it for a bit. Everyone else landed and just Todd and I were still up. I decided to let him have the ridge especially in case it shut down all at once- I didn't want traffic in the LZ. I set up and after my unintentional direction on approach, I had a landing that my glider didn't appreciate much. But dinner with the gang was fun at Bin Bin and even though it wasn't an H-port flight, it was a pretty good way to end the week.
Airtime 1:20
Alt A2 1005'