K-Blog

Show Us Your Limits - Well done Nic!

A friend Nic from Canberra recently won the 'video' category to acknowledge the 100th anniversary of the border survey of the ACT.

The video shows him and other Canberra boys hang gliding around the Canberra borders.

Love your work Nic!!!

(some of the footage is from my first LiteSport flights in June)

 

Gulgong Day 7 - Too windy to fly..... Congrats to Jonny Comp winner!

Strong chance of thunderstorms and 15-20 knots of wind on the field, Billo and the task committee decided to call the day.

Jonny won, followed by Steve Blenkinsop and Scott Barrett. Congrats guys!

Results

We had 7 great days of fantastic conditions. It was the type of flying I had been looking for since Forbes last year. I learned so much in 20 hours of flying. Great stuff indeed.

Roll on Forbes in a month!!

Gulgong Day 6 - tough for some

Tough day but some smoked it home.....for example Scotty and Jonny.

You had to be right up on top of the lift today to gain advantage, if you dropped low you were screwed because the climbs were really broken and weak.

I was doing well until after the 2nd turnpoint, It was getting late and the lift started to get REALLY light.

I drifted with Dave the last few KMs, picking up any last bit of lift we could. Tough going. We worked in zeros for ages until Dave said screw it and moved on. I followed him and we both ended up decking it about 15kms short of goal.

Great day though. I felt I made some good decisions about when to fly and when to keep climbing.

Tonight we experienced the nightlife of Gulgong. ALOT of fun. One of the locals showed us what happens at 'flirtation hill'. Interesting stuff.

89 km triangle

We were told to fly fast and not take the last start due to high chance of overdevelopment.

Late start today

The trough came in early. We will have a task but it will be a short one. 11am and people are slowly setting up... Maybe some tiredness setting in. This might be the last day, tomorrow looks like thunderstorms.

Gulgong Day 5 - The fun continues

 
Getting high at the start gate

Most of the big guns took the 2nd start. I took the first because I thought it would take me longer to get around, but they ended up catching me near the first turnpoint because I got seriously low and got the landing gear out at one stage.

It's a joy to watch these guys fly. There is no dawdling, they know exactly where they want to go and they do it fast.

I flew with Mark Russell for the 2nd leg, it was so much fun having someone to tag team with. Of course it helped that there was a nice cloudstreet that took us most of the way to turnpoint 2. After tp2 you needed to be a bit more experienced or lucky to get out of there. Just didn't happen for me today.

The only bad things about Gulgong are the 'dead zones'. So many places with no Telstra coverage. Makes for a difficult retrieve when you cannot get hold of anyone by radio or phone. AND for the last 3 days I have landed in paddocks with knee high thistles. The rain over the last few months has made them sprout up in abundance. You'd think i could recognise it from the air by now, but they look deceptively like grass. Meanwhile my legs are torn to shreds :(

But good news is the towing is going really well now we have 3 trikes and a dragonfly. No more waiting for an hour in the tow line.

Results are up. Scotty Barrett won the day, followed by Steve and Trent. Jonny still in the lead overall.

Tomorrow is looking good.

2 more days to make goal :) 

106 back to gulgong

5 turnpoint, this task has everything, upwind, downwind, crosswind. It'll be a tough one. They say its only 5 knots on the ground and at base but it looks windier than that here at the strip. Chance of overdevelopment today, we could be avoiding showers...

The boys, dave and ant, working out the tats game plan :)

The Gold Rush Town of Gulgong

Rocket fuel

Is it the vegemite sandwich at cloudbase or the power juice that does it??

Whatever it is, it's working.

I'm just waiting for the flux capacitor be activated when he hits 88 mph :)

 

Gulgong Day 4 - a tough day

The days are getting better and better.

Wish I could have stayed in the air longer today, but only managed the first turnpoint. Despite the amazing looking sky, the thermals were not as easy to core, so I had to work really hard for that first turnpoint.

On tow, bar pulled in trying to keep up!

Trent won the day! Overall, Jonny i in the lead, followed by Steve Blenkinsop and Grant Heany.

Tomorrow the forecast is looking similar, but with winds to the North.

Out on course, looking for those elusive invisible columns of rising air. 

Results