Day 2

I woke up with one goal for today, to beat my previous days personal best XC distance of 2.5 miles. I did not want to report back to the crew at Blue Sky that my best flight of the trip was 22.5 minutes and 2.5 miles. Per the daily routine, our pilots meeting was held at 10:00am and we kicked the day of by discussing the previous days flights and sharing some of our little victories. After Day 1, the Air Hogs team (mostly Russians) were leading by a nice margin (I can't remember the score) with Below Me (our team, be careful how you say that name) in second and team Cloud Base in third.

Today's task for the C pilots was originally called as an out and back to the La Belle airport and back to the Florida Ridge, a 22 mile round trip flight. Based on my previous days performance this seemed like a pretty daunting task, but the conditions looked good with around a 3mph headwind foretasted for the up wind leg, lift at 3-500fpm and cloudbase at around 5000'. The launch window was set from 1:00 to 3:00. Those of us who had never used the waypoint and GPS functions on our instruments were scrambling to get all the Florida waypoints downloaded and the route function figured out. Davis Straub gave us a quick run through on how to set things up and we were ready to test it out. After taking a short flight, Davis reported back that the wind aloft was stronger than foretasted and the C pilot task was revised to be landing at the La Bella airport, approximately 11 miles from the flight park.

Today, our team was scheduled to launch last, which was fine with me, as it looked like it was going to get better as the day progressed. When the launch window opened, our team captain Steve Larson, decided that he would launch first, since nobody was jumping up to the starting box. Steve is flying an EXXTACY rigid and we figured he could get up and start marking for us.

Steve Larson our captain and John Brantley talking strategy for
team Below Me in the  staging area.

Steve gets ready to launch his EXXTACY and start the day. John and I sit in the shade
 of his wing trying to figure this all out, while Amy keeps us organized running ground crew.

Steve, hit something that felt good shortly after launch and released at 800', but couldn't get it to stick and jumped back in the box for another launch. Shortly after launch he again hit something solid and released at around 1000'. Again Steve was back on the ground and shuffling to get in the launch line. This had John and I scratching our heads. If Steve isn't skying out, we are in trouble. Downwind of the field looked pretty good, but up wind was a big blue hole, which they call the lake affect from Lake Okeechobee. Withe the launch window coming to a close, I geared up and jumped in line one pilot back from John and three back from Steve.

Please just let me beat 2.5 miles today........

I had a nice tow and although, there were some sharp thermals out there, it wasn't nearly as sporty as my tow yesterday. Off tow, I immediately head down wind flying through some rowdy smaller stuff hoping to hook something just up wind of the nice looking clouds that were downwind from the flight park. Around a half mile downwind of the park I spotted Pedro flying a T2C and working something just down wind and about 1500' above me. I was able to use him as a marker and hooked up with some nice 4-600fpm lift below him that brought me from around 1500' to just over 3000'. When I lost that thermal, I started looking for Pedro again and found he had gone on glide and was about a mile down wind and working what looked like some pretty good lift, that was the last I saw of him. For the next couple miles I hit pockets of decent lift, with what seemed like disproportionately strong sink, bouncing around between 1500' and 2800' AGL. I found myself over an abandon subdivision project at around 1800' and working hard to stick in broken lift. I would claw up to 2300' and dump it off in sink before I knew it. At around a 1000' I unzipped and started scouting my LZ. On an up wind leg of boxing the field, I hit a BOOMER at around 800' and took it to just below cloud base at 6200'. I was so dialed in to staying with this thermal that I didn't even think about zipping back up until I topped out and my legs were feeling a little chilly. After that, I knew I had the airport nailed. I hit strong lift and strong sink as I got the airport insight. At one point I had it banked up pretty steep and climbing nicely, when I got spit and hard over the falls I went. That really got the juices flowing! I tagged the airport at around 4800' and flew around for 10 minutes debating about what to do. I decided that if I made it back to cloudbase on my next thermal that I would, continue down wind over La Belle and if I didn't, I would head back up wind toward the flight park....... Bang, and I am back at cloudbase and drifting as I circle over La Belle and into the mist at the bottom of cloud base, oops, ERR UHHH I mean "I was 500' below cloudbase and legally compliant".........so I stuff the bar and go on glide porpoising down a lift line for a couple miles until I am back to around 3000'. Time to circle again, and I am back at cloudbase, how freaking AWESOME is this flight!!!! After the last cork screw to cloudbase, I am actually a little loopy from cranking and banking so much. I opened my visor for a little fresh air and went back on glide. At this point, I am kicking myself for not eating more than an Egg McMuffin for breakfast, because I am actually feeling pretty whipped. The sky in front of me is starting to open up a little and I can see that the landing options are getting a little tighter in the next few miles, so I decide to start scouting an LZ. My first choice is a ranch with a nice green pasture, but as I get lower, I see that it is speckled with some small trees/bushes that don't look good, so I start looking for option number two. This turns out to be a nice field about 1/2 mile back up wind and right next to the highway. As I commit to the field and begin to box it, I can see that it is one of the abandoned orchards that has shallow ditches running the length of the field and they are about 15' apart running perpendicular to the wind. I couldn't see this from 800' with all the grass, YIKES! As I round out into ground effect, with good ground speed I am focused on my airspeed and not worrying about trying to time the ditches. I flared a little late and set the base tube/wheels down as I landed in one of the shallow ditches, no whack, but not a no stepper, oh well.

Getting ready to breakdown after a great day in Florida.

What an AWESOME DAY!!! The first hour and fifteen minutes of this flight absolutely kicked my but and not eating right didn't help. I actually felt like an XC pilot today and that is something that I have waited 20 years for, since I learned to paraglide..........and I still have 5 DAYS OF FLYING LEFT!!! Today's flight really made the trip for me, so anything else is gravy. There is still time to come down and join me.

Good stats for this rookie.

Here are my stats for the day, with three new personal bests; longest flight 1:56, highest altitude gain 6617' AGL, farthest XC flight 23.5 miles.