I set the task deep into the mountains because I was worried it would be too blue to the south. Unfortunately, I went just too far north and struggled to get to the western turnpoints in amongst a mass of clag. Every time I passed the start point there was upwards of 8knots of lift, so for the final leg I took it to 14500ft, expecting an easy run to the finish. Another bad decision. I climbed above the wind shear and turned a 15 knot head wind into a 50 knot head wind. The result was that yet again I arrived at TUL in amongst the clag. This time, I took a dirty dive at the back of a wave bar and arrived behind the 6km finish line just as the glider touched cloud. A climbing turn got me back to the bar down wind.
Having finished the task, I couldn't resist a return to the start point to climb to FL195 and prove once again that diamond heights are really difficult with the FL195 ceiling.
I seem to have spent too long climbing without moving, with the result that See You breaks the flight into three sections and doesn't want to calculate a speed around the whole task. |