Judith's blog

Judith writes: First task of the British Open in St Andre, France. People had thought the night before that today might be too windy, but we woke to light winds and blue skies. We all headed up the hill and a 62km turnpoint task was called. It seemed a bit cramped with 150 pilots on the hill. I have become used to a somewhat smaller number. As soon as the window opened, loads of people were off. The race start wasn’t for another hour and the start gate was only 3km away, so I launched about 20 minutes in and started to work on getting height. A huge group of gliders turned as one and started heading for the ridge ahead. This really confused me. I was sure the start was still 30 minutes off, but others started following them. I got my task notes out and checked I was right about the time. It was only a couple of minutes later that it clicked that they were getting further away, but in a much better position to glide to the first turn point.

So I tried to push out into the valley as well and followed a glider with a really good line. He fell out of the thermal, so I glided to the ridge ahead, but in big sink all the way. I slid past the lowest part of the ridge and straight into the venturi effect. I knew it was going to happen, but had little choice. I popped round the corner of the ridge and connected with good lift. With Kirsty’s advice in mind, I soared up the ridge, in lift all the time and overtook a number of people. At the end of the ridge was the promised thermal, and I started working it. However, with the strong wind I was being pushed back over the top of the ridge. Once I got enough height I pushed forward to the turnpoint, hoping to pick up something along the valley. I lost more height but found a thermal over some black rocks. I would take it, but being weak, it would drift me over into the gully. I played thermal and turn back several times and then evaluated my options. Taking a low thermal back might blow me over the ridge, and soaring along it would put me in the lee. I had watched others land and also saw strong upper winds by looking at the people above. In the end I decided that I wasn’t going to make it out of the place I was and went down to land. There were a group of us, including Martin Knight, Michal, Sander and Steve Newcomb. I have developed a new policy of cheerfulness in the landing field. No point in moping! I was happily being cheery until Martin told me that if I didn’t pack it in he’d burn my glider.

Safely downloaded, I got a bit of a fright when I was reminded about handing back my live tracker unit. I had half an hour to hand it in before my score was disqualified. I can’t get used to these newfangled rules.  

See photos of today.

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After the wildest post-comp party I have ever been to we had to leave early today. We were up and off for 8am and had a quick breakfast in Balaguer and then headed off. 15 minutes later, I remembered that we had forgotten the parcel shelf, so we had to turn back and collect it.

Just before Barcelona, Emma’s tomtom seemed to go to the April 1^st version and they sent us from one roundabout to the next and back to the first. From Barcelona it was howling all the way to St Andre, where it was freezing and I had to go home and change from Ager to Alpine clothes.

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Today was the last day of the Women’s Open. Because we had three valid tasks the reserve day isn’t needed. The wind forecast was for a gale, and so it turned out to be. It’s a hot wind, augmenting the already roasting temperatures here. Instead of a task we had a talk on psychology from Ruth, who is from Barcelona. Very enlightening and it gave me a few surprises on how I see myself and how others see me. Then off to run some errands and now preparing for the end of comp party. Kirsty has won and Ruth is top in the sports class, so we have plenty to celebrate. Shame our team didn’t win, since we were beaten by the French pineapples. It would have been nice to make Doc proud.

See photos of the prize giving and party.

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The forecast was good – blue but unstable, with SW winds, which would increase later. They set an ambitious 101km task, which most of us were pretty excited about. Launch opened as soon as they could in case it got too windy on take-off. Since it was a three kilometer exit cylinder around launch, I didn’t think there was a great rush to be off, so I took off 20 mins before the race start. I got the best start ever. I was higher than everyone and set off just after the gun and got the first turn point with the lead gaggle. I have never been in the lead gaggle before, so it was pretty exhilarating. We all sped back to the Montsec de Ares ridge to get high before crossing the gorge to the Monsec de Rubia ridge. You can go along the lower ridge, but if you have enough height, then the higher ridge is the safer one. By the time I got the height to cross others were already ahead of me and I could see Kirsty and another pilot ridge soaring up the ridge.

I dropped onto the higher ridge, but far from soaring along it, I slid down the rocks. This put me and Klaudia Bulgakow in the dip between the ridges, where the air is pretty dead. A French pilot managed to work a broken thermal and get up, but I was too close to the rocks and was half in and half out of it. Eventually I had no option but to fly back to the end of the ridge and fly around the front of the lower ridge, loosing height all the time. There are no landing fields round there (in fact there is only one landing field in that area and I was miles from it), so my options were getting limited. I could land in a car park in the mouth of the gorge, but I assumed there would be a very strong venturi effect there, and if I got it wrong, there would only be the road or the river. There were two small clearings in the trees, so I chose the higher as my plan A and would use the other, slightly larger one as my plan B. It was a tiny clearing and I brushed a small tree with my body coming in, but landed unceremoniously, but ok. Klaudia radioed me to check I was ok and I ran to watch her land in the bigger clearing below, not envying her having to put down a comp wing in such a small sloping space. She had to stall the wing before she overshot, but landed unharmed. I packed up and then tried to walk to the dirt road I could see along the mountain. I had landed on old overgrown terracing, so kept having to find the edge where the path was, since the walled drops were too big climb down with the paraglider on. I eventually got down to the path and then walked down to Klaudia. By the time I got there I was pretty hot and tired, since it is about 37C here. We called for retrieve and then waited. To make a long story short, it took some hours of waiting and then a long 4×4 adventure higher up the mountain to get Emma and Sophie, before getting back to HQ four and a half hours after I landed. I was hot, headachy and dehydrated, so got a few liters of water down me and then off to bed.

Today’s task has changed the leader board – Laurie landed after a few kms and Kirsty is now winning the comp. Ruth had the hardest flight of her life, but came third today, landing only 5km from goal.

P.S. last night’s kayaking was a hoot. We got there and were all allocated a single or double kayak. I went out with Jordi, the comp medic, and soon the lake was filled with the sound of giggling, singing and people playing kayak dodgems. Once we were out on the lake, it was magical in the full moon light. We caught up with others who had gone into a side arm of the lake and got drenched by the boys who just can’t resist a water fight. At 12pm, we decided it was time to head back, so we set off. The only problem was that the guys on shore had switched off all the car lights and we couldn’t find the jetty. Calling them didn’t help… there was nobody answering. We eventually found the cars and everyone was either chucked in or splashed so much that we were drenched. But on getting out of the lake, we found the vans abandoned and no rescue boat in sight. With everyone now cold and shivering, we decided we needed to get back and dry. My spare clothes were mostly wet, but at least I had a dry pair of shorts. The vans luckily had keys in them, so we commandeered one of them and set off. It’s such a heap of old junk it couldn’t get up any inclines and every time we came to a hill we all had to get out and walk and/or push the van. Bearing in mind that most of the women were in underwear, we made quite a sight. We got back at 1am.

Turns out that the organiser guys had come back in the rescue boat after we had left, counted the kayaks and realised three people were missing, so had to search the lake to find them, while we were all off to bed!

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The forecast was for an epic competition day and there were rumors of a task to Organya or Castejon de Sos, which would mean us crossing some pretty big mountains and stunning terrain. Everyone was buzzing and up for it. Unfortunately, the forecast changed and we were suddenly looking at a blue, inverted day with climbs to 1800m only, rising to a possible 2200m later.

It was 90 degrees off when we arrived on launch, but confident that the valley would warm up and bring it on, they set two provisional tasks. One would take us along the ridge, then over the back for a technical cat’s cradle task, landing at the same goal as on task two. The second option was Organya. The west wind kept blowing, but eventually there were launchable phases and the wind dummies were dispatched to check out conditions. They reported NW in the valley and I started to get concerned when I saw Jamie not going forward much heading west and then doing huge oval shaped turns in thermals while he was getting drifted fast east. Ivan was the last wind dummy and he reported the same conditions, so the task was cancelled. A really good, safe decision. Some flew down, some drove. Ariana decided to try the task and landed at Tremp. She was chauffeured back by a 70 year old bloke who couldn’t speak a word of English, but was happy to drive her all the way to camping.

Everyone is chilling out now. There’s a pool party to celebrate scorer Chris’ birthday, then a panel discussion on comp flying. After that we are going to make the most of the full moon by going for a moonlight kayak trip round the lake. I love this comp!

See photos of today.

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The star gazing last night was excellent. We had an audio-visual thing in the planetarium before they decided to show us the actual sky and slid back the roof. We then went to an observatory and looked through the most powerful telescope in Catalunya and saw the surface of the moon and a star cluster. Shame the moon was nearly full, so there was a lot of light pollution.

Today’s forecast was for a blue day with more westerly wind and Nicky wasn’t optimistic before we went up. Once there, the wind actually seemed less strong. They set a task down the ridge, back and then over the back to a goal beyond Tremp, next to a lake. We’ve been promised this goal, so we know to pack bikinis in our harnesses. Our wind dummies, John and Jamie, were dispatched and reported excellent conditions, so we all got off quick. As we were heading along the ridge good cumulus started to form and conditions got very good indeed. I would be ecstatic if every blue day was this good!

I bagged the second turn point gliding back from the start in lift the whole way, and then turned back along course to take the thermal over the back. From there it was easy – there was a cloud street all the way to the third turn point and I was still high enough for a comfortable glide across the valley to the spurs before the lake where I could top up. Not having a fancy GPS that tells me I am going to make it, I decided to play it safe and topped up in a thermal 5km out from goal. I thought I could probably make it, but decided I would never forgive myself if I landed short, so thermalled while Bella and Jess flew past me straight into goal. I got there with loads and loads of height!

I’ve decided that consistency is the most important thing, rather than racing (I’ll do that when I get to goal as a matter of course), so getting to goal is more important than how fast I get there. However, I could maybe reduce my time by not taking photos before I get to the ‘end of speed section’. Ooops. Still, I was no slouch. My average speed around the course was 40km/h and I did it in 1 hour 1 minute.

Lots of happy faces in goal, especially when our whole team got there. We swam in the lake and then had beers in the beach bar. It’s been such a lovely comp so far. Everyone is just so nice and the camaraderie is better than in any comp I have experienced before. You get to chat to so many women from different countries and they’re all just really nice. I want to come again next year!

See photos of today.

For results and a map of the task, see here.

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We woke up to lots of high cloud, but I was pretty sure it was going to burn off. The organisation’s greater concern was the forecast of strengthening westerly wind. They got us up the mountain early and set the start in the valley at the east end of the ridge, then back to launch and then over the back. Conditions looked weak before the start, and windy-dummy John was struggling to maintain at times. As soon as we got into the launch queue the wind picked up, but people got off ok and there were no long delays to wait for lulls. We had 45 minutes to race start, which was 7km away, so you had to work out the tactics of how to spend that time. Go straight to the end of the ridge (not hard with a tail wind, but lots of sink around), or stick to ridge soaring the westerly facing bits of the ridge and then work your way along until nearer the race start time.

It wasn’t very lifty, but I was maintaining well close to launch. However, this meant I was in the path of all the people launching behind me. As I was heading east (with the ridge on my left), I got pushed along by a pilot, since she was flying on my outside and I couldn’t turn out. She pushed me right along to an easterly facing bit and we slid down to the lower ridge. There it got really hard to stay up and we ended up in a gaggle of six. There was a perma-thermal there, but very light. I knew if there was constant lift it was a good trigger point, I just needed to wait for the big release. So I went into patient mode. I circled and circled, topping up in ridge lift from time to time and waited until I got my chance. Others decided to try somewhere else and got drilled, or went on low glides along the lower ridge. I eventually got enough height to fall back onto the higher ridge and then scratched my way on to the top of it. It’s quite intimidating when you are flying wingtip to the rock. It’s quite a big ridge!

I soared all the way to the end of the ridge while those under me didn’t make it up, and then topped up in a weak thermal and headed for turn point one. I lost too much height flying across the valley to get the turn point and couldn’t return to the ridge before getting drilled, flying into a head wind. Lots and lots of people got minimum distance today and I did reasonably well to get 8.2km. Conditions improved dramatically half an hour later, with cumulus and good height gains to be had.

The tactic today was to stay on the ridge until the conditions improved, and then set off on the task, like Laurie and Jess did. But you needed a lot of patience to do that. There just wasn’t enough strong sun until later. However, it did blow out on take-off within half an hour of the window opening, so it was a good decision to get us off. I wouldn’t be a meet director – you’re constantly between a rock and a hard place.

Results are Laurie Genovese 1st, Natalie Fresne 2nd and Kio Pujol 3rd. I’m 12th in the task and overall. Laurie Genovese is now leading the comp before Kirsty Cameron. Our team dropped from first to second place.

We’re off to do some star gazing at the local observatory tonight.

Update 24/8/10: Kio arrived late at launch and was a little hung over. It’s a comp tactic that worked for her. She was in the air when it got good!

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