Geoff writes: A good forecast for today, but the weather turned out much worse than the forecast. How many times have I had to write that recently!

Forecast was NE, a nice breeze, cloudy early, but then rapidly getting very sunny, with reasonable thermal strengths. So, along with a lot of others, including the BCC, we went off to Corndon. It was cloudy, but we expected the sun to break through any minute. The BCC set a short task, only 25km, but that was partly because they wanted an early finish to do the prizegiving, and minimise the long retrieves. Kai set a goal to Tenby. I did the site briefing, stressing what a good XC site Corndon was.

And then we basically sat there for the next 4 or 5 hours, in almost no wind, and very little sun, chatting to people in the comp. Thermals coming through were rare, and very very weak. A few people had a go at different times, and the ones who did really well managed to scrape back on top. The others had to walk back up. Kai didn’t quite make Tenby – he went on a glide in front, and landed on the ridge next to the hang gliding bottom landing.

Eventually, Ali managed to scrape a thermal, and must have got a massive 400′ ATO, and glided off, to land at Church Stoke – less than the activating distance of 5km.

People gave up then, and started to fly down. A few people right at the end, including Judith and DaveT, managed a bit of ridge soaring, even occasionally getting slightly above launch, but that was it.

Of course, as we drove away, the cloud did finally clear and the sun came out, and the wind picked up – but far too late!

Amazingly, the BP Cup in Snowdonia did managed a respectable task of around 40km, I think, with a race from Berfydd to Criccieth, and a number of people making goal. So they have managed two tasks in two days, a lot better than the BCC here.

See photos of today.

1 Comment »