
I flew into Seattle a couple of days early to visit my sister. She talked non-stop about every issue under the sun (we don't talk too much so she feels the need to catch up). Had a nice evening with her friends, who are all exceptionally beautiful. A typical "grass is greener on the other side" story. But at the end of the day/night, you have to remind yourself that you live in Hawaii...
Off to the rat race! I peeled the plastic off of Suicide Pete's brand new Garmen 76S GPS he let me borrow. I really wished he'd let me borrow the used one because I didn't want to scratch up the new one! Practicing on the GPS during the drive was great. It even had highway information even though I think I can manage navigating I-5. Unfortunately I should have practiced more. I remember passing through Grant's Pass thinking, wow, this is a turn-point in the competition, I'm still 30mi away from Ruch! I can't do this!
I'm now nearing Medford Oregon, I decide to call up Pete since I plan on crashing in his tent for the duration of the event. He immediately dispatches me on a search and rescue mission to find Quentin. This dashes my plans for stopping by a grocery store to stock up on supplies. I find Q and 3 other pilots in a field. They all can't fit into my car so I end up taking Mike Steed to the HQ. He just happens to be the Master's winner from last year. I actually recognized him from the website and proceeded to suck all his knowledge from him. He didn't seem to mind the vulcan mind meld grip I had on his head. Better than walking I imagine.



DAY 1:
The next morning was crisp and cold, woke up to the sound of sizzling bacon. Rich was kind enough to cook anything in sight in the morning. His only rule, "I don't do dishes!". Fair enough. The first pilot's meeting was cool because I got to see all of the Hawaiian pilots from the other islands. It was nice seeing familiar faces amongst the unfamiliar. I got an idea of the personalities of the competitors there.



The start time came and went. The gaggles raced off on course and left the sky to me. I finally got enough altitude to head out to Rabies, but my GPS is acting up. Somehow my arrow is not pointing to where rabies should be. I try reloading the route, but end up activating the man-overboard mode. Anyway, I think that I finally sort out my nav points and hit Rabies and head back to the launch area. I tank up again and start to head towards goal. It's about a 14km leg down a valley. I try to stay over the ridges and milk the thermals, but I make a mistake and leave a thermal early. My mentor had told me to not worry about time and just worry about making it to goal. Don't pass up any available lift. Well the triggers I was betting on, were not pumping any thermals. I ended up landing in a field about 4 km away from goal. One unknown bonus to me was that I didn't realize that the competition counted your max distance on course. The end result was that I was only about 2km from goal as far as scoring was concerned. I was concerned about my landing because the valley winds were blowing dogs-off-chains and I thought that I was landing in a bit of a wind shadow. I expected some leeward rotor, but never got any. The retrieve came quickly and transported me to goal.

Anyway I get back to camp and the poker tent is in full swing. I was going to study for my exam, but who are we kidding? There was this young blonde sitting in the tent playing poker and doing well. I remember thinking that she could be no older than 21. I quickly learn that she's, well, less than that, alot less. This is probably the finest example of jailbait that I have ever seen. She had the looks(ie. good looks and great equipment) and the maturity of someone far older, very dangerous indeed. I could say more, but have to protect the innocent and the not so innocent.
DAY 2:
Pretty much the same task as day 1. Same story as the previous day except I made a huge error by forgetting that Rabies had a 2km turn-point cylinder vs the normal 400m. I spent over a hour try to close that distance. I finally realize that I had the turn point made and raced back to the launch area. By this time, I was clocking 4 hours flight time. It was getting really windy. The next leg of the race was 14km all into the wind. No way. So I just landed out in the normal LZ. At least I didn't miss any turn points and got some decent points.
DAY 3:
This task was a ball-busting 70km task. The launch was pretty windy. I thought they would cancel the task, but ended up curtailing the task down from the epic distance. The thermals were sharp and shredded. I made the mistake of following a thermal too far behind the ridge line and getting sucked into the valley between launch and burnt ridge. Had I been smarter about the wind direction I would have ran towards burnt ridge and try to get up. Instead I was in the middle of valley fearing rotor from both sides, on the speed bar trying to make an LZ and not end up in the trees. It was nerve-racking to be on speed bar in such turbulent air. I landed out safely in a huge field and was joined by about 12 more pilots to include Scrappy. This day was worth minimal points due to the short course and all or nothing nature of the task.
DAY 4:
"The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly; 'tis dearness only that gives everything it's value." Thomas Paine.
It was another mega 72Km task. I blew my launch, it wouldn't be the last time. As usual, I didn't play in the gaggles and they consequently left me behind at start time. This time I wasn't too far behind. I got up high enough to start heading towards Rabies and caught some good stuff on the way out there. I saw Bob working some stuff around Rabies Peak and we more or less left Rabies at the the same time to head towards Wellington Ridge. I was a little higher and ahead of Bob en route to Wellington. While en route, I was trying to figure out where the lift was at Wellington by watching the other gliders in the area. Unfortunately everyone was in hunt mode and nothing was revealed. I was flying in a headwind and there was not a beep of lift the whole way. I knew I would arrive low and was prepared to bombout somewhere in the valley. This was the first time I was looking for a gaggle, I desperately wanted to find a gaggle.
I drove in towards the turn-point, tagged it and retreated back to the foothills. Now would come the hardest part of the whole comp. The distance from the turnpoint back to rabies ridge was about 5 miles and I had to work for every feet of it. Lot's of leeside thermals. I lost track of all the asym collapses, must have been over 30. Most of them were just 20-30% collapses, but a few were bigger. The thermals were really sharp and small. I was really using the gliders around me for lift cues. Everyone was taking collapses, you could hear the fabric whacking all around. I just hoped that no one would fall into my lap! Although the air was rough, I liked it because I knew I wouldn't bomb out, there was lift! Beggers can't be choosy! I would turn back for the rough stuff and bench up. Look down the line for the next glider going up and beeline over there. This is how I made it back to rabies ridge, back to familiar territory, back to my house thermals.

I decided that enough was enough and set myself up for a landing at the main LZ. Reaper was in the air with me with a tandem although I never saw him. There was another pilot in my same predicament also coming in for a landing. I was about 400 feet off the ground when I got some substantial beeps. This is before Bob let me borrow his vario. This whole time I was using my audio vario. The beeps represented about 400ft/min climb so I decided to turn in it just for the hell of it. It kept going up and up and up! It was super smooth and broad! The other glider didn't catch it/want it and went on to land. Reaper congratulated me on my catch. I used the altitude to run to the launch area. Now I had the wind on my side and I got high enough to make a proper run to Burnt ridge. I scratched around the ridge to get up for a little while, very nervous about getting sucked into the valley. I was completely alone at this point. Then I hit the convergence lift. Yeehaw! 1200ft/min. It was so smooth, but scary fast. I had to vasalva to clear my ears! It got cold quick. Up to about 8600'. Ruch looked very small at that altitude.

Then pow! Convergence again and I sky out again. I even out climb the other guy. I'm now high enough to hit the Cemetery turn-point and then some. Cemetery comes and goes (never saw the actual cemetery) and I switch to my "home-stretch" mode that Ray taught me. (Compass screen with glide-ratio to goal). I'm looking for the magic 7:1 glide ratio to goal that would assure me of goal. Right now it's about 10:1, gotta work it down. I manage to find some weak stuff along the route. I have no idea where Donatos is even though I've been driven there before. It's looks a lot different from the air. I have a nice tailwind to help out, about 55-65 km/hr ground speed! I finally get the magic 7:1 and start to beeline it to the goal, passing up niblets of lift. Then I realize that there is a ridge in front of goal that need to be cleared. Crap, I just passed up some good lift. I hope I find more! I guess that if I can get that ratio to 4:1 I'll clear the ridge and leeward rotor. Luckly I find plenty of lift. I can see two other gliders. One is ahead and is working the ridge to get up and over (did he forget the about the ridge?). And there's another glider to my right about equal distance to the goal. Race time! I have to beat the other glider! Now I have the magical 4:1. Turn to goal and punch it! I get into an aerodynamic posture and go full speedbar. The air is fairly stable and I'm poised to immediately release if I feel any bumps. The glider in front of me had successfully made it over the ridge and shows me the goal!


DAY 5:

DAY 6:
My name was called again during the pilot's meeting, but this time it was Hawaii getting scolded for not signing in immediately. The meet director gave us all a 10% penalty for the task. That really hurt the 0 points we all got for that day. Message was received however. Today, you either made it to goal or you bombed out right away. I fell in the latter category. I think this is also the day that Irene fell out of the sky and luckily into some trees. No reserve deployment.
DAY 7:
Last day. Goal is at Donatos again. Still windy, but not as bad as before. The trick was getting to Burnt ridge, if you could hit the convergence, you made it. I made the convergence again, but this time it was a little rougher. The air was way colder too. My hands were in trouble! Another nice memory is catching up to Ray and coring together. We were close enough to shout. It was awesome hooking that thermel with a friend in a far away land... Ray soon outpaced me to goal. Bob also made it to goal, his first! I'm sure he has a story to tell.
I'm now in a rush to pack up camp and drive to Portland to catch a flight. Everyone else is in a hurry to get to nationals. I'm trying to leave a day early in order to get back and manage my huge project (which went great by the way). Joey decides to come with me to do the same thing in order to visit his family a day early. We pack up and say our goodbyes and unfortunately miss the awards party. We finally arrive in Portland late that night and spend an epic 2 hours looking for a freaking room. Joey and I are remarkable patient and calm throughout the whole affair. Everything was booked due to multiple conventions. The hotels were telling us that you have to go 40 miles away to find vacancy. Now its getting super late and I'm not liking the idea of spending $150 to sleep 4 hours. So we grudgingly check into a motel. I prefer the tents! Hard to fall asleep with the intermittant police sirens in the background. I catch my flight and Joey takes the car to Seattle which saves me the drop-off fee.
This is definitely my longest article, but that's my Rat Race story and I'm sticking to it!
Nick
(some of the pictures, I stole from windlines, especially from Scrappy)
3 comments:
Awesome story Nick. You did great at the Rat Race in very tough conditions, as did all the Hawaii pilots. I couldn't have been any prouder of you guys...
That was a fun comp, and yea Paul kicked my butt. Good thing we settled down for the rest of the event. Paul and I were comparing scars from our wrestling match at the Nationals, haha
Reaper
Excellent article, Nick! I'll be sure to come back and study it before the next time I go mainland flying. I wanna make goal, too!
Thanks for including the extra tidbits, not only the glory, but the blood, sweat, and tears, too. We need to remember that taking chances doesn't always work out so well, but when it does, how sweet it is.
Congrats on some great flying.
Nick . . . Thanks for the write-up.
Not going to Rat Race this year was a HUGE disappointment for me.
I thought I'd gotten over the crushing pain of missing out on the thermals and the poker tent and the beer swilling . . . and . . . of course, my dream of making GOAL.
Now . . . thanks to your wonderfully detailed article . . . I am feeling that pain all over again.
Well done,
Suicide
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