After 3 days scrubbed for competition flying though some local soaring, Friday brought a real window of opportunity. The weather briefing hinted at the risk of spread out and sea air but at least from the grid it looked good as the first gliders launched.
With the DSGC team near the back, the sky local to Pocklington looked good initially but spread out was already starting to appear. BBB and AXJ headed off to Castle Howard with Mike Armstrong in AXJ taking young Amy Playle. Amy has only just gone solo and was to be given a master class by Mike in picking good energy lines.
Mike and Amy in AXJ (John Pursey)
At Castle Howard the JP / AR combo in BBB picked a less good line and with a seriously deteriorating cloud structure, started to get low. The inevitable happened and we ground to halt alongside a field of detectorists scouting for Saxon finds.
The Duo with Phil and Nick were already heading back down the Wolds, but with 8 octas were slowing down. Slowing down gave way to an engine start but with the Solo engine running badly the glider was coming down and a field beckoned.
This shouldn't happen (Phil Morrison)
Even Mike A in AXJ couldn’t get far without lift and soon the whole team were in fields. Stirling started the retrieve process with BBB with the Chef to get back and get going on the paella social evening.
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| Chef at work (JP) |
With the exception of the hot ships on the front of the grid it was a day of landouts.
The evening was rounded off with a paella and 30 guests from the wood teams with a generally swapping of field stories. - Chef JP
