Another great tow day in Ecuador

We got in another fun day towing here in Guayaquil behind Rauls trikes. Unfortunately we have not had much sun the last few days but the soaring up against the foothills is remarkably consistant. Today was no exception and we tore up and down the ridge. More press came out for a taste of the action and Dusty and I tweaked gliders a bit. I tried to fly away but didnt make it very far.

The last few days we have been flying out of a new airstrip that Raul set up this year with his fellow pilots. It is basic but still far fancier then a place like, say, Hay. HaHa. We have our red bull tent. We have the beautiful women. We have great flying. Dusto and I have been working with the newer pilots here with our quick and dirty aerotow clinic and it has been great seeing our new buddies improve their flying skills. I have a bad habit of talking too fast for our translator but we are getting it done so to speak. The guys have a great positive attidude that works perfect with the subtle pointers we give them. Their determination and skills respond so well to those simple little pointers that take flying to the next level.

Since I fought to the bitter end on my XC flight today I had to land in a not so accessible area. Like a fool I left my glider bags back at launch (because I was so confident I was going to fly back). Needless to say, the beers are on Kevin tonight!

Tomorrow we are wrapping up in town with a news conference for the local media (the love the Bird Men of Guyaquil) before heading up to the Andes! Everyone is super pumped to try and fly those fat daddies before we head to the coast.

I am a punk, I need to get my PC online so I can upload pics.

Kev

Ecuador

I wish I was using my computer so I could put up a good post with pictures.

How cool is it to be flying in Ecuador as winter draws near in North America! I can´t get over my GPS coordinates every time I turn the thing on. Not only does it read out ¨South¨ rather then ¨north¨but the numbers are so low! We are at one degree south here. Erie.

The trip down was an adventure in itself. Dustin´s glider was shipped to Miami, then accidentally shipped to >Texas then back to miami. It showed up an hour before we did at the freight fowarder to claim it. Miami was a mess. The storm jacked that place up.

We had to short pack dustins glider in the airport instead of loading it in its shipping container and that meant we were short a travel bag. My glider didn´t survive the trip unscathed. A nice fat dent in the inboard leading edge to keep my flying mellow.

R aul has hooked us up with killer accomodations here in his hometown. Yesterday the sun broke through the clouds about midday and we all soared for a few hours. Today we wanted to fly a task but the clouds never broke for our downwind task. If we had been smart we would have set an alternate task up and down the ridge because the soaring there was consistant despite the strongly crossed sea breeze and total overcast skies. Dustin and I were partying our butts off with vulteres all afternoon long.

We are going to hang out in the city a few more days then head to the beach for the comp. Before that I t hink we are also heading up to a 4,000m launch in the andes. Depending on conditions I think we could fly to the ocean from there. Don´t worry, the camera batteries are all charged up and ready to rock!

Kev

Here is my pretty new Flytec harness. When I am not flying XC down here in Florida, the cocoon is about the best choice for jumping from glider to glider taking care of other pilots' wings. The Flytec blue/pink was designed as a symbol of the different vario bag colors. I would like to hope that I am macho enough to pull off the pink without any questions about my manly-ness. haha. 

Thermalling up with a beautiful Peregrine (I think that is what it was). 

CIVL rankings updated

The new World Rankings are out and lucky for me a top placing at the German Open moved me into the top 10. My performance in the US meets has been below expectations this year so my US ranking has slipped 2 places.

http://www.fai.org/hang_gliding/rankings/
http://www.davisstraub.com/Glide/2006class1ntss.htm

Kev

twitchy 

Frontal Blues

Thursday a front and a tropical storm started an arm wrestling match over Tennessee effectively ruling out any hopes of flying for the next few days. Since the flying has been back to back until now we used this extra time to hold a few Q and A sessions on skills like weather prediction, thermalling technique, etc. My tent leaks so I am going to get a new one. The damp sleeping bag was a bummer but nothing was going to keep these tired eyes open.

Kev

Team Challenge Task 4

Weather doesn't look so hot from launch on this day. The wind is strong and crossing from the left (north) and the windsock really likes to dance. I think someone slipped that nylon bag some crack cause it was twitching like a spaz. We waited to launch till late again hoping for some clouds but none were heading our way. Blue day blues. I found the air off launch to be rough, broken, and very challenging. The best I could get was a thousand over launch with really difficult conditions down low. Every few minutes a viscous shear would pull me hard behind the ridge and the conditions, although very soarable, were way too much for a fun comp. I went out to the church LZ and landed. Most of the pilots on launch broke down after an announcement was made to drop the scores for the day. Some pilots hung out and slipped in some flights during the late glass off.

Kev C

This is the Church LZ from pretty high. It was a tough day on the ridge with the valley flow close to 90 cross.  

Task 3

Today had a great weather forecast but it just wasn't apparent on launch. We hung back and waited while a few pilots punched off here and there. Finally a few good clouds popped off the ridge so Ollie G and I had a sprint race for the gliders. He lost his vario just off launch so went into immediate pimp mode. Conditions were super scratchy and I struggled with a bown out harness zipper. I pushed the frustration aside and made the best of the day. The pair of us crawled to the first turnpoint and back struggling to stay high. Most of the climbs were very slow and we didn't see any other gliders till we were most of the way back. Ollie's new VX has a phenominal sink rate that shows a big advantage in the 50-80 fpm climbs we kept getting stuck with. Lucky for me he had no vario so I could catch up every time I found a short core. A few times we got solid 2-300 climbs with a short 400 thrown in there as well.

I barely squeaked into the main whitwell LZ. Ollie thought about continuing on but came back to join me and share good times after such an epic flight for us. It felt good.

Kev

Close to cloudbase on Task 3. 

The story that isn't where it belongs. About 2 weeks ago, while Hurricane Rita crossed past the southern tip of Florida, we hit the coast. Bo, Lauren and Paul Tjaden came with me out to the Florida coast for some dune soaring. Now if there was only a way for me to post video again..... The winds were stiff and Bo showed us the way. Paul and I did a brief man tow to help sling him off a rock pile and into the lift band. From there he showed us all just how good he is. He transitioned effortlessly back and forth between the low band of the dunes and cottages to the higher band of the hotels. His example proved priceless when I took my try. I realized Bo just makes it look easy as I struggled to wrestle the glider into the lift band. A few crusty turns marked the beginning of my flight but I got my act in gear to soar as long as I wanted. It was really interesting to see where the lift band was around the different buildings and dune shapes. A real eybrow raiser.  

Carl Burrick climbing like a rock star over launch. 

This is the north west face of the Sequatchie Valley here in Beautiful Tennessee. 

Team Challenge Day 2

Everyone is still in varying degrees of shock from yesterday but like a bunch of emotionally dysfunctional social misfits we really only have one way to get our feelings out. At least the weather saw it fit for our need to get air therapy so we flew a mellow task/free fly today. The conditions were south east again but with lots of sunshine and clouds. A few of us flew the "A" task and then tried to go further. I flew about 50 miles before landing in a less then stellar field next to where we had stashed my car as a backup. I took a bunch of pictures so I will just post photos instead of rambling from my rattled brain.

Kev

Team Challenge

I drove some hard miles through the middle of the night 2 days ago to arrive in Tennessee for the famous Team Challenge. I had to wait for the shop to drop a new clutch in the battle wagon. The nice fellas at the shop got a bit backlogged and seemed to forget my request to have the car BEFORE Friday, not Friday evening ?!?! OH well.

This meet holds a special place in my heart because it is where I got my start in XC competition in what seems like just yesterday. The format has been restructed to get back to the roots of the Team Challenge concept. That is to foster new XC and competition pilots in a safe and friendly learning environment. I am behind that concept 110% so nothing short of a hurricane would have kept me away.

I arrived about 7 in the morning and grabbed a short nap before starting the day. The sky was totally overcast and the wind over the back so we drove about 20 miles down the valley to fly off Whitwell instead. That site faces SE (versus the NW of the main site). Clouds broke apart just past midday and conditions looked workable.

Tragically there was an accident with the very first pilot to fly. He attempted to launch from this steep cliff site without connecting himself to the hang glider. Without a solid connection between the pilot and glider, attempting to fly was synonymous to any normal person just walking up to the edge and leaping off. I tried to use my fast legs to provide swift assistance but have never felt so powerless to improve a situation in my entire life. Everyone has been devastated by this obviously preventable tragedy. I don't want to forget the lessons life is trying to teach us here but I would give anything to give the memory back. It serves as a reminder just how precious life is and how privledged we are to live every day of our lives with the opportunity to do something so extrodinary.

Kev