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from Kevin

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Kevin

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Kevin

 

 

Kevin

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sportstracklive.com

Flytec XC Clinic

The Flytec XC/Competition Clinic will again be at Quest Air March
15-18, 2007, led by U.S. team members Dustin Martin and Kevin Carter.
Four days of learning and flying with the first day dedicated to landing, towing, and equipment perfection.

The last 2 clinics were wildly popular. This year we want to raise the quality even higher by focusing on a smaller group for more individual attention. To maximize value for the hungriest pilots we will fly 3 to a group capping the clinic to 6 pilots.

The clinic will incorporate both general XC and competition XC skills. This will includes learning and refining GPS navigation, using the radio, perfecting XC technique, improving out landing skills, and practicing aero towing.

Pilots will be grouped with similar wings and skills to foster consistent group flying. Each day your group will rotate to a different instructor so you can experience a variety of techniques. This is an opportunity for pilots of all abilities and all glider types to take their flying to the next level. The clinic curriculum will be custom tailored to the pilots who commit in advance.

We want to encourage, support, and help teach our future champions and XC record holders in a safe, friendly, laid back environment that will also cram a pilots head with as much information he or she is ready for!

The cost of the clinic is 300 dollars plus tows.

One of the most popular aspects of last year's event was the landing clinic. This year the program will more tightly integrate several landing sessions in response to demand.

Each day will include

* Morning seminars on weather, thermalling, gps use, route planning, XC skills, landing, towing, foot launching, tactics, etc.
* Midday XC tasks. These will be flown as a group tailored to the needs, skills, and equipment of the students.
* Evening GPS scoring, flight analysis, and debrief.

To sign up contact Dustin at flydustin@hotmail.com or Kevin at heaviek@yahoo.com

A New Year, a New Post

Wow, its been ages since I posted anything to this blog. I haven't competed in a long time and the free flying I have done has been sporadic at best. After becoming a family man the flying priorities had to take second place. Relocating to Maryland is a mixed bag. Traffic, pollution, crime (some say)...On the upside, we have lots of family here (aka free babysitting), it is bursting with culture, and I LOVE my job. Now after 6 months with my new job life is more stable and we have begun traveling again. Two trips so far to Florida this winter, both times with great flying. Granted, my definition of great flying has been relaxed to include any flight longer (or shorter) then 10 minutes.

Come April we are going to pack the family up and head on south for all the Florida Fun. I can't wait to see everyone. After the Florida Tri-fecta (The Ridge, Flytec, Flytec "Worlds") it looks like Dustin's meet in Arizona. That boy has been pumping me up on running a tow meet in AZ for as long as I have known him. Now that it is coming together I'm counting down the days. D swears we will fly in one handed 1000 fpm lift all day long.

I'm sure anyone that reads this is more interested in flying pictures so I will save the videos of Amber flipping me the bird or spitting rice cereal at me for trying to teach her the alphabet. I'll get some good flying pics up soon.

-Kev

Flytec Champs Day 3

I am so worked up about my finish today I can't even sleep. My instrument told me I made goal but then the scoring software said I might have missed. Finally as I tried to doze off to sleep I figured it out. The scoring software measures distance wrong (WTF?!) All I had to do was pull my GPS track points out of my flight instrument, graph the points in my Garmin and BINGO@!@! They show me crossing the plane by just inches. Too much stress after such a challenging flight.

The day took her time clearing out and cooking up. The 100 cloud cover didn't break till about 30 minutes before the rigids took off. I thought the day looked still iffy so I took my time organizing myself in the air. Unfortunatly a small chunk of raw hang gliding talent grouped up and bolted away at the first start (Oleg, Jonny, Brett, Super Mario). I went back for the second start and managed good position at cloud base with Robin and Curt just a hundred feet below. We flew together for just a couple of climbs before parting ways. Robin went more west (upwind) and curt fell behind. I took my own line and followed the clouds. It worked well until I-4. Just when I got in striking distance of some guys from the first start I got stuck. Curt joined me and we flailed around like desperate fish on the floor. We got out of there and continued on. The day seemed hard again, not like the las 15 miles.

Glen joined us and we hooked some climbs east of courseline in an area that seemed much more blue then the rest of the state. I got greedy chasing after mystery cores that weren't there and the other boys left me behind. I couldn't chase them into the blue before getting back to cloudbase so I just hung back and bit my lip. The slow broken climb was tourture.

Now flying solo again I couldn't bear to glide into the blue hole with all its ratty broken looking clouds. To the east the clouds seemed so much better formed. Time for a major course diversion. Boom Boom Boom I hit a bunch of good ones in a row. The sky still worried me, with long gaps between clouds and no backups if my first choice didn't pan out. Since I was alone, I held back and didn't charge too hard. I knew I had alot of cross wind ahead.

40k from Avon Park(Goal) parts of the sky looked over developed. On the ground below I could see signs of smoke laying flat from the sea breeze. Lucky for me I was high and got to take advatage of the Mega glide bonus from this cool layer shoving under our airmass. I set up final at cloudbase from about 30k out and the 5030 showing 1000 feet of spare altitude. I was not excited because I knew that would be barely enough once I decended into the strong west cross.

My biggest concerns were well founded as my numbers deteriorated HARD below 2000 feet. The west pushed hard and I had to follow a few lines up wind to stay alive. That airport looked very far away. I just pointed my toes, tucked my elbows in and did my best to use the speed to fly on my Flytec. A bit of dolphin flying here and there and I was pretty sure I wouldn't have to bail out in the fields short of the airport. I had to be sure because the last bit was over a road, 2 fences, and then a small building before gliding across airport property. I just glided till my distance to the radii about zeroed out, popped the VG off, and quickly landed. Milking the flare I got too greedy and turtled my glider. That is what sparked all the horror about "in the circle"/"out of the circle" I think I got pushed back out when I was upside down. Ha Ha. Got to love technology.

Oleg, Brett, and Jonny got to goal before me but our course times were relatively close since I took the second start.

Weather looks pretty sweet for tomorrow. I can't wait!

Kev

Flytec Champs Day 2

Today is a stronger West wind then the day before. Nothing like beating your head against the wall for over 4 hours just to score 200 points more then the folks that spent just 5 minutes in the air. That comes out to about 50 points per hour on course, or 5 points a mile. What a rip. Fortunately all of the pilots are quickly learning how important setting good nominal values are for fairly scoring a meet. Quest has a legacy of flying out and returns or triangles on any day it can be pulled off. That means longer times in the air, but shorter distances flown. That is why this meet scores better with a shorter nominal distance, but an average nominal time. Enough tech talk!

The weather man said today would suck, and it does. So we fly tomorrow instead.

Kev

Flytec Champs Day 1

Man a crosswind task can be a pain in the butt! What a long day. I'm knackered. Flying upwind takes a hard penalty out of the flex wings and too many of the glides had that death glide feel to them. Usually I only get low once or less per flight but on this one it seemed like we were struggling after at least half the glides. By the time we cruised past Quest my hopes were flailing. Our realatively large gaggle got split up south of the flight park but I later noticed that the group ahead was getting blown pretty far off course. As the lift weakened the climbs were not strong enough to make good progress against the crossing headwind. Bronson ranch lay below us so I pushed towards 33 rather. Fortunately most of our group followed and landed close to 33. Bonson ranch is all locked gates. Especially on the weekends. I heard Curt, Oleg, and Brett were lucky Chuck was able to get them out since they drifted in so deep. I also heard they recieved a warning that included the word "arrest" in it. Uh oh. I am sure Curt smoothed things over with that slick talking Ozzie style of his. haha.

It is very dissapointing that such a long flight (airime) was worth so few points in the end. It was not easy staying in the air and on course.

Kev

Finally the winds abate

The pilots voted to extend the meet one day to Friday because it looked like that would be the only flyable day. It worked out well even though the east/NE wind was pretty stiff. The chosen course was crosswind to the turnpoint with a set of 5 very early starts. I didn't think the day was going to come together as fast as they were expecting so I took my time getting in the air. Between sink outs and weak link breaks it took a very long time to tow everyone up. The wind was hard to overcome ratcheting across the start circle. I ended up alone at the bottom while most of the gaggle was more on the side, but upwind of the first turnpoint. Lucky for all of us the day really came together around that time so driving to the first turnpoint was not as hard as it had been. Once there the sky was full of other pilots and the strong lift was even easier to find. With a tailwind and a blue hole ahead I flew too conservative hoping for a one thermal final glide. As it turned out there was tons of lift because the area was just turning on and cranking hot. I had to keep the VG at only half racing into the airport because the air was so cracking! Oleg smoked everyone there. Jonny and Brett were a few minutes and change ahead of me. Under the circumstances (scoring) I should have been racing much harder on that last leg so I regret flying so conservative. I would have like to finish with them.

I can't seem to find the full results anywhere online and my memory isn't good enough to quote the awards ceremony.

Kev

BLOW BLOW BLOW

I can't believe this weather! It has blown, HARD, every single day we have been down here. High winds with big gusts. I don't think we will get to fly another task. I left the Ridge a few days ago to tackle wedding planning tasks. I feel bad for ditching my bro's in their time of mega-boredom. With such a long stretch of bad weather the Flytec meet is assured a week of great flying. Maybe we should crown our National Champion there instead.

Kev

US Nationals Day 2

Low clouds, a front, strong wind, and periods of rain.  No flying today.  A bunch of pilots flew in middle of the day but the wind picked up hard as some storms moved into our region.  Dustin and Brett had some fun horsing around on a PG.  Man towing is always fun to watch.  When that got too boring Brett decided to “Wonder Twins Activate” “form of a garden rake”.   The winds had gusted up a bit and he was getting pretty manhandled with the PG.  A couple of lines got disorganized around his feet and in the blink of an eye he was getting drug across the grass by his foot.   He looked like a calf that got roped and taken for a ride.  He was all smiles afterwards but at the time it was a bit scary to watch. 

 

Tomorrow looks sketchy also.  Some say strong wind, others don’t. 

 

Kev

Florida Ridge Day One

So the US Nationals down here at the Florida Ridge near La Belle, FL.  The forecast is looking pretty windy.  I thought it looked to windy to fly but I guess I was wrong (the jury’s not out on that count).  Clouds pepper the sky early as the wind slowly increases out of the south west.  The task is a 75 mile crossing downwind zig zag.  I don’t many pilots were in position for the first start but it seemed like a big group was lined up for the second.  I chased after them but it turned out to be just Curt and one of the Norwegian Olav’s.  Trailing behind I got a jump around Curt with a different cloudier line into the first turnpoint.  He says I got bad karma for going to high and I wonder if he is right.   On the second leg I got too far downwind and did the tether ball wrap around the second turnpoint.  This turnpoint was a relatively active airport (pretty smart planning eh?) so getting in and out of there low proved tricky.  By the time I got the turnpoint I was just thrilled to still be in the air.  Down low it was pretty rough.  Some of the nastiest I have flown in quite some time.  It drifted me downwind of courseline but still crossing tail in the correct direction.  Gotta love those increasing forecasts…sike!  Last leg went well since I was high again.  The lift was organized with only a few mystery whomps here and there to keep you alert. 

 

Rob and I had fiddled with my harness zipper before launch and I suppose we left some threads in the way.  The pee break must have jammed the zipper because coming into goal I couldn’t sort it out.  I was determined to get out so I could land on my feet but the conditions demanded I swallow my pride and just belly in.  While tugging on the zipper pull, with Half VG, a wind gust moved me back about 10 mph.  I figured the zipper would make little difference if I didn’t just fly the glider.  Jonny was the keenest eye on the ground realized the zipper was jammed.  Jeff, Raul, and a couple others met me in the field after a nice soft belly landing to help me get out of the glider.  Seems that this goal was an even worse choice then the airfield turnpoint!  Surrounded by lots of trees, an angry owner, and the sherrif!   Belinda, ever the diplomat, managed to talk us out of trouble smoothing the situation over like a champ.

 

A knife, some thread, and a lighter and the zipper is reset and good as new!  Looks sexy also.  I will have to get Jamie to take some pictures.

 

Kev

Santa Barbara is great! 

I stopped over in California on my way back from Australia. While I was there it snowed! Here is a pic from a day test flying. 

Shark Bay baby! I spotted one but no one else can confirm that sighting. 

The ships here are so small. 

What a beautiful sunset! 

Do you think this guys is hot? Someone shear that poor fella. You should have seen all the wool jiggle when he ran. I was just trying to help him over the fence.