Today was a great day for racing. Cloudbase around 6000 feet, lift up to 500 fpm, and light winds. We didn't come back to Highland since the winds were predicted to become 15 mph later in the day. Also cloudbase was predicted to lower to 3500 feet by 5pm. Sounded like a classic convergence to me, so I was ready to go when the launch window opened. I had a nice tow and initial climb to cloud base. Ollie, Davis, Paris, and I danced around the clouds while we waited for the start gate to open. I crossed the start gate about 60 seconds after Paris, Ollie, Davis, Paul, and Russell. We had a east-west zig-zag course to an airfield to the north so we kept passing gliders going this way and that. I got seperated from the lead group at the first turnpoint but still had them in sight. Bubba caught me at the second turnpoint and we glided together half way to third turnpoint where we caught Paris and Ollie. Ollie was struggling over the field I landed in on the first day while Paris was searching for something to climb in. Paris and I finally found a decent climb but Bubba couldn't find it. Just before the third turnpoint Paris got an extra 600 feet on me before we headed across the sea breeze to snag the third turnpoint. Paris had enough altitude to reach goal, but I was short. I was close to landing 3 miles from goal when I saw a buzzard struggling to climb over some metal buildings. Although the buzzard couldn't climb, I managed to get some altitude when I saw some swallows a little to the northwest. I raced over to join them and finally got high enough to zip in goal. I was second flex wing for the day. Dennis came in about 30 minutes later. Many pilots landed on the final leg of the course after struggling with the sea breeze and developing thunderstorms.
I finally got enough points today to make up for the bad flight on day one. After watching Ollie blaze by me as we passed the third turnpoint I think I need to consider using ballast to increase my wind loading.
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