Hi Guys,
Quest Air is going to be celebrating it's 10th anniversary in October and Jim Prawl came up with a fun competition they are going to do and that can be held over and near the launch area with out needing to worry much about retrieves and landing out.
It's pretty simple. Jim established waypoints in 5 locations, One directly over the field (or launch) and 4 more surrounding the field approximately two miles from the center point. Jim just chose a point due north, south, east, and west. We then chose a course starting at one waypoint and then traversing the other points in what ever order we all agreed on. The pilot completing the course in the shortest time wins. I flew a "test flight" a couple days back when conditions were strong and completed a 15 mile course easily but I had no one to race so I just cruised around high and climbed whenever I found lift. Had I been racing, much more strategy would have been involved.
Yesterday J.D., Lauren, Jim, and I tried to have an informal competition but conditions were too light and none of us finished. Still, everyone had fun and was excited about trying it again. The task offers all the same problems and decision making of a longer XC task such as trying to get as high as you can next to the start circle or whether you should go straight to the next turnpoint or head for that cloud off to the right. But if you are getting low you can scurry back to the field and land for a re-light. Even pilots with out XC experience could do this. Just keep an eye on the LZ and don't get too low too far away. A similar task could be set up at a mountain site with turn points along the ridge or possibly out in the valley in front of the ridge.
Scoring could be as simple as using the honor system and timing yourself as you cross the start and finish points or as complex as downloading track logs to a computer. Of course, each competitor would need a GPS so you could put in the turnpoint coordinates and program the route of the task but that's all pretty simple.
Just thought you guys might want to try it some time rather than just boating around over the field or down the ridge. If you have any questions, drop me a note.
Paul
PS. Glad you had such good conditions for the fly in. Looks like it wasn't even cold.
Fun Competition Format
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