Worlds Task 4 from Kari

Paragliding World Championships: task 4

The light wind, low base, stable conditions with afternoon thunderstorms are continuing here in Feltre and today the Task Committee sent us on an 83km task via 6 turn-points.

The task started today on the high ground behind launch. We floated around enjoying the views in the clouds for 30 minutes and then despite the lower level stability and slow conditions, blasted off down courseline on full bar as usual. For the vast majority of the field, today's task was a one-glide wonder across a valley and along a fully shaded out ridge and back, as the gaggle refused to stop for any climbs. (If this collective decision making sounds non-sensical, it was.)

Gareth and I tagged the first turn-point together and turned to fly back down the shaded out ridge. The air felt like a warm bath - buoyant, but with nothing actually going up. The gliders in front were already in low save mode and had pushed out over a small village in the bottom of the valley. I dumped my water ballast and hugged the contour of the ridge for as long as possible before pushing out to join a gaggle of about 15 pilots just maintaining in zeroes.

Over the next 30 minutes, approximately 120 pilots ended up landing in the valley. Pilots were shooting this way and that looking for any skerrick of lift. I held on grimly to the zeroes with about 7 other pilots and drifted back over town and a rise in the valley floor. Little bit by little bit the zeroes turned into 0.1s, then 0.2s and so on. Until finally we had a messy 1m/s climb to 1000m and we lobbed back onto higher ground at about half ridge height. We surfed our way up the ridge and escaped the valley and were finally back on task.

This small triumph was short lived. As we popped back out of the valley floor and went on glide we could see the afternoon thunderstorms brewing back in the mountains. It was going to be touch and go to finish the task and as we glided into the next trigger the task was stopped.

Felipe was the best placed Aussie for the day coming in 15th, I was 18th, Gareth was 51st, Steve was 58th and Pete was 107th.

All in all, poor conditions today for tasking, but our Aussie team worked hard and our results saw us jump from 16th to 6th in the team Championships. We are pretty stoked with this 🇦🇺😊

Results are at: https://airtribune.com/worlds2017/results/task2663/day/overall