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Dean Stratton

The Rat
Comp Dates from Tuesday 5/31 - Saturday 6/4/05

If I was to ask for a perfect week of paragliding, last week would just about be it.  Great weather, plenty of activities, lots of friends and laughter, and more race strategy & info than you can assimilate in 5 days.

All of us had our good days and bad days in the air.  Some of us missed turn points, some screwed up routes and some jumped the start gate too soon.  All in all even the bad days were fun to fly.  I still think it’s amazing that the event was free of mid-air collisions and had relatively few injuries considering the amount of pilots in the air.  The flying was so good I think pilots will be talking about this comp for a long time to come.  This is my 3rd comp and I think I learned the most at this one.  In the first two comps I spent most of my time trying to figure out my GPS and get the basic strategies down.  Just getting off launch seemed to be monumental.  Even with all the articles available on competition strategy it takes a while to figure it all out and put it into place.  For the first timers like Milley and Bob P. it’s got to be intimidating sifting through all the chaos at a comp, I know exactly what it feels like.  I’ve heard it said before and I have to agree, you’ll learn more at one comp than you would in a years flying at your local site.  It’s a whole new ball game and I think I’m finally getting the bigger picture.  Can’t wait for the next one.

For those of you who didn’t check the daily results, Rob Sporrer spanked everybody on Task 2 taking home the gold, nice work.

Of course no trip would be complete without a few pranks.  I won’t go into detail but I will tell you we got Bo Criss and Raelynn really good.  Next time you see them, ask Bo about his neck massage and Raelynn about her run in with the KKK.  Bo and I showed up late at the cottage where OJ, Pipkin, Rob and Raelynn were staying one night and peeped through the front window.  What we saw shocked us.  There they were, hooting and howling, drinking like sailors and playing strip poker.  All three men were down to their tighty-whities and Raelynn was fully clothed holding all the chips.  I don’t know how it ended because we couldn’t get out of there fast enough.

I took lots of pictures, so I’ll let them tell the rest of the story.

[photos]