Flight Articles from From Woodrat Starting 5/29 (in order of posting time stamp)
[Ron Faoro] [Dean] [Bo]

Ron Faoro (The Spin Doctor)

Monday, May 29th, 2006
Woodrat

Tom Pipkin and I met at 4:45 AM today, with a destination of Medford and our fourth Rat Race.  It took several Red Bulls for us to maintain consciousness over the two hour layover in Salt Lake City.  It was nothing but cumis all the way from Utah to Oregon.  We touched down at noon and headed for launch as soon as we picked up the rental car.  Rae Lynn told us conditions were booming at Woodrat.  Everyone was flying the 15 miles to Grants Pass on an out and return.  They were getting up to 6,000 feet.

That was nothing.  Tom and I got a ride up the hill on the shuttle and launched just after 2 PM.  Tom took three whacks just off launch and lost 50% of the wing on the side of his "bad wing."  We got up to 8-9,000 feet, hooked up with Dean, cruised the bowl and froze our limbs off.  We got the distressing news that SA had deployed and crashed in the trees, but the news update late tonight is that he's OK, just bruised or cracked ribs.  Don't know whether he'll compete tomorrow.  But the conditions were the best ever here in the four years of competition.  It all starts tomorrow!

Pipkin's reintroduction to mountain flying