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Saturday, 4/11/20200 [Weather] and [Flight Articles] by [Carter Crowe] & [Sundowner]

Saturday, 4/11/2020
Leg 1 ~ Skyport to the Antenna Farm
Leg 2 ~ Antenna Farm to the VOR Spine
Leg 3 ~  VOR Spine to Castle Point 1
Leg 4 ~  Flush from Castle Point 1 to a re-boost at Polo Ridge then glide to El Carro Park in Carpinteria.
2 hours 17 minutes airtime, Launching at 11:53 and landing at 2:10 PDT
Niviuk Icepeak 7

Reference: [IGC Text Data File] and [Google Earth KMZ File] or [Ayvri Web Animation]

Sundowner's Flight Report, see also [Weather Archive]

Not proud of my launch.  Drove it too hard (again) and a little off line.  It lifted me but then dove as I wasn't able to build any forward speed.  I've had a tendency to overdrive the pull-up because it gives me more steering authority so is more likely to come up straight, but that method also introduces problems and hazards so perhaps I need to budget some tome for practice?

Nothing worth turning for on the initial glide, but did try over the Bypass before heading out to the Antenna Farm to wait for it to "turn-on", which it did pretty quick.  Initially weak, but I was able to bench back to the Factory.  I was getting better by the time I got to La Cumbre Peak.  Big crowd of up there (maybe 20 to 30?).  Did a peak altitude probe and got to 49 at the base of wispy clouds, but Logan reported 53 a little later.

Probably should have followed the back ridge toward the Alternator, but there was some drift from the North on glide and I didn't fight it so I came in a bit out front then turned right to fish up the spine because there was a wispy over the top, but ended up boating back out because I had enough to get across to No Name and cloudbase was low at the VOR anyway.

Had a couple of wind dummies to mark the action at the VOR.  They did better out front.  I worked up the spine but then dribbled back down and left eastbound with arrival altitude.  With pilots up high, I though it would be easy going eastbound, but I had to work some weak thermals.  Was wanting to transition to the back ridge, but didn't want to detour, so took the lower route along the front points thinking I needed to get out ahead of potential west wind that never really was much of an issue for me.  I though I'd boost back up to bigger altitude further east, but had to struggle more and more, thermalling close to the terrain with a lot of tight turns, and eventually flushed out from Castle Point 1

Got a boost over the SW end of Polo Ridge.  Could have angled back in for Snowball, but I sensed the day was deteriorating so I angled out reaching for Carpinteria High School.  Got some glide extenders and easily made it past the high school to El Carro Park.  The main field had temporary baseball outfield fences, so I used the Howard School field, which has some parameter trees but the wind was light to nil on the deck and the air smooth.

Could have walked home, but I phoned Laura and she collected me.

Nice day.  Very little time investment. (Cracka style?)

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