Canadian Nationals Day 5

Task 4

Well, if you’re still reading after yesterdays post, you’re either a glutton for punishment or you’re my family and wondering why I haven’t called. I got back after midnight last night – the almost 1 to 1 flying/retrieve ratio is something I’ll try to avoid from now on ( 5 hours flying, 4.5 hours retrieving yesterday…) It was interesting enough though, I got a ride with a guy named Helmut (long time local originally Austrian) who spent the last 13 years coaching the Australian alpine ski team – he’s been around since the days of Zali Stegl, coached Alyssa Camplin and until 3 months ago was working with Australia’s next medal hope (Johnny someone?) who he says is an absolute natural on the snow but is a bit injury prone. A really friendly guy, he was the only one to stop, right on dark after I’d been walking down the highway for 2 hours waving a $20 bill at all but empty passing cars. I can safely say that petrol is still way, way too cheap. But walking along the road was a bit nostaligic – the Red Bull X-Alps is on again right now and I spared a thought for the guys out there suffering. Actually they’re having the time of their lives, they just don’t know it right now ;-) Have a look at the site and send a message to Lloyd who is competing for Australia this year, he’s doing great, currently in 18^th place and over halfway to Monaco. Go Lloyd you man machine!

Today’s task was much shorter and kept us closer to Golden which everyone was thankful for. A 55km race first to the south, back north past launch and return south to a westerly waypoint and goal at the HQ. The day was on and we hit 3300m just before the start. Having monumentally screwed up the second task I was in no position to challenge anyone so I thought I would take the opportunity to practice some of the things that I don’t do so well in, one of which is flying fast. Gavin and I were first out of the start gate gliding right next to each other, it was on. We took a couple of turns in lift that wasn’t worth wasting time in (or so I thought) before gliding to the next mountain to the south. I took a line about 100m west of where Gavin was and that was the difference between him getting up on the main ridge and me scratching the cliffs out in front. The rest of the field had topped up before leaving Mount Seven and flew past quite soon after (nice and high) while I was low and now groveling. In short I was really happy with my flight at the end of the day – firstly I learnt not to be too greedy about speed and then I spent an hour and a half scratching around including a save from 100m off the valley floor, climbed back to 3000m, blasted along the ridge tops and landed just as the day was shutting down 1k short of the northerly turn-point.

Gav played follow the white rabbit (this alternates between Keith and Will who both fly white boomerangs – and take you places you normally wouldn’t go…) and came in 5^th. James and Heike were both in goal. Gav is 4^th overall, a few hundred points behind Keith, and flying incredibly well. You can all expect the boy to do very well back home this summer, no pressure Gav ;-) Heike is flying really consistently and working hard to try and catch Nicole McLearn of Canada. Days results:

1 – Matt Beechinoor – 1:54:36
5 – Gav Zahner – 2:09:39
16 – James Thompson
26 – Heike Hamann
Plumbing the depths - Me