Canadian Nationals Day 7

The Nationals ended with 1 final task, a 55Km race to the south. The sky was completely overcast in the morning and again the forecast was for afternoon thunderstorms but again they didn't arrive. Conditions were really light at the start (but apparently ballistic later on) and many people scratched around trying to survive after the start gate. Heike and Nicole were both low heading south from Mt Seven, Heike fought hard but wasn't able to get high, Nicole flew low all the way to goal and took out the womens class. One of Craig Collings comp flying tips is to get ahead early in the comp, then you only need to fly as well as but not better than your nearest competitors - Nicole employed this tactic with Heike from before the start gate and it was fun to watch! I saw her launch and fly into the thermal I was in, it was quite useable but she made only 2 turns and then flew straight for Heike who was further away from launch and proceeded to lock on. Gavin had the opposite situation and needed to go all out to beat Keith and pick up an extra 30 points. After getting low around launch, Gav climbed in his own thermal near launch and tracked the lead gaggle down just after the start. He ended up beating Keith into goal by 30 seconds, but it wasn't enough and he finished just 21 points behind Keith who became the new Canadian National Champion. The End results were:

Open Class:

1 - Jamie Messenger, UK 5215
2 - Matt Beechinor, USA 5014
3 - Keith Macullough, CAN 4725
4 - Gavin Zahner, AUS 4704
12 - James Thompson, AUS 3912
18 - Heike Hamann, AUS 3133

Womens:

1 - Nicole McLearn, CAN 3865
2 - Heike Hamann, AUS 3133
3 - Michelle Macullough, USA 2207

The winners with trophies, some of them animated...

It was great to do so much flying in such huge, inspiring terrain, but everyone was mentally broken by the end of it. I didn't meet anyone who had flown the nationals and was planning to hang around for the Willi Mueller XC comp - sleep was the only wish. In the end we had 6 tasks out of 7 days, average task distance was 66Km for a total of just under 400Km of task distance flown with some very good racing by the fast guys.

We were told by all the locals that the conditions here during the comp period were 'not the best Golden has' and if that is halfway true, I can't reccomend coming here for comp or free flying highly enough.