Chelan US PG Nats July 12

The final day of the comp and one of the pilots suggested a starburst-type task with an epicentre and multiple stabs to various cardinal points.  We thought this was a fantastic idea as it would keep everyone close with lots of thermal markers and make retrieve fairly straightforward on the final day.  So we set the epicentre at the turnoff to McNeil Canyon with stabs out to Withrow (south), the edge of the plateau (north), Mansfield (east), and back to the soccer field (west).

It was quite a fun task as pilots were crossing each other back and forth to the various stabs and the lift was abundant with lift to 4000 m.  But task close was early to allow for the final scoring and a bunch of us simply didn't fly fast enough to finish the course by task close.  I landed a few km short of the rim and guess who was the first car by?  Martin Henry coming back from retrieving a HG pilot who landed out at Waterville!  Small world!

Around 25 pilots made goal with many others landing within 10 km of the soccer field.  I believe Brett Yeates was the only Canadian in goal, most of the rest of us landed near the rim instead.

This was a hugely successful comp with 7 tasks flown in 7 days, no weather/rest days, and over 700 km of task setting, including the longest task in US PG history.  Final results can be found here.  Just about everyone who attended was raving about the flying and the site including some visiting Europeans and Asians who had never flown Chelan before and were blown away with the quality of potential flying here.  I bet the next time we have a comp here it will be hugely popular and possibly oversubscribed.  We were incredibly lucky with the weather however as it could have quite easily been too windy, or thunderstormy, or shut down due to smoke or TFR's.  A special thanks to Kim and Kari for putting on a fantastic comp and hopefully we'll have a repeat within the next few years!




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