Goodbye

The story at Hobbs this year was the weather, obviously. I knew that the CD's job would be challenging, but when I accepted it a couple weeks ago, I thought to myself, "At least I won't have to worry about the weather."

We had an ordinary low pressure system, followed by a tropical storm, followed by unforecastable severe thunderstorms. All this in just 10 days.

But that's the nature of our manic-depressive sport. We never get tired of it because the highs always outnumber the lows. Wait till next year!

Despite the weather, I had a great time at this contest. I met a lot of friendly and helpful people, both inside and outside our event.

I will go back East now, with fond memories of my vacation in the desert southwest.


-Rick Sheppe

Contest Results

At noon today the contest day was cancelled in both classes, due to weather. The competition is over.

While the results will not become official for a few days, it appears that the Open Class did get a valid contest, and the winner is Ron Tabery, who is out on the ramp right now receiving congratulations from his fellow competitors.

With only three contest days out of the required four, the Standard Class does not have an official contest. They came up short by less than one mile of distance flown.

Volunteers

Regardless of the outcome of a competition or how many days we fly, it would be impossible to hold a gliding contest without volunteers.

This year at Hobbs, we needed an unusual amount of help to get everyone launched and retrieved, and the CD needed a lot of advice.

Here are the people who gave up ten days of their normal lives to help us out:

Tina Bearden, Ron Clark, Hayden Connor, Rhonda Copeland, Bud Copeland, Colby Deming, Ralph Douthit, Mary Ann Douthit, John Godfrey, Austin Goodwin, Donna Head, Alex Johanson, Austin Keene, Bayley Layton, Denise Layton, Cheri Long, Steve Maier, Charlie Minner, Kathey Pope, Julius Tabery, Mechelle Tarrant

And here is a picture of Denise and Donna, whose normal lives include working for us at the SSA Headquarters:

July 7 Scores

It was a valid day in both classes.

July 7 Report

1235 - First launch.



1313 - Standard Class Task is open.

1355 - Open Class Task is open.

1408 - Twelve have started, and one has landed back at Hobbs. There is a storm in the second circle that will definitely cause problems later.

1715 - We were overrun by thunderstorms today, and at least a dozen have landed out. Mark Keene and David Greenhill made it home. Many of the contest officials have volunteered to go on retrieves.

The next update will be quite late tonight.

July 7 Tasks

For the first time in the contest, our met man Walt Rogers, mentioned the possibility of getting above 10000 feet. That's more like it.

July 6 Scores

July 6 Report

1350 - The launch has started.



1435 - A stratus deck moved in from the south, delaying the launch to 1350. As happened yesterday, the beautiful cumulus field to the north stayed just out of reach. The conditions are very weak, with low cloudbases. After collecting everyone in the Start Circle, we changed both Tasks to the bare minima:





1545 - Both Tasks are open.

1625 - At least fifteen have left, with start times ranging from 1546 to 1620.

1804 - The last finisher crossed the line a few minutes before 6pm. There were several rolling finishes. Nobody landed out, and it appears we have a valid contest day in both classes. Dick Butler (67 mph) and Chip Garner (65 mph) seem to be the winners.

July 6 Tasks

The moisture in the southeast has moved back into our area. We'll probably have a pair of large-circle TATs to the north today.

The weather briefing this morning was excellent, as usual. However the future is essentially unknowable. All the usual forecasts disagree about how weak it will be. But it will be weak.

Here's the Task that will be handed out in a few minutes:

July 5 Scores

The Open Class got an official day, but the Standards did not.

July 5 Report

All times are Mountain Daylight Time.

1233 - First launch. The sky is going blue.

1350 - All the gliders have been in the air for a while. They are struggling to stay airborne, and so far there have been no landings. Heating is progressing much more slowly than forecast. The sky is completely blue. We are nowhere near opening the Task.

1430 - Still milling about over the airport, not very high. The Task has been shortened to 2 hours. 85 degrees on the ramp. Still not hot enough.

1505 - We can see the cumulus associated with the Dry Line, far to the north. That's where we wanted to go today. But it's just too far away, and they're still not getting high. There are clouds in the south and southeast, and they are starting to look good. Task changed to a 2-hour MAT.


1522 - The Task is open, finally. They are beginning to trickle out.

1530 - Make that a stampede. They are all on task now.

1915 - (Back from a retrieve) - Conditions deteriorated near the mandatory Turn Point, and the going got very tough. At this hour the Open Class day is valid with about half of them finishing the Task. Dick Butler and Ron Tabery essentially tied for first, at about 61.5 mph. The Standard Class probably did not get a valid day. Only one returned (CG), and we won't know how far the rest got until much later. It will be a while before the next update.

July 5 Tasks

Here is today's Task, the same for both classes. Grid time is 1200 MDT.

July 4 Report

The day was weak, with cloudbases not much over 7000 MSL, but enough pilots made it around the course to make it an official day.

All the Open Class pilots made it home and three of the Standards landed out.

Here are the unofficial results for the day:

July 4 - On task at last!

After a slow start to the day, they're finally on their way.

With the low cloudbases (7000 MSL) and late start (1500 MDT), they're probably glad they got a short task today.

Here it is:

Saturday morning in Hobbs

Read all about it

The news from Hobbs isn't any better from the other bloggers and correspondents here. But you should go over to Dave Nadler's blog or the ASA Forum for different points of view. Tom Kelley's excellent racing blog probably won't cover this contest, since Tom folded under the strain elected to withdraw from this contest to get ready for the World Championships.

How wet is it?

At the briefing this morning, Walt Rogers presented this morning's sounding. It showed saturated air from the surface to 27000 feet. Pretty impressive, we thought. We were even more impressed when Walt, a professional meteorologist, said, "I've never seen anything like this, and I don't mean at Hobbs, I mean anywhere."

Flying was cancelled for the day.

Another no contest day

At the morning briefing, our meteorologist, Walt Rogers, advised us to hold out for a break in the weather in the late afternoon. Glider pilots are an optimistic lot, so we took him at his word.

Sure enough, the sky opened up for the first time in three days at around 2pm. The sniffer was able to sustain on his second flight, so we launched the Standard Class, starting at 1523 MDT. The Open Class was second to launch, and there was very little hope of getting them out the door before we ran out of time. Their Task was cancelled on the grid.

Standard Class gliders were able to stay in the air, but they were not able to get high enough for a safe trip across the mesquite, oil wells, rilles, and rocks around here. Their Task was cancelled at 1559 MDT.

The next couple of days look pretty grim, as the mess of moisture formerly known as Tropical Storm Alex moves into the area.

But we remain optimists, nevertheless.

Here is today's Task (click to enlarge):