Eagleville Tenn GTA Race Wrapup

Woke up this morning, looked out the window, and realized I had been wrong the previous night about the weather forecast. I thought it was going to be sunny but unflyable. Turned out it was not only unflyable, but cloudy as well :-(.  We didn’t get a day in, but the GTA series is kind of unique in that the real prize for GTA racers is the season rankings, so missing a day or two at weekend contests isn’t that big of a deal. Think of it as a season-long soaring contest, held at different venues throughout the year.

We got up pretty early this morning, as we were on the hook to help Bob “PigPen” Richards get his glider out of a muddy field. He landed in a great field, but one that was more than a little bit muddy from the rain two days earlier. He wound up getting his truck and glider trailer stuck in the field, and was finally rescued by the farmer’s tractor, which itself almost got stuck in the process. Finally, Bob left his truck, trailer, and glider in the field overnight, and came back to Eagleville to recruit some more manpower. A bunch of us volunteered to meet him at 0730 the next morning for a what was billed as a ‘difficult’ retrieve. So, at O-dark-thirty the next morning, about 9-10 intrepid (and blurry-eyed) glider pilots followed Bob to the landout field. Once there, my first thought was “OMG, we’ll never get this thing out of there!” Bob’s glider was at least 100 yards away from the only access road, and every foot of the that was deeply plowed, or deeply rutted, or both. At one point we had to step over tractor ruts that were at least 3 feet deep.  If you fell in one of those ruts, your soaring career would be over!

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That little teeny tiny white dot in the background is Bob’s glider.

Now, those are RUTS!

Now, those are RUTS!

The rescue team

The rescue team

Anyway, after the shock wore off, we did what all glider pilots do in a difficult retrieve – we got it done, and had a lot of fun in the process. As it turned out, after pulling the wings off out in the field and carrying them back the trailer (a trek in itself), we all gathered around the fuselage and rolled/carried/bullied it across the field and through the ruts, to Bob’s trailer, only making one or two navigation mistakes on the way. After the glider was safely in its trailer, we all followed Bob to the best (i.e. only) breakfast cafe in Eagleville, eagerly anticipating the promised free breakfast. Unfortunately upon arriving we found the cafe was closed (it was Sunday, after all), so Bob got off with just his heartfelt thanks and his promise to come get us wherever/whenever one of us landed out (based on my own personal landout history, Bob may be in for a lot of work!)

I’m writing this post from a motel east of Atlanta, Ga. where John Mittell (BZ) and I have holed up on our way to Perry. We’ll get there probably late morning tomorrow, but we probably won’t be missing anything in the way of soaring – the crappy weather that killed the day at Eagleville, Tenn. will probably also kill off soaring tomorrow at Perry.  At least we will be able to get our respective trailers and campers set up, all ready for the superb soaring weather we are hoping for during the rest of the week ;-)

Stay tuned,

Frank (TA)