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This morning when I looked out the window of the micro-castle, I saw pretty much the same weather we had yesterday that resulted in a no-fly day.  However, at the morning meeting Mike the Strike was optimistic that today’s weather would be much better, and the OD problem from yesterday would not recur.

On the grid, things were looking pretty good for the day, right up until CD Karl Striedieck announced that we were going to have to shift runways due to stronger than anticipated winds from the south.  As elephant walks go, it was a pretty orderly one, but it still consumed a lot of time, time that ultimately caused weather problems for the 15m nationals guys at the back of the loooonnnnnng line.  I was about 10th from the last position, and I swear the line of gliders ahead of me stretched out over the horizon!

Out on course, it was a real crap shoot.  The ‘not to recur’ OD recurred in spades, but this time with rain, thunder, and lightning.  Getting around the course at all was a major accomplishment, and still there were some amazing speeds in the high 70’s in both contests.  Basically if you could get around the course without being blocked by rain showers or the changing winds, you could really smoke.  If not, you found yourself on the ground in a hurry.  Many top pilots in both classes found themselves with ‘AB’ by their scores today, including current ‘Mr Logan’ Tim Taylor (TT), reigning 15m champ Bill Ruehle (WR), past Sports Class champ Tim Welles (W3), current Perry regional 18m champ Jerzy Szemplinski (XG) and many others.

Hopefully the frontal passage and monsoon moisture combination that caused all this nonsense today will pass off to the east tonight and the rest of the contest will be a bit less pathological.  Stay tuned, as I suspect there will be even more Logan weather surprises before the contest is over.

TA