TVHGC Sites Comp 2016 – The First 10 Days
Friday 15 Jan 2016
It’s been an interesting start to the year, at a time when we are normally still in paragliding hibernation. Those that can have been out flying and the usual suspects have got straight back into the Sites Comp, with predictable results…Malcolm has even joined in on the paragliding comp as well as his hang gliding one!
So I asked them both to write a piece about how they do it. What is it that they see that makes it worth getting into the car and driving all that way to a hill that is in fog, with half a gale blowing, in the middle of winter, but suddenly turns into a nicely flyable day? What follows is a transcript of various Facebook posts that are likely to be hidden by newer posts, which would be a shame. Lots of excellent points and plenty to learn from the experts.
Chris Williams
The comp is well under way already and guess who is winning the PG and HG comps... none other than last year's winners, Richard Bungay and Malcolm Beard! We'll hopefully hear from them how they do it, but a few things are quite clear. Yes, it certainly helps if you've got great skills and the sort of job that allows you to fly midweek, but it takes more than that. You'll never win the comp if you sit at your laptop watching the depressions moving towards the UK. It takes a bit of get-up-and-go, a willingness to take a punt and have a go, even if the weather forecast is 50:50 at best. Winter is a fabulous time to fly, as has been shown by recent photos. You've got to be in it to win it so come and join the fun!
Here are Malcolm Beard's thoughts on the opening weeks of this year's comp:
Malcolm Beard
Friday 8th Jan.
The weekend forecast was not looking great, but Friday looked OK for hang gliding (HG) and borderline too strong for paragliding (PG). A front was due to pass through late morning, but the actual rain radar in the morning looked like it might miss the Pewsey Vale. It seemed worth a trip to Milk Hill if I could find a friend to overcome the no lone flying rule. After several calls I persuaded Phil H to come along and loaded the car with plenty of toys to keep occupied if the weather turned out bad. Surprisingly it was sunny and moderate winds when I arrived at 10am. A walk along the South face confirmed that the wind on launch, was actually marginally too light for soaring. As usual in a South / South West the wind funnelling up the gully to the car park and the cool temperature made it seem stronger if you didn't get out to check!
With a lot of south in the wind, the choice was rig and take off on the south face above the track, or carry round to the White Horse face. Needless to say I elected to carry the HG the minimum distance and luckily it picked up a bit by the time I was rigged. The south take-off adds an extra challenge to bagging waypoints, as you need to either fly into potential rotor in the main Milk bowl to get the start / finish points, or fly to Tan hill for the start gate there. Once that hurdle is overcome, there are three relatively easy waypoints to get, even if just soaring conditions. Given a bit of lift, you can actually reach waypoints on Rybury - but obviously need to exercise caution with regard to possible rotor low down...
As it turned out, the conditions were quite mellow and while not quite lifty enough to make the jump forward onto the White Horse face, they did allow the full length of the ridge from Milk to Tan and beyond to be explored. The rain mostly held off, but once it did finally pass through, it was worth the walk to MHWH to fly the PG too...
Not bad for early January
Wed 13th Jan.
Again the forecast was overly pessimistic. - I expected to be flying the hang glider in the forecast wind strength, but ended up flying my low end PG all day instead. It briefly got a bit strong for my tastes, but having packed the PG away, it dropped again and went more southerly, so it made sense to carry round to the White Horse face and keep flying until dusk!
Malc
Malcolm mentions the "actual rain radar" in his piece. For those who haven't seen it, it's a timelapse animation of weather radar images that give a good warning of any rain coming our way. Unlike a forecast, this is 100% accurate as it has actually happened! Rainfall radar is one of the many very useful tools on http://www.netweather.tv/, as recommended by Barney Woodhead at Avon's social last night. Apps available too.
Weather Forecasts, News & More - Netweather.tv
NETWEATHER.TV
Here's a few words from me on the TVHGC Site Comp to complement Malcolm Beard's comments above.
The Comp is designed to get pilots to explore more of the site and push themselves further along the ridges, out the front and over the back than they would normally. Once you have explored sites further you will find you feel more comfortable searching over a larger area for thermals so this will help your getting away XC.
At this time of year it can be quite flyable, even though far fewer pilots venture out. Remember currency is the key to better performance and enhanced flight safety. Granted, you won't be getting lots of height and good thermals but our sites can be explored and exploited in ridge lift even in this "heavy damp" air.
With the lack of sun, the amount of mixing low down in the atmosphere is a lot less. This means that what seems like a strong forecast will turn out to be a lot lighter in the bottom few hundred feet that we are limited to. It's always a gamble but even if it looks top end it is often worth going to the hill to see what the actuals are like. Waiting for someone to post on Telegram that it is on probably means you will miss the flyable windows!
Here is my flight from the 8th January. I screwed up and didn't have my instrument loaded with the turnpoints, note to self and others, be more prepared. I did however remember where some of the turnpoints were and as Chris has set them at the "obvious" features on the terrain, it is quite easy to guess where they should be.
As you can see from my tracklog, my memory and guessing was not up to scratch, and although I tagged 2 waypoints, I just missed another 2.
So get yourselves prepared, go to Chris Williams talk on loading and using your GPS, get the waypoints in your instrument, look where they are on a map and go and explore the full potential of our sites.
Happy Flying and stay safe!
On the 13th January, I was again out and met Malcolm Beard on the Hill. This time we were flying the whole Southerly face between Milk and Tan which you can do when it's due South. I thought about pushing a bit further into the Tan bowl to tag TV08 but decided it would be too rotorary in there so turned short.
Chris Williams
I hope you found that useful. If you’re new to the comp put 3 Feb into your diary for a ground-based session on how the comp works, GPS programming and even a run through the Winter Quiz answers.
Any questions, fire away!
Chris
comps@tvhgc.co.uk
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