Andy’s Blog

Speed Session

Sat, 5 Sep 2009 08:15:27 -0600

Hi winds and cloudy skies kept paragliders out of the sky today, but as Nate Scales so convincingly claims, “It’s ALWAYS speed flyable.”

The photo above is Mikey in the rain, ready to fly, but ducking for cover to wait out the squall and avoid lightning.

The mountain was called Della, and we flew off of it 3 times with vehicle shuttles to the top, starting around 5 pm and going until after dark. Hailey and the Big Wood River below, we cranked it down over the cottonwoods in unison, landing in a cow pasture to the east of the river. Several local flyers landed on a large gravel-bar at the edge of the river, made exciting by the water below and the deep cottonwood “canyon” that you fly through during the approach. I stole some great video from some of the pilots that did this, and I’ll be posting a video soon.

Two pilots new to speed flying had their first 3 flights today. Unstoppable grins on everyone all evening. The speed flyer list looked something like this:

Will Burks (SV)
Nate Scales (SV)
Michael Pfau (SV)
Charlie (SV)
Chad (SV)
Jesse Therien (Bozeman)
Andy Macrae (Bozeman)
Dennis (SLC)
Jochen (SLC)

Photos below, Video HERE

Sent

Fri, 4 Sep 2009 12:58:38 -0600

Sun Valley League Meet: Task: To the road intersection before Borah Peak. New task when we got to Otto’s: Open Distance!!!!!

Looked good on launch, turned out to be epic in the air, crossed about 7 mountain ranges, cloudbase at 5000 meters (16,500 ft), tailwind of 30 km/h. Launched around 12:15pm, landed around 6:20 pm. Best part about this flight: Flew the whole thing with the company of Nate Scales and Lupi. I was 8 miles shy of Honza Rejmanek’s 138 mile ID record, landing to the east of Lima Reservoir at 130 miles. Longest flight of my life so far! Nate Scales got 128 miles, also the longest flight of his life. Lupi landed in Lima, MT for about 112 miles.

Super perfect, safe, high, fast day, with great pilots to search the sky with, awesome terrain covered, porpoising over mountain ranges like hurdlers in a 200 m hurdle race. Today was another example of the perfect paragliding day, complete with retrieve below us and a cooler full of beer. Yes.....Smiling.....

The photo above is just after tanking up over Otto’s and realizing that this was a day to take full advantage of. Thanks Darlene and Mikey for the 10 hours of driving retrieve!

Speed flying this afternoon with Nate and Mikey, then we’ll head back to Bozeman, as the forecast looks windy and cloudy for the rest of the weekend.

Photos below, video to come...

Comfortable Stagnation

Sun, 23 Aug 2009 21:28:16 -0600

Few times in my paragliding career have I learned so much in so little time as Round 2 of the 2009 US Paragliding Nationals.

It was quite possibly the best week of flying I’ve ever had in the United States due in large part to the excellent weather and spectacular scenery. The Boomerang 6 is a wonderful glider, and completely held together all week. I’m still very much learning how to fly it, but I can already see that it’s a beautiful contraption.

Although Mads Syndergaard, a foreign pilot, dominated the competition, the pilot skill level in the United States is exploding. It’s so much fun and so educational trying to keep up with the top 10 US pilots. The things we did and the fun we had are beyond description and beyond what a helmet cam or still camera can capture.

The point that I want to make with this blog post is that participating in a competition is almost certainly the best way to progress your XC flying skills after you’ve learned how to thermal. There is a long list of reasons why coming to a competition is a good thing for a blossoming (or stagnating) XC pilot as well as for the paragliding community as a whole, but I’ll spare you the list and simply ask that you come to a paragliding competition in the near future. Paragliding competitions are not about competing. The next one is the Monarca, in Valle de Bravo, Mexico. Come play with us. Email me if you have questions, need convincing, or want details HERE.

SLC US Nationals 2009: Day 6

Fri, 21 Aug 2009 19:51:45 -0600

Task: Inspo Launch 3k Exit, Camel Front 2k, Mahogany 1k, Beacon 1k, North Side 2k ESS, North Side Goal 115 km.

Extremely fun day. I didn’t get a great start, but progress was fast and we went south to Camel and quickly back to Cascade to tank up again before heading to Timpanogos, ridge soared and thermaled here, tagged Mahogany, and headed into now familiar Lone Peak territory. I was mentally and physically prepared for lee-side battle, but to our pleasant surprise it was butter smooth and tall. Thermaled right over Lone Peak in a climb that took us at least a thousand feet over the summit, making it a beautiful, relaxing time. From here, a long glide north, and about halfway to Olympus we took a climb which was a little deep, but very nice. Got the highest here, somewhere over 4000 meters, and headed for Olympus. Good climb here, and we had Beacon on glide. Some of us stopped to tank up on the hills just to the south of Beacon, while the lead gaggle went straight for the turnpoint. We were way higher and hoping that we were really in the lead. Tagged Beacon, and back into the hills to tank up again. Our climb didn’t hurt us much, but it didn’t help us either. The lead gaggle was still ahead and now climbing. Back to Oly to climb high. While everyone else went from Oly to the mountains, Pete Schaefer and I got high over Oly and pointed straight for the North Side on a 12:1 glide. It became 13:1, then 14:1, I was getting a little nervous, but figured since Pete is a local, he must do this all the time. We squeaked into goal with a couple hundred feet, and when I asked him about it, he said, “That was the first time I’ve done that glide.” Glad I didn’t know. :-)

We ended up not catching many people by going the valley route, but it was no slower, and possibly gave us more “style” points. :-)

Super fun day, brilliant flying and scenery. Many pilots in goal, I’m guessing 30. Happy faces. What a week. Sick.

I have to hit the road for Sean Becker’s wedding, so I’ll have to skip Saturday, and I don’t have time to make a video tonight. I’ll get one posted on Sunday or Monday, but really yesterday’s video says it all.

Awesome comp, wish I could stay for the parties, food, dancing, and general rowdiness. We’ve all been in “serious mode” all week. I guess I’ll have to be the crazy guy at the wedding... Thanks for reading. - Andy

You can see my track daily HERE

Photos are HERE

Results are HERE

SLC US Nationals 2009: Day 5

Thu, 20 Aug 2009 21:47:05 -0600

Task: Inspo Launch 3.5km exit, Mahogany 1k, Beacon 1k, Inspo Launch, Inspo LZ goal. 111 km.

My brain hasn’t fully comprehended this flight yet, but I’ll give the blogging a shot:

If this task was to be completed, it would be the out-and-return record for the site.

The weather was forecast was great for the day, and so the task committee came up with this big one. Basically this task took us north along the Wasatch range from launch (which is south of the Point of the Mountain) over Lone Peak, continued north past Olympus, and took us to Mt. Wire (Beacon Hill), directly east of the downtown Salt Lake area. From here we were to fly back south along the same courseline, all the way over Lone Peak again, and tag the 400m Inspo Launch cylinder, then land at the main LZ at Inspo (school).

Flying into the lee-side of Lone Peak is an amazing experience. Climbing just above the top and committing out the front of it is also amazing. Coming back over it with 30 m of clearance at 6 pm is equally amazing.

Anyway, nobody was getting high at all before the start or for the next hour or so. We bobbled down the foothills along the courseline together, and eventually near the end of Mahogany we started to get high. Staying in the air until it finally started to work was the key up until this point, and most pilots did very well at staying in the game. Now it was game on, big mountain flying for the next 5 hours. We nestled up into the lee of Lone, climbed high here, and although I could literally hear my heart beating in my chest, I didn’t miss the critical move over the top of Lone this time. Wide-eyed, adrenaline-induced alertness as we got ripped up over the top of the rock below, we pointed north and didn’t look back. Cruised north, gliding and climbing occasionally, and got to Beacon after taking one critical climb just before it. Pointed south without a ton of height, and bobbled along the hills with a slight tailwind. The day was getting late (5:30 ish) and the climbs were starting to weaken, but we were able to find some lifting air and make it back to Lone Peak. At 300 meters below the peak, we needed a climb to get over it. The lead gaggle found one, which I also latched on to, but had to stay a bit longer than the rest of them. This worked, and we passed back over the more western side of Lone with about 30 meters of ground clearance. Back in the lee of Lone, but nice and smooth this time. Climbs were getting very light now and we found a couple more before it felt like the day was shutting down. Gliding downwind, we had boaty glides, but of the 12 pilots that made it to the Inspo LZ (goal), only 3 of them tagged the End Of Speed section, since it was up on a hill. I was 380 meters shy of hitting the ESS. Josh Cohn, Bradley Gunnuscio and Peter Schaefer were the only pilots to hit the ESS.

My words don’t come close to describing how perfect this flight was. Insane, amazing, technical, committing, beautiful. This may have been the “all around” best flight of my life (so far). :-)

I hope the video will give you a good feel for it. I’ll post it by about 9 am tomorrow morning. Time for bed...

You can see my track daily HERE

Photos are HERE

Results are HERE

Video is HERE

SLC US Nationals 2009: Day 4

Wed, 19 Aug 2009 22:17:28 -0600

Task: Inspo Launch, Buckly 1km, Avoid Fire 2k, MAPJHR 1K, Levan 2k ESS, Levan Goal. 89 km or so.

In direct contrast to yesterday, today’s task was meant to be a downwind task with relatively little “deepness” or sketchiness involved. They sent us downwind to a mountain to the south of launch (Buckly), then into the flats to hit the MAPJHR turnpoint while avoiding the forest fire airspace, and once here, the next required point to hit was goal, about 60 km “downwind.” Downwind seems to be a myth around here.

Anyway, launched early, bombed out, stuffed my glider into the re-launch van with Nate Scales, Riss Estes and Sam Mulder, got to launch just before the start time elapsed and was surprised to see almost half of the field of competitors still waiting to launch. We must have made it look really bad. As I was clipping in the second time, I tagged the start cylinder. :-) 3/4 of the field was getting high over Cascade before I even started thermaling. Hmmm, sounds a lot like yesterday’s start, eh? Anyway, got up and away from launch, and started playing catch-up. Left launch lower than the rest had, surfed along the foothills a bit until about the Y, where a couple of us stragglers boosted up high before tagging Buckly. Into the flats for the next turnpoint was easy, and then onto the hills just before the windmills. High here, making the crossing to the other side of the windmills easy, surfed the hills a bit, and all of a sudden I found myself with the leaders. Very Nice. Watched Brett Hardin very properly manage a decent cravat, and we got high here before crossing to Elk Ridge. The crossing was long, but easy and we came into the middle of Elk Ridge. Ridge and thermal lift here, but didn’t get too high before committing to the canyon crossing and on to Mt. Nebo. The photo above is Mt. Nebo, with Brett Hardin, Bernard Winkleman, and Brad Gunnuscio in front. Assuming a lifty mountain soaring session like last time, we felt comfortable not being super high. However, today the conditions were a bit different. With goal still about 30 km downwind, we needed a glass off, a tailwind, or if neither of those, several more real climbs. I found every climb I needed except the very last one. Brett Hardin landed pretty much with me, and Bernard and Brad managed to find that last climb and make it into goal. I was 5.8 km short of the ESS (End of Speed Section). I think I landed around 7 pm.

This was a super fun, fairly relaxing day of perfect paraglider racing. Given my bomb-out and super late (second) start, I was stoked to have pretty much caught up with the leaders, and although goal would have been icing on the cake, the icing is usually just butter and sugar anyway. Days like today are the reason we love this sport so much. 11 pilots in goal. I was 12th for the day.

Got back to HQ at almost 10 pm, making this another long day of paragliding.

You can see my track daily HERE

Photos are HERE

Results are HERE

No interesting footage, unless you want to see me bomb-out, so no video for the day. I’ll do better with the camera today!!

SLC US Nationals 2009: Day 3

Wed, 19 Aug 2009 07:17:37 -0600

Task: Inspo Launch, Hounds Tooth, North Side 2k ESS, North Side goal. 56 km.

This was a great task. Very technical, very deep and the air was quite active.

In an attempt to nail the start, I climbed high out of launch and opted to go north, to the front edge of the cylinder. Had this worked, it would have been brilliant, but seeing the rest of the pack stay high in back of launch (over Cascade) while I struggled to find any lift made it obvious that I had blown the start. Mike Steed was the only one with me, and we struggled to work our way up Timpanogos where the rest of the field was already high and on their way north. Finally established, but now 30 minutes behind everyone, it was a fight against the impending north wind. I made it across the jagged, rocky canyon just north of Timpanogos without much trouble and into the lee-side bowl of Lone Peak. This turned out to be the crux of the flight for most people. I watched the right move happen, and tried three times in earnest to climb high enough to cross over the peak. It is my opinion that at this point in the day, being so late (4:30), the thermals had either weakened or stayed the same in strength while the north wind had increased. As we thermaled up slightly over the top of Lone Peak, the thermals seemed to disintegrate in the north wind, not allowing us to climb quite high enough to make it over safely. After getting flushed down in the rotor/lee-side of Lone for the third or fourth time, I pointed it towards goal, skipping the Hound’s Tooth. Getting to the North Side was relatively easy, and it was a bit difficult to get down once there. About 20 pilots in goal. In the end, it seems that for me, today was about start position and timing. Tomorrow I’m staying with the pack. :-) The photo above is one of the few that I could safely take, and it doesn’t do the terrain justice. Imagine a panorama of alpine rock, snow fields and lakes, way above tree-line with green valleys below. Cool.

This day was a really fun day to be flying, and once again a very educational flight for me. The wind was strong, which made timing critical and the air very active, but it was great to see the door open just a little bit wider with respect to what is possible on a paraglider. And not just for me, but for 70 pilots to fly without incident.

I had fun.

We had a great dinner at Superfly, with most of the trays of food being vegetarian! That’s my kind of party!!!

You can see my track daily HERE

Photos are HERE

Results are HERE

A short video of the flight HERE