It was a sunny morning for the Electroglide competition this month. No June gloom, just blue skies. We did, however, have some wind. At 9:00 a.m., Lindbergh Field was reporting 8 mph winds coming from the north. By the 9:30 launch time, the winds were shifting to the west and approaching 10 mph.
On the first launch, we had eight pilots start, but Fred and Scott had to drop out due to problems with their aircraft. All remaining aircraft being flown were Radians. Vince and Tom were able to find the lift to the west of the field. Vince stayed up for 8:53 and scored a 20 pt. bonus landing. Tom had a duration of 7:10 aloft and picked up a 10 pt. landing.
The second launch was into a north west breeze. It blew all the lift away that Vince and Tom had made such good use of in the first round. On my way back to the landing zone with the timer approaching 4 minutes, I found some ridge lift just east of the boat launch area. It was a nice little bump that turned my short flight into a pleasure of 7:08 duration. Hitting a 20 pt. landing bonus was the cherry on top. I should also mention that all pilots in the second launch scored bonus landing points, all of us. Has that been done before?
The third launch was into tricky wind and flight times were on the short side. New member Bryan Respess got the longest flight of 5:22. The rest of us were well below that. Only myself and Roger were able to hit the bonus circles on landing.
The fourth and final launch saw conditions not much better, with flight times under six minutes. Roger got the Lucky Dog award for a 47 second flight, but landed center circle for 30 bonus points. Nice save Roger. Again though, only two pilots scored a landing bonus. Vince being the other with a 20 pt.
Winners for June: Vince Gonsowski came in first with 175 points, I managed second place with 170 and Tom Erickson came third with 143 points.
Mark your calendars for the next Electroglide, July 16th.
See you there,
Jeff Struthers
