Task 4 PWC Chelan, WA

So Task 4. We have an ambitious task committee as they have a called over a 150 km task today. The weather for today looked great, but winds were forecast to be around 12 mph from the northwest. This made the task mostly crosswind, but it turned out the winds had a more northerly component and getting to the first turnpoint became very difficult. Most of the pilots landed in the vicinity of the first turnpoint. Jack Brown was the only one in goal before the 8pm deadline. He flew the task in a little over 6 hours.
I launched at the end of the pack today, but it was no problem climbing out from launch as I topped out at 8,300 msl and still had 30 minutes until the start. Once on course we crossed the river and ended up about 1,000 feet agl above the flats and several of us worked together to climb out and get established on the flats. Ironically we were south of the course line at this point, and fighting the north to northwest wind component we kept south of the course line for a long ways. We had some nice cumulus in the flats, but some of the climbs were broken and small cores. Cloudbase was around 12,000 msl. The first turnpoint was Barker, and Leahy was the town just before. Pushing into the wind I made ok headway, but at Leahy I got stuck, found a couple of climbs, and frisbeed back away from turnpoint 1. While I was climbing out of Leahy, several pilots were to the east, and I noticed one pilot having some action. Was it to be? Yes, another reserve deployment, as I watched the pilot have about a three minute ride from about 4,000 feet agl. I was worried he was going to land in the lake to the east, but ended up on land and ok. I would push into the wind and end up low where I had started the last climb. Around Leahy there is a big gap, and you go into areas where there aren't many roads. Not being high as I approached the gap and fighting the wind, I chose to stay near a road. After about 45 minutes of pushing and sinking. I landed near a retrieve van.
I got 50 km, and another great flight, and still learning alot about the new glider U4 2010.
Overall the US pilots are still doing well and there are around 7 pilots in the top 15. The top 15 pilots will go to the superfinal in Turkey. Josh Cohn is in the lead. Results and info here at http://www.paraglidingworldcup.org/ .
Today the 22nd of July was cancelled due to wind, but the next two days look fairly good. Stay close for more excitement from Chelan.