| Author |
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| John WoiWode
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2003 King Mountain Meet
King Mt is on, the conditions are cooking, and over 80 pilots are signed up for this annual event. The contest
has an unusual format: open distance XC, with a point for each mile. Gliders are handicapped, with king post gliders
the base receiving the 1.0 miles per miles flown, rigids receiving a penalty of 0.81 and topless receive a penalty of
0.89 times the miles flown. Single surface receive a bonus of 1.25 times miles. Best three out of five days are scored,
most points wins.
The contest has been held since 1986, and for the past six years has been capably run by Lisa Tate and
Terry Edington. They continue to evolve a contest that attracts a huge following from all over the country.
We all come here to fly the big air and distances that King has become known for. To get a picture view of the
awesome terrain that we fly at King Mt, have a look at the Sonoma Wings website at sononmawings.com.
The XC is flown on one of three corridors, "Route 1, Route 2 or Route 3". Route 1 follows the immense Lost River
Range for 70 miles, then doglegs right to and along the 30 mile long Salmon River Canyon, which from altitude looks
like a giant open mouth 9000' deep that wants to eat you, to arrive at the town of Salmon, 100 miles, snuggled deep
into the canyon.
Route 2 is by far the most intimidating, the most difficult and least flown (I only recall two times in all the
years of the contest). It angles over the Lost Rivers, across the Howe Valley to the Lemhi Mountains, across those
lofty peaks to the Birch Creek Valley then over the Bitterroot Mountains, which is the Continental Divide. It gets
worse, and you've only gone 40 miles at this point. This is the formidable route that I flew for the site and state
record in Year 2000; I am convinced that, though difficult, this is the best route for more distance off King, given
the right conditions.
Route 3 goes straight over the back of the Lost Rivers to the Lemhis, over these craggy peaks to the base of the
Bitterroots, then follows the south side of the Continental Divide to eventually reach Henry's Lake, 115 miles.
The task committee calls one of these at the pilots meeting based on the latest weather information and winds aloft.
I missed the first two days, so I'll report the conditions, routes and top pilots:
Day 1 was stormy, rain cells dumping near launch and downwind, north winds aloft. The task committee called
Route 3, the best call they could do; venerable pilot Joe Evans dodged rain cells to get 74.4 miles on his rigid.
A few pilots made the Dubois airport, 59.6 miles, and received the "bonus" miles. There are select fields en
route designated as "bonus"; the advantages to the bonus fields are free points; the disadvantages are that it
provides a random injection of points into the open distance XC format.
Day two dawned clear, but still had the NW push from the frontal system. Forecasted winds aloft were 330, so
Route 3 was again appropriately called. Zach Majors and Bill Soderquist got out to the Kilgore Store, 89.3 miles,
and secured the specious bonus points associated with that field for the day's best flights. They crossed street
after street, punching crosswind to pull off the fine flights. Altitudes of 14000' were common.
Day 3 came in clear and beautiful, with 260-280 forecasted aloft. That is a classic Route 3 direction, and had
Henry's Lake 100+ milers written all over it. But for some unknown reason the task committee called Route 1.
For background, 210-230 aloft favors Route 1, 230-250 favor Route 2, and 260-280 favor Route 3. With the day's
forecasted winds aloft, there was no question that on Route 1 we would be flying up the Lost Rivers in a howling
headwind!! King Mountain and its surrounding terrain are well known for turbulence; we didn't have to seek more
by flying the mechanical turbulence of a headwind along the range.
I quickly pointed this obvious fact out at the pilots' meeting, and was reprimanded with "once the task is called,
it is called". I started to ask one of the task committee members, Kevin Frost, what he was thinking, to be told
by the meet director that no one is allowed to talk to the task committee!! Holy smokes, ignorance surrounded by
stupidity.
The westerliers made for difficult launches. The SSW upper launch was especially treacherous with dust devils
ripping up the road and across the face. Launch cycles were scarce. I was one of the first off upper launch,
at 1500. I crank into a beauty, pull out at 10,500', and moved as fast as I could across Rams Horn Canyon to
Sunset Mt.
Mr. Nasty, on the shoulder of Rams Horn, had gone leeside and was death defying so I slid across the face of
Sunset Ridge and after much broken lift between 8500 and 9500 I hooked a magnificent rocket that held my averager
at 1800 fpm and put me out of the hole and near cloud base at 14000'.
This set me up to make the long crossing over Pass Creek, a large pass in the range that is always difficult
to cross, and vicious in a head wind. I fortunately hold altitude to get past the massive venturi, but by the
time I get to Invisible Mt, now in a lee, trouble brews as a leeside thermal.
I milk altitude through this rock and roll to the front of Invisible, climb on the windward points of the
canyons to 11000', and measure winds aloft: 22 mph along the range, a direct headwind. Higher altitudes are
smoother, as one would predict, but have higher headwind velocities. Lets see: vicious turbulence along the
face of the peaks or pound into howling headwinds; I guess I could get a sharp stick and poke it in my eye.
Many pilots below me, some skating above at altitude punching along the range. I was hoping that I could get to
Corner Mt, an obvious and huge dogleg to the right in the range, where the winds would hit the face and life
would smooth out. I got there with reasonable altitude, 10500', turned the corner, and was dismayed to find
the winds now NNE, a 70 degree cross for the face I was hoping would be windward. Down to 9000' along this face,
I hooked a beauty and took it to 12000', only to find my drift had placed me around the peak and back to the edge
of the rotor!
There are better things to do than this, so I flew out and landed in front of Corner. Distance of 38 miles,
2 hours, 20 minutes. Let's see, that's a whopping 16.5 mph, even on my speedy Aeros 14 Meter Topless, moving as
fast as I could. Joe Evans, in his rigid (!), described it as "exceeding my highest bump tolerances". Yup.
Zach Majors, Shannon Raby and Bill Soderquist pounded it out at high altitude against the headwinds for between
four to five hours to get 65.5 miles, the longest flights for the day. They also landed at the "bonus" field
of the May airport, securing those not so random points.
In epilogue, the day was a beautiful Route 3, with cloud streets setting up all the way to Henry's Lake.
I heard numerous complaints and great disappointment by pilots who had come here to attain their personal best,
would could have readily hit 100+ miles, and were forced to pound into the wind, not to mention further the
outright danger of the severe mechanical turbulence along the range.
The single surface gliders had it especially bad: Frank Gillette, former record holder at King Mt, slugged it
out in his Falcon, the longest single surface for 14 miles. So much for the validity of the "handicap", as
these factors were based on glide ratio downwind. King Mt has a rap for turbulent air; but if flown properly
and intelligently, it is a great big air site. I can only hope the task committee wakes up from their stupor.
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| John
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2003 King Meet - Saturday
The day dawned beautifully clear, clouds starting popping early, and it looked to be a great day. Winds aloft were
forecasted to be 290, Route 3 all the way again. Revolt was rife at launch; to heck with points and scoring, we're
here for flying big distances, as safely as possible. Fortunately the task committee called Route 3, that issue was
defused, and everyone was happy. Maybe they caught the drift, or the grumble, or maybe they just learned that
yesterday's call was terrible as well as dangerous, but they did right today, and everyone was jazzed for real
open distance.
As a nice aside, yesterday the town of Moore put on a great breakfast for the pilots and crew, free. There is
also a portable shower system in the town park, a very welcome addition to the meet infrastructure. Many pilots
camp at the town park. All are provided free. Some of the many reasons why so many pilots show up here year
after year. And of course to fly the big air.
The west winds played havoc on launch, and forced upper launch to use "backside" initially. Backside King is a
mammoth welded metal ramp one could launch a battleship off that aims the glider into a terrorizingly deep chasm.
First pilots off the top fought their way all the way to the ground, and the rest on upper decided to wait until
it might cycle into the front.
The next two groups from lower launch slowly got away in slow climb, and were on course over the back by 1400 hours.
The westerlies continued to make launches difficult, some pilots reported waiting 40 minutes in harness, sweating
liters, and it would be quite a while before the rest of the gliders could get off either launch.
Steve "Bigfoot" Rathbun and I got off lower launch and pulled it up off the deck together. Cloudbase was low,
13,700', but the sky was magnificently studded, and we were off to the races, Zach Majors and Shannon Raby with us.
We took our time crossing the broad Howe Valley, and pressed into the Lemhi Mountains. The sailplane pilots
have always said the Lemhis are poor lift producers, and that was the case. Even though they had clouds, they
were mostly dead soldiers. Bigfoot got low and worked into the faces, eventually going over the back of the
Lemhis through a gap in the range. I picked lift out in front of the range, took it to 12,700', and crossed the
range low at 11,800'. Whew.
The next crossing was the Birch Creek Valley, and it was sleeting. I flew to clear air space to the north,
picked up zero sink, and got to the Bitterroot spur of the next range 300' off the deck. The lift was there,
building from zero to a steady 700 fpm, and I crossed the next range in fine form, cloudbase timing perfectly
for the crossing. But I was now entering one of the tricky parts of Route 3, an area known for its giant blue
hole, and I tip toed through the sinky area holding onto every shred of lift. Montana pilot Dan Gravage flew
in with me, and we flew together for the next 35 miles. Bigfoot was about 8 miles behind and holding altitude ok.
I kept trying to get onto the Continental Divide to my north, which runs straight east-west here at the 50 mile
mark, but the 290 drift kept me away from it, so Dan and I worked the flats. We split up somewhere around Kilgore,
the 90 mile mark, where I headed out over rugged lava terrain, trying to stay high and find a way to get north
against the quartering NW.
The only way to get to Henry's Lake airport would be to essentially get up and cross the Continental Divide and
stay on the north side, then glide quartering NE into the airport. Joe Evans said it was "like connecting the
dots", moving cloud to cloud, and this was mostly true for my line of flight as well. I brought my ship into a
pretty landing at the last possible clear space, Dan Gravage and several other pilots nearby, for 103 miles.
I was sure we were the farthest, feeling it was just impossible to get over the vast forest and the Divide given
the conditions. But no, Bill Soderquist did it. In some of the finest flying I can imagine, Bill got over
Sawtell Peak in the lee of the Divide, and stretched his glide and ground skimmed 20' off a small ridge for 3/4
of a mile before flaring into the airport with 100' to spare, 113 miles. What a fine flight, and a superb example
of persistence and flying skills. Joe Evans landed a few miles short of the airport in his rigid for 110 miles.
Eight 100 milers were flown.
Numerous personal bests were flown yesterday, and I apologize for not having all the details for all at this
writing; congratulations to everybody with wide grins this morning. Trent Rigler from Salt Lake flew 38.5 miles,
his farthest before was 21 miles. Kristian Merwin and Peter Swanson flew their first 100 milers. Kristian ran
over to me after I landed, and said "John, Dude!! I just got my first 100 miler!!!" Way way cool. He was still
regaling pilots at the headquarters with the details of his flight, cryogenically preserved smile pasted across
his face, catatonic glaze to his eyes, at midnight when I hit the hay. That is what this place is all about.
Great flying.
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| John
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2003 King Meet - Sunday
Yesterday's great flying got the buzz going, and we all hoped for another big day to finish the meet.
We were not disappointed. Winds aloft were forecasted to be 190 through 9000', with 250 and more westerlies
clocking around at the higher altitudes. Route 1 is in its prime element with stacked winds at 220 from
surface to 18000'. That maximizes the lift component along the range, and provides a nice quartering tailwind.
Also, at about the 45 mile mark en route, the winds aloft on Route 1 always shift about 20-30 degrees more
westerly, providing an even nicer tailwind component for the dogleg across the gaping canyons to Salmon, the
lofty goal of 100 miles.
But 190 low with 250 aloft is a bit tricky. The lift component on the range would be minimal, and often it
goes easterly, rotoring those on the range and sliding the pilots out into the valley. Something to watch for.
And where is the shear, and how strong? It is what it is when we get there.
The task committee calls Route 1, the proper call, and everyone is excited. The winds are surprisingly strong
on launch, and pretty much straight in. Two Falcons launch from upper at 1300, and boat up in the very buoyant
air. There is a mad rush to get on course.
I get off at 1330 and after dodging boating launch traffic, I hook a snarly thermal on a rock point and take it
straight up at 900 fpm. Montana pilot Will Lanier joins with me at altitude, and we take that to 13000'.
Looking good. I note the strong and distinct shear from the south to the west at 11,500'; this would remain
throughout the flight.
My flying partner Steve "Bigfoot" Rathbun got behind some pilots in the queue, and got off about 20 minutes
behind me. Too bad, as we really wanted to fly this one together. We did stay in touch the whole flight,
though, and compared conditions along the range continually.
Will and I shot across Rams Horn Canyon to Mr. Nasty, but he only offered turbulence, so we continued along
Sunset Ridge at 10,500'. At the high point of the ridge I hook a broken core to 12,700'; Will caught a part of
this, but I leave him behind there, telling my self to move as fast as possible.
I cross the broad area in front of Pass Creek at the 13 mile mark, note the strength of the venturi in the
pass as significant, then drive into Red Rocks. No lift. Hmm. Now down to 8100' (valley floor at 5500' or
so) I polish the rocks on the corner of the venturi, with limited effect. I've caught up to Frank Gillette in
his Falcon, and he and I are trying to sort out the lift component on the range. Pilots are finding that the
190 offers no lift component on the range, and the valley is starting to litter with gliders. I hug the range,
no easterlies yet, and pull a thermal off the rocks that is moving directly along, not uphill, on the range to 13,000'.
The shear is sharp and turbulent as I go through 11,500', and the westerly headwind component strong at altitude,
so I plan my course along the range to stay within 10,500 and 11,500'. I am able to move fast, though am surprised
at the infrequency of lift; each real thermal is a long ways from the last.
Lofty and big shouldered, Mt. McCaleb (11,330') at the 25 mile mark offered only rough turbulence, so I skate
over to the Three Sisters (11, 720-11,989'), 10,500' at the 30 mile mark. Holy smokes there was something here,
but violent. The conditions made my instruments make unnatural sounds, only to loft me weightless in an
uncontrollable spiral. Where was it??
I would alternate between trying to find the thermal and trying to fly out, using faulty logic such as "if I
can just find the core, I can get through this and everything would be ok." Finally I said forget this, radioed
to Bigfoot the bad spot on the range, and pushed further along, past Leatherman Peak (12,228') at 9500', gunning
for Corner Mountain, the 35 mile mark, with the south tailwind.
When crossing a few canyons relatively low, I was able to note easterlies sliding out with my GPS. I am sure
this affected many pilots, as I was seeing more and more pilots on the ground in the valley. Almost to Corner,
down to 9,000', I definitely was getting an east flow driving me away from the range. The turbulence was terrible,
and I called for landing winds. I also said this is the place, if I can get up anywhere in these conditions,
it would be at Corner.
I found a sharp thermal that drifted with the easterlies, but I was unquestionably right at the shear point of
east, south and westerlies. It was gut wrenching to hold onto and track this rocket, but I held it and she paid
off: once I got the Aeros wrapped on a wingtip, she took me through all shears; it is not often that one sees 2000
fpm on the averager, but there it was and I rode this Atlas Rocket straight up. She bent back nicely to the west
over the peak. I pulled out at 14,500' with plenty of altitude for the next crossing.
The next move is to bypass Mt Borah (12, 662', highest point in Idaho) to the west and glide the 10 miles across
the broad valley to intersect with the range again at Dickey Peak (11,141'). Dickey is always a great thermal
source; I hit it at 10,500' and was astounded to not have a trace of lift on the peak. Part of the problem was
the 190 below 11,500'; Dickey is best with more west, and was just not producing.
I slid out in front of the peak and about two miles in front, I centered on a nice thermal that pushed me NE
toward Victory Ridge. I topped at 14,000' and headed north on this beautiful 12 mile long knife edge ridge.
This is normally our "free ride", as it usually faces into dominant westerlies and one hardly has to turn to
zip along this leg of the flight. But with the 190 there was no lift component on the ridge, it overcast and
shadowed for 20 miles in front of me, and even from 14,000' I had a sick feeling that I was in the wrong place
at the wrong time.
I glided for the next 15 miles without a peep out of the instruments, and flared and landed five miles short of
Challis, 64.1 miles. Nuts. Shannon Raby landed three miles past me for 67, a few others in the area.
In retrospect, maybe I was moving too fast, but the day was a series of windows that opened and closed, and I
got stuck in a closed window. I radioed to Bigfoot, who then slowed his flying accordingly, and 25 minutes
later he over flew me at 11,500', in clear sunshine. It's kinda like that sometimes.
Bigfoot played the cards perfectly for the next move: almost to Challis (70 mile mark), he hooked and drifted
with a thermal over the piddly end of the Lost Rivers (here called the Pahsimerois). The drift had him right
on course, making the dogleg in textbook style, climbing to over 17,000' drifting above Ellis. Perfect crossing.
He then glided along the deep and intimidating Salmon River canyon, holding altitude well, getting to the end
of the canyon and looking at Salmon with 12,000' and a thermal. I was all encouragement: "Take any drift and
get over the Continental Divide into Montana. Go go go!"; it was still early (1800) and he had a shot at a
really big flight. But a rain cell formed to the NW and then moved in front of him closing his route, so he
circled down to land east of Salmon for 101 miles. Nice flight!!
We got back to the awards ceremony being held at Sally's Ramshorn Cafe and Bar in Darlington, 10 miles north
of Moore, at 2300. Everybody was there, telling great stories of their flights over flowing beer and Mexican food.
Scott Huber flew the farthest in his tailed ATOS, the only one to cross the Divide for 138 miles. Four other
pilots landed at Salmon, landing at the Salmon rodeo grounds (106 miles) for the bonus LZ points. Salt Lake
pilot Jeff O'brien did that flight in a king posted Predator. Montana pilot Karl Hallerman logged his first
100 miler! Great flights by all, really well done!!
I don't have the final placings at this writing, though my impression from the scene at Sally's is that
placements were not all that important. It was another great day of big air flying, and the stories abounded.
Many pilots opted to land at the bonus LZ of the May airport, 65 miles, in order to secure those points.
The open distance format is really great in this day and age of triangle contests. If we could just get rid
of those disincentives to flying real open distance, the "bonus LZs", the scoring would reflect more of the
true XC efforts.
An example of hundreds I could draw from, Teammate Salt Lake pilot K.C. Benn got to May at 15,500' and said,
oh what the heck, the bonus points are probably more than I can get by continuing on, then circled down 10,000'
to land at the airport! The idea is open distance XC, and disincentives should not be placed en route to
dissuade one from doing his or her best. KC' s best was less than 75 miles to this point; he surely would
have exceeded it if given the nudge in the right direction.
It was a great gathering of pilots from all over the country, and everyone had a great time in the big air.
No injuries that I heard of, just a fair rash of broken downtubes, all related to misreading of winds on landing.
There were fourteen 100+ mile flights, all flown during the last two days, and many personal bests: three of the
100 milers were first timers. They'll be telling those stories for years to come, with wide eyed gesticulations,
and somewhere in the mix of words, a phrase like "there I was, no shit, thought I was going to die..." will surface,
appropriately.
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| Steve Rudy
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2003 King Meet
I was happy to see John Woiwode send in a write up about the King Mtn. meet. It did seem a little too
negative about the call to go upwind on Friday the 20th. I think part of the task committee's thinking is
that there were a lot of pilots there that just don't have the XC experience to be comfortable going over the
back at King.
More than half the competitors didn't go downwind on Thursday when the mostly downwind route was called, so
calling a task to push into the headwind it least got some of the recreation class pilots some miles.
I also don't know why John ignored my flights - he mentions Bill Soderquist and Zach Majors on day 2 making
the bonus LZ at 89.3 miles as the best flights of the day when I flew 104 miles. On day 3 he mentions Bill,
Zach and Shannon Raby making the bonus LZ at May airport - I was also there for the longest flights of the day.
In any case, the weather was great, the scenery is magnificent, the organizers put a huge amount of effort
into making it a fantastic meet and they do it purely for the love of the sport.
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| Richard Chamberlain
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King Mountain - view from a king posted glider
I flew during King Mt. meet as a free flier. I have an older kingpost glider. Steve Rudy's statement
that it is safer for less experienced pilots to fly directly into the wind along the mountains than go over
the back with the wind is just not true.
I followed everybody on Day 3, thinking they knew where to go. I thought I had plenty of altitude (12,000')
to get across Pass Creek in the headwind, only to find myself helplessly falling from the sky, feet in the sail,
uncontrollable in the terrible turbulence at that huge venturi. I barely kept it level and landed hard at the
base of the pass. My logbook for the day says "Never so glad to be on the ground. What am I doing? This is
crazy." Over the back with the wind is much saner, no matter for pilots with limited XC skills as myself.
Later, Jon Woiwode was very kind and spent much time with me. He gave me lots of tips on how to move as
safely as possible on the range. As far as I could tell, Woiwode spoke as a voice for the overwhelming
majority of the pilots (at least everyone I spoke to) about the danger (and frustration of no distance)
of the call into the wind along the range. Woiwode should be commended, and his experience at King well regarded.
And by the way, I set my personal best, 21.6 miles, over the back the next day! What an awesome place to fly gliders!
Richard Chamberlain
(editor's note: Awesome is one word that one could use. Others are dangerous, crazy, scary, and absurd.
But, there are many varieties of hang gliding, and for those who wish to experience pure terror, the best place I've
found is King Mountain, especially up the range on a windy day. If my feet aren't in the sail, and the wires ain't
slack, I might as well be back at the office. - Davis Straub)
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