I believe the low turn out at Montague standard nationals can be explained.
First off, most of our top pilots were at the worlds. At least 2 of them would
have made Montague, had they not been otherwise engaged. Then we had the race
to Kitty Hawk this year. At least 2 more would have come if they hadn't spent
their discretionary time and money on the 30 day Kitty Hawk race. Two local
pilots said they were coming, but had to drop out due to work demands. I
remember work, although it is becoming a distant memory. Then we would have
picked up a couple more if the 15 meter and standard nationals were held back
to back. I spoke to Charlie Light about this and he agrees (Charlie's on the
sight selection committee) Throw in the long drive for most and the start of
school and you get 12 instead of the 25 I figured would show.

Those who couldn't make it, missed ane hell of a great race. Nine days of great
soaring. A cut-off low just sat off the coast for the whole contest period and
gave us unstable air and 10 to 25 knots southwest wind every day. On most days
we chose between thermal, slope, wave and occasionally shear line lift. The
trick was to choose the best source of lift for each particular part of the
task. On the Crater Lake task, Bob Epp and I worked a wave to 15 thousand. We
thought we had it made until we checked the new wind, 50 knots of direct
headwind as we tried to go south again. The wave givith and it taketh away.

I thoroughly enjoyed the contest, even though I placed 8th out of the 12
contestants. That's about par for me, my soaring fortunes seem to have peeked
at the regional lavel. I was particularly happy with the performance of the
Genesis 2. I couldn't see a teaspoon full of difference between it and the
Discus 2 or the LS-8. I was able to win a day with my Genesis. I hate to admit
it, but that was my first day win in a nationals in something like 25 years
that I have been racing these glass toys.

In the past, Montague has been guilty of poor tasking that resulted in massive
land-outs. Charlie and Gary worked hard to prevent any reoccurrence of this. On
most days, Charlie could be heard working with his advisers to drop un-doable
tasks and come up with a workable plan. Montague has bid the 15 meter nationals
for 2005, come check it out, if we get the bid.
JJ Sinclair