The day stated off with overcast skies and the sound of rain on the roof. At the 10 am pilots meeting, the CD called for another meeting at noon since the forecast for the afternoon was for soarable weather.
We gridded at 1:15 ad waited, you could see the edge of te cold front to the west with Cu behind it. Once the front passed two sniffers were launched and they stuck, at 14:50 the launch started with a 2 hour turn area task with one cylinder 44 miles to the west. By the time the gate opened we were getting 2-3 kt climbs to 5000 AGL.
I started at 14:47 and ran a good cloudstreet for 31 miles until it ended, then I had to make a major deviation to the north to get to some better looking clouds. The wind was again in the 19 kt range and lift was about 2 kts making the run upwind to the turnpoint challenging. About 2 miles from the turnpoint 1:13 into the task, I decided to head home knowing I would be undertime.
With a 300 point lead over 2nd place going into the day, I needed to get home and not land out, so I did just that. Talking to some of the other pilots it sounds like we all did about the same distance, so It looks like I will preserve my lead - and that was the goal today!
Tomorrow looksl iek we could see some classic post-cold front weather.
