Super Race

Canadian Terrorist

www.abvl.com.br

One final day of testflying and tuning before the 2-day State of Rio Championship, and conditions were perfect. The launch, Pico do Gavião (Hawk Peak), is the nicest launch in Brazil.

Speaking of hawks, one attacked me here. The weird thing was that it wasn't focused on my wing, but me! It kept trying to get around the wires, with its talons drawn. I shook my wing around and got the hell outta there.

The comp is called Super Race... don't ask me, I guess here that sounds cool.

Anyways, the interesting thing is that this comp uses an unusual scoring system that rewards the fast guys even more than GAP and is purely finish-order based. About 25% more points for the winner over second place for the day, regardless of time separation.

We only flew the first day, in unstable conditions that threatened to go nuclear. A 65km closed circuit with a 15-20km/h wind. The first bit was slow and trying to be too smart on the route choice, I was dropped by the lead gaggle. So, it was recovery time for the rest of the task.

The second half of the task was chosen well to take us back and forth along a convergence line, so the speeds were blistering. Came in above the lead gaggle at the second to last thermal, with a big smile on my face! It all came down to the final glide over the low hills. Final glide numbers weren't so useful because you had to clear the small mountains before reaching goal.

Moyes took the day, with Michel Louzada (Litespeed S4) being the most ballsy with the final glide. I came in third, a minute behind Michel, and 7s behind Max. Soon after, a gaggle came in together, amongst them the Niemeyer brothers on their Combats. Guga and Dustin came in later. Dustin used more aggressive numbers on final, expecting the tailwind would lift him over the last bumps as the he reached the upslopes... no dice. He was stuck in there with nasty landing options until he could pull himself up 50m.

We all hit the clubs that night. Heaps of fun, with a mix of eletrônica, MPB, and forró music. Someone dropped a pepper spray bomb... imagine 500 people with red eyes, tearing, coughing, and struggling to get out. But 30min later we were all back in there.

The forecast for the Brazilian Nationals is good.