Task 5 The calm before the storm.

Task 5, Cirrus and cumulus 11am. The task was a quick back and forth between launch and several k's to the South, then a push far to the North. Massive winds were slowly evolving on launch as the pilots were trying to get free. Most everyone got off of launch but some were left there to suffer. The valley wind was blowing 180 degrees opposite and clouds were forming over the bigger mountains. The task was on with manuevers clinics happening all over the course line. Climbs to 14,000ft were found that were going up around 2000ft/min. Depending on your route through the sky you were either climbing like a rocket or going backwards and just trying to survive. Eventually, everyone had landed with many pilots still making goal and others doing emergency landings beforehand. All was safe and were eating bratwurst on the barbeque around 7pm when the major gust front blew-in around 60-70kts/hr on the ground. Luckily, no one was in the air. I think the task will be valid still even though the bad conditions, because lots of pilots flew to goal. Tommorrow is looking rainy so it might be time to head back. This place is awesome. We saw about every kind of meteorological condition happening in the big mountains with textbook lift, convergence, gust fronts, ripper thermals, long down valley xc's over razor sharp ridges, long task flying and camaraderie. Golden B.C. Rocks! More pics soon.
SM