Another gliding story. My first gliding competition day 5 and we had flown tasks everyday so I was tired before I took off. Hot with a 4000ft cloudbase and a 300k task. Half an hour in I realised that my water bottle had slipped out of reach. Five hours later I was 7 miles from home and 2500ft so I set off thinking I was home easily. 10 minutes later things were not looking so good i had lost a lot of height without making much progress and was over woodland. Eventually I "arrived" in a crop field 2 short of the airfield. collapsed the undercarriage and put a hole in the wing.
My mistakes. Dehydration. I didnt take enough water with me or make sure it was accessible. Wind direction. When we took off the wing was about 5knts nw. coming back the sea breeze had come in and was about 12knts northerly, right on the nose. I was tired and dehydrated enough not to realise the the situation was deteriorating. It was a competition and there was an element of get-home-itus. My final mistake was going to the wrong farmer to apologize for landing in his field. This resulted in being being required to report to the CFI at the briefing the next day and cost me two bottles of gin