Does Logan really "start later" in the year than Nephi for good soaring?

[Bret Hess]

A friend is thinking about coming to Utah next year to fly, and I thought about what I could tell him about how the different airports work in the different months. 

In our online seminars on soaring at our different airports the comment was made that Logan starts later than Nephi, but was better later in the summer because it avoided some of the monsoon thunderstorms that closed down Nephi. 

I decided to look at our archive of flights posted by club members to compare the different airports at different weeks in year, from 2007 to 2021.  (https://groups.google.com/g/utsoar-tracks; a spreadsheet is available if anyone wants it).

Here are three plots that seem to suggest that, where we have enough flights to get reasonable data (May-Sept),  Logan and Nephi's flight distances don't really differ from each other ...no late onset for Logan or Morgan and no monsoon decrease for Nephi (You have to smooth over the noisy plots). Does Logan's ridge play a big role here making up for maybe thermals starting later?  

First the number of flights per week:  A huge peak in Nephi during the contest/OLC  time (and dips right before and several weeks after)

Next the average flight distance vs week.   There is no early start for Nephi, and no significant drop in August (monsoon season).

And finally the record or maximum flight distance vs week. Again, Logan and Nephi track pretty much the same over the year.