It's a real pleasure to have a good tuggie up front, usually a glider pilot
with some hours to his name. He'll know right away just how good you are and
will crank the tug around into a thermal if a good one presents itself.

This season I had 3 aerotows tows where I released at or just below 1000'
AGL, one of which was at no more than about 500' AGL. During a right hand
turnout from the initial liftoff in Spain we flew into a real stonker. The
tug climbed high as it flew into the core and I simply could not catch him.
I held on just long enough for the vario to confirm that it was 'off the
clock' pulled the plug and left the tug to complete a right hand circuit and
land. I got charged a cable break price for that one, it probably lasted
only about 1min 30 secs start to off tow.

Ian

"Bill Daniels" wrote in message
news:1Bg7d.150967$MQ5.46505@attbi_s52...
I can only speak for the USA but here there is a minority with the idea
that
gliding exists solely to support tow planes. The rag and tube taildragger
tug drivers want glider pilots to support their hobby by falling out of
the
sky ASAP so they can fly another tow and log another takeoff and landing.
This idea goes hand in hand with the preference for Schweizer 2-33
trainers.

XC takes a glider away for the day with only one tow - no fun in that for
the tug drivers. Really good XC pilots release at less than 1500 feet AGL
which is even worse. No XC means more tows.

Bill Daniels

"OscarCVox" wrote in message
...
I am amazed that some clubs dont actively encourage XC! In our club
virtually
everybody flies XC as soon as they are qualified to do so. OK some
people
only do their 50km and never venture out of gliding range ever again.
The single seater club aircraft fly cross country on every possible
occasion
and this year we have had 4 entered in regional competitions, 3 in
national
competitions and one competing in the European Championships.
Note I said that these are club aircraft not private.
We do get occasional damage from field landings (stone chips etc) but
this
is
small price to pay.
Everyone who is flying XC on a particular day either arranges their own
retrieves or puts their name on the board for a mutual retrieve.
Nigel