wrote in message
oups.com...
I'm a new student learning with a DA-20. Got most things mastered
except for the landings...most important, no? haha
Seems that most of my landings and I have only tried 9 times thus far
are not very well executed. My CFI sez that I am doing two things
wrong:
1) I am flaring too late.
2) When I flair, I am not quick enough on the stick.

First, this is a classic problem for students. Second, you will have a lot
of success posting this in rec.aviation.student.

Third, this thread does come up here as well. One of my favorite
suggestions, one that is mentioned often and which helped me when I was
trying to learn to land:

With your instructor, practice NOT landing. Make all of the usual noise
beforehand, up to and including the final approach and flare. But do NOT
touch down. Fly the length of the runway as close to the runway without
touching the runway.

This exercise gives you a lot of time to take in what it actually looks like
to be in a landing attitude just above the runway. After you've done it
enough (usually a half-dozen times would suffice, but each person is
different of course), you'll have a much better feel for when and how to
execute the flare

Try to remember that the flare is not just a rote movement of the elevator.
There's an actual goal in mind: to reduce your descent rate to near zero,
just at the moment when you arrive at the runway. Adjust your elevator
movements appropriately; pause when it seems you may be slowing your descent
rate too quickly, speed up a little if it seems you're arriving too soon.
Don't try to push on the elevator during landing...this almost never works
out, and simply not adding more back-pressure is generally sufficient.

Your instructor seems to be commenting on the rote elements, and for the
initial stages of learning this may be appropriate. But long term, you'll
be better served when you can generalize the rote movements of the elevator
control to getting the airplane where you need it to be.

Of course, you may also benefit from following along with your instructor a
few times. Let HIM do the landing, while you just feel where the stick is
during the various points of the flare and landing.

Good luck. Remember, almost every student pilot goes through this. And
frankly, if you've only tried a landing 9 times, you've probably got a lot
more to try before you get it right. As far as "landing this thing
perfectly" goes...forget about that. The perfect landings are granted to
you as a boon from the aviation gods, when you least expect it. What you
want are the "acceptable landings", where everyone walks away with their
tailbones intact.

Pete