T o d d P a t t i s t writes:

I think most airplane pilots here will say no. When I fly
gliders, my average flight duration for some years was 5
hours, with some flights of 12 hours or more, and I always
had very sore calves after each flight. I used to call them
"rudder legs."

How did your calves get sore? When were you flexing them (seems like
they'd be used mostly to pivot the pedals for brakes, no?)?

And you must have been catherized before take-off if you could fly for
12 hours at a stretch.

A racing glider is designed with minimum drag in mind, which
means reducing the wetted area of the rudder. That means
reduced effectiveness. At the same time, the wings are very
long (more efficient - lower drag) and the glider is making
steep turns and rolling those big wings in and out of
thermals at low speeds. I would hit the rudder stops
regularly when trying to coordinate thermal turns, and
counteract adverse yaw. The rudder was being worked
constantly.

Did you use your entire leg to work the rudder, or did you have your
heels on the floor and work it just by moving your feet, or what?

Plus, when you were low over some farmers field while
working up in a thermal, you wanted to be perfect ...

Because ... ?

... and it
was easier to control the rudder effectively when you
applied a little bit of force on each pedal, and applied a
bit more on the side you needed. That counterforce
technique could get to be an unconscious habit.

You mean keeping both pedals under pressure, so that you had more
precise control of movement?

Maybe this is naïve, but: Would there be any advantage to rudder
pedals you could clip into, like bicycle pedals? Then you could pull
and push, which might work your legs more evenly and reduce fatigue
(?).

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