On Oct 9, 9:23*pm, "noel.wade" wrote:
All -

Does anyone know of any good books or articles on the nuts-and-
bolts */ common-strategies of how to fly the various competition task
types?

I'm still waiting on my copy of Winning II, but Reichmann and
Brigliadori don't really touch on these and the competition rules only
define what the tasks ARE, not how to approach flying them...

I haven't yet been able to find any good reading material (other than
the SRA 2005 Comp Guide) on how to approach the different task types -
anyone have any recommendations?

BTW, I've read some of the different rules documents, and it may be
that I don't fully understand the scoring system... the big question-
marks in my mind relate to speed points vs. distance points, and their
trade-offs. *For example: when is it worthwhile to push for extra
distance, even if it might hurt the average speed you have going (so
far) during a task?

Thanks, take care,

--Noel

Many good points made here. Some I agree with, some not. But the
bottom line still is to get out on course and learn by watching. One
good way to do this without actually entering a contest is to free fly
during a contest and just follow the crowd. I was able to be a
sniffer at a National Sports Contest some years back and it was the
best thing I ever did. It got to the point that I could( I thought
anyway) almost tell what pilot was thinking by watching him fly.
Don't worry about "leeching". How else are you supposed to learn?
The good pilots don't care anyway. The point is that these
discussions are fine for the winter and a good place to start, but I
promise that the cliche' is true. You will learn more in one day in
a good race than in all this discussion. And most of it you won't even
know you learned. The best stuff can't be put into words. Not to say
the discussion isn't necessary, but it's my belief that things can be
over analysed. I once read a article by a senior instructor at the
Top Gun school that always stuck with me. His opinion was that the
best fighter pilots were not the officers that were the engineering
students, constantly analysing information. The very best were the
liberal arts majors, who were much more intuitive. True or not, I
have no idea, but an interesting proposition! The sponge analogy is
very apt. TM