John,

I respect your concerns. I really, really do.

But leveraging this rule against a couple yahoo's that might get killed via a midair collision while cloud-flying in an SSA sanctioned contest VS. the vast majority of glider pilots which might honestly benefit from this instrumentation if they accidentally needed to maintain straight and level flight in a cloud one day seems foolish at best. I again sight Kemptons experience. I ask you why do these instruments exists? Why do so many glider pilots use them? To Cheat?

It is illegal to be in the clouds in a glider, PERIOD. No pilot, contest or not, should be in a cloud (technically within 500 ft. of base) ever. Should the rules committee start encouraging protests when pilots witness other pilots within 500 ft. of cloud base? I have a great video camera...and while i am not the best pilot in the world I could leech these illegal cheaters really, really well ;-). Video evidence is stunning. Do we really want to go here?

Consider this... Does the FAA mandate removal of the the Artificial Horizon & turn and bank instruments from power aircraft when a non instrument rated pilot flies the aircraft? Would it be wise (for the same reasons you sight) to remove the gyro based instrumentation every time a non instrument rated pilot gets into the cockpit. Would this be an equally ironclad deterrent which ensures that non instrument rated pilots never get into a IMC? Hmmm?

Doesn't the occasional private pilot or even student accidentally fly into IMC accidentally? Is this how the FAA deals with this problem? Has a private pilot ever saved themselves after inadvertently entering IMC?

Honest pilots make mistakes. The dishonest illegal pilots who goes into the clouds intentionally are not a concern of this discussion. They are on their own. Just as a pilot who flies inverted thru the open hangar should not be a concern of our contest rules committee. Those acts are completely illegal and outside of the area with which we can control.

So lets PLEASE stop worrying about 2 idiots who might cheat and the honest guy who might die in a potentially preventable accident.