On Thursday, March 7, 2013 11:08:41 AM UTC-6, kirk.stant wrote:
John, I appreciate your concern with making finishes safer by eliminating "coffin corners" (MC 0 at 300'), but to me you are trying to eliminate the pilot from the equation a bit too much. Fine for Sports Class beginners, perhaps, but to me this is part of racing - accurately flown final glides, or landing out to avoid damage (can't win with a broken glider).



Just because you can finish at 50' with a line, doesn't make it smart - since now you only get distance points for a rolling finish, if you are on that MC0 and barely making it, you still have no incentive to push it. If you cant cross the line and fly a normal pattern (either cross at 500' and blend into traffic, or if alone, push down and cross at Vne and pull up - yes, because it's fun and gives all those working or watching on the ground something to see), the decision process is still there. Crossing the line at 50ft and 60 knots get you nothing but distance points and a warning from the CD for dangerous flying!



The point is, if the finish is "cross the runway then fly a safe pattern", then what I have to manage is getting across the runway high and/or fast enough for the existing conditions for a safe pattern and landing.



You don't like it. Fine. I do, but I'm not making the rules, so I'll finish whatever way is legal and safe.



See you at the races!



Cheers,



Kirk

66

Kirk: Though in fact the numbers show many crashes involving 50 feet, 50 knots, and no ideas, I don't actually push this issue, because I do think adequate pilot education can solve it. OK, I think I'm smart enough to do a rolling finish in this situation.

IT'S NOT ABOUT THE FINISH. IT'S NOT ABOUT PEOPLE'S ABILITY TO FLY PATTERNS. It's about the marginal final glide that the low finish sets up. We give 1000 points on one side of a barbed wire fence and 600 points on the other side of that fence.

Here, all of us really are in a quandary. If you want to be competitive, you have to be prepared to end up at 50 knots 50 feet over the fence, and to make last-minute landouts from a straight in 53 knot 45+1:1 glide, ducking into fields from 300 feet or less when it does not work out. The numbers bear out that this is extraordinarily difficult, for pilots well past "sports class beginners." These crashes happen at nationals and worlds too.

Beginners are not the problem. Sports class beginners land out long before they get to the coffin corner. The problem is you and me, experienced pilots who have read all the great stories about pulling up to pop over the last tree line, and who know this is a neccessary part of a competitive pilots' toolkit if the rules allow it. Historically, many pilots like you and me have mishandled this situation.

Maybe you feel you have the skills to do it. I know I don't, even though I've studied this intensively (!), and I carefully scope all the fields near the airport. The end of a long contest flight with marginal final glide is a time that I know I am bad at split second risk my life or lose this contest decisions.

My view is simple: this is the sort of thing that if we all studied it, we would volunteer for. I agree not to beat you by flying in the clouds if you agree not to beat me by fly in the clouds. We'll agree to remove the artificial horizons so we know we're keeping the deal. I agree not beat you by landing out, racing back at 90 mph, reassemble and start again, if you agree not to beat me the same way. We'll agree to abide by that rule.

And, I agree not to beat you by popping over the fence at 10 feet after a harrowing glide over the quarry, if you agree not to beat me the same way.

The rules are, really, just a gentleman's agreement between pilots of this sort. And our rules process in the end does not keep things that the majority of pilots don't end up feeling this way about. If, having tried it both ways, the majority of pilots really wants to go back to the old days, then so it shall be.

Now, do you really want to do it? Make no mistake about it, the top 10 at nationals will indeed push the glide to the last field before the airport, will glide over fences at 10 feet, and those not willing to do it will lose. Do you really want to go back to making that a central part of the skills we measure, and are you willing to clean up the occasional mess that results?

John Cochrane