A partner and I recently bought a Mini Nimbus, although not for competitions (I don't think, anyway, I'm pretty much a newbie and it's a first glider for me).

But I can echo what others say about thr trailer and ease of assembly. We got a decent Cobra trailer, which does need some work but not much, and every time I fly it I am grateful for the trailer.

When we first tried to assemble it we gave up after about three hours, deciding we'd made a big mistake. But a bit of persistence, very examination of the nevessary alignment, and careful development of a good checklist has me routinely assembling and disassembling it singlehandedly. Worth platinum, that.

And I'm growing to love the way it flies. Great climb (+8 flaps), decent legs, roomy cockpit, comfortable flying at higher speeds (-4 and -7 flaps, I just love them), and an awesome trailing-edge spoiler linked to flaps that drop into speed brake position that allow for very steep descents.

The only thing I don't like (read: hate) is the CG hook. I'm learning to deal with it (negative flaps on starting the TO roll, switching to 0 or +8 before lift off, quite necessary as my ho.e airport features most takeoffs with a quartering tailwind). It's already produced a ground loop on one TO and a PT3 when I yawed right to take out a slack line just as the tow plane turned left, causing the CG hook to back-release.

Now if I could only fly it half as well as it can be flown I would be in permanent heaven.

Van