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Old January 25th 19, 03:55 AM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
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Default SSA Competition Rules Committee Meeting Minutes Now Available

On Thursday, January 24, 2019 at 8:38:22 AM UTC-5, wrote:
Nationals are no more life risking than regional contests. The skill level is higher by a bit, the tasking has more challenge, and the duration longer, but the risk to pilot safety is not greater. What Ryzard asserted is not true.
UH


One hopes that is true ... my belief is that risks on course depend very strongly on the terrain/venue and the contest committee; wiser/warier pilots can pick their venues, but have no control over tasking.

Starts & weather strike me as the greatest risks; I won't pontificate as I'm not so experienced at contests.

Ryzard's sarcastic comment about handicapping

"Our US clubs are swarmed with D2 and V1 and LS6 and ASW28, this is why they are in US Club Class "

is bang on, but is not about the contest rules per se, nor about hazards. I don't know any American club with glider(s) that have handicaps much better than 1, let alone sending anybody with one to a contest. L-201s, Std. Cirrus, G-102 ... club gliders rarely get better than that in the USA. Lord help you if you try to fly a 1-26 in the sport class ... but there's 1-26 class.

I have some arguments with the handicapping scheme, but that's an argument for another day -- don't think there is any possibility of a fixed one-coefficient handicap that will be fair, and seemingly nobody wants to deal with anything else.

I do understand why the best pilots want to fly sailplanes at the top end of the handicap range in any handicap class -- it's to have any chance at all of dropping the leeches.

I learned a bunch of things from flying the Region 3 (really great contest BTW and very friendly place and people, big thanks to the folks at Finger Lakes who put it on) ... but one of them is "the Hank Nixon rule" ... do not follow the leader that the pack has been leeching over the high-ground to the last or second-to-last turnpoint ... from 500' below. You will end up landing out in difficult terrain.

How do I know this? I ended up doing several of these retrieves. Hank and his friends came along to help one of the worst of these. (Thanks!) rec.soaring doesn't allow photos, or I'd post one of these land-outs -- a super-experienced pilot pulled off a no-harm-done landing in a wretched field with about a 20° slope, taller-than-knee-deep alfalfa, difficult access .... and ticks.

Another one of these scrape-off-the-leeches retrieves rescued two guys out of the same badly-rutted soy field, and featured all of us casting about for about a 1/2 hour to find a tail-wheel broken off -- I found most of it. (for anyone reading this who doesn't know, tailwheels on most fiberglass sailplanes are designed to intentionally break off to prevent worse damage to the fuselage ... this is a nuisance, not a crisis)

I was flying the sports class, starting behind the club class, and didn't want to leech but there wasn't anybody obvious to leech if I'd wanted to. (Leeching Peter Scarpelli in his ASG-29 ... not!) I flew conservatively on my own and never landed out.

The Finger Lakes region has excellent landing sites generally but it does have ridges, many of which even have good landing sites on top (but not all) ... most top out at about 2500' but a few go over 3000' even 3500' ... we never had a day with cloud bases much over 4500' ... funny how every task had a late turn-point over the high-ground! Safe and fair, I completely agree. It's pilot judgement: if you are leeching and you are low, time to quit leeching, gain some altitude ... admit reality. A really safety-minded contest committee could arrange a designated "leeches land here" field though?

Transitions ... safety and handicaps are about transitions too.

If you've had the patience to get this far with me, my point is that most contests should be FUN! Handicapping is never going to be "fair:" just go out and fly and try to beat yourself. If you are really serious racer material, don't fly the handicapped classes ... and probably you would be irritated to have me in your contest, except I'll be the cannon-fodder that makes you look good.

I can probably adjust to FAI rules ... no biggie. The problem of why America's teams look like chumps in international competitions isn't one that I'm going to fix; I'll never be in anything like that league. But I do think it is a good thing for the USA to align with the world rules, just on general principles. And folks, we've got to stop the idea that we need kiddie-wheel rules because we are Americans. If there are problems with the FAI rules then we should work to get those changed, and I'd surely think that if those problems are real the rest of the world would see the point.