Bill Feldbaumer wrote:

the Time Distance Task (TDT) has been approved by the
International Gliding Commission for use in competitions.

In fact there is no more TDT in IGC rules (see version 2002 of Annex A)
- it's now called "Distance task" - but there *is* in the Annex A, of
course, the possibility to choose the kilometer scoring system instead
of 1000 pts.


Joerg Stieber wrote:

There is one disadvantage:

* For an optimized flight, the pilot has to have converted as much
energy as possible into distance at time-out. This leads to pilots
timing out low in the vicinity of the contest site (to take advantage
of the 10% home bonus) and wobbling with minimal energy over the
fence. (Karl Striedeck was quick to point this out). We are looking at
solutions, i.e. reduction of the home bonus to 5% for arrivals under
500 ft, timing-out as soon a pilots descend below 1000 ft agl (or an
equivalent pre-defined MSL altitude) before finishing.

In the Annex A there is already a possibility to avoid such a problem,
by setting a minimum "finish" MSL altitude (minimum altitude at time-out
- if a pilot happen to be lower than this altitude, only his last fix
above it counts).

And there is also a option to give a malus (20% of distance) to pilots
who don't fly back home after the time-out - this is another incentive
not to "finish" too low at time-out.

I'm happy to see that such a system has been used with success in
nationals. I see two main advantages to the distance scoring, by respect
to the 1000 points system :

- it gives more importance to longer tasks, which are usually with the
best weather, and less importance to the shorter, in the poor weather,
where luck is more important

- it enhances the fact that gliders flew long distances (for the public
or media)

--
Denis
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