On May 29, 9:12*am, wrote:
On May 29, 10:05*am, rlovinggood wrote:



On May 29, 2:19*am, Andy wrote:

On May 28, 6:48*am, wrote:

Back at the 2006 Club Class Worlds in Vinon France we went on a 498km
assigned task, in thunderstorms, and I think I pushed my Libelle
around at @ 113kmh - and that only gave me 5th or 6th on the day.
Still - shows that "old" gliders can certainly go out on long,
assigned tasks like the "FAI" classes.

Tim EY

Impressive - Tim's example rightly takes the wind out of the argument
that the US needs a separate Club Class based on the belief that Club
Class gliders can't go out on "big boy" tasks.

9B

9B,

I disagree. *Those of us who support a Club Class in America aren't
concerned about the length of the task called. *Heck no. *What we want
is the ability to call Racing Tasks (also called Assigned Tasks)
instead of just Turn Area Tasks and Modified Assigned Tasks. *We also
want a group of gliders more closely matched in performance. *And, we
would like to get a handle on the assignment of handicaps. *Since many
other countries already fly Club Class, I think they are using an IGC
based system of assigning handicaps. *Is it any better than the Carl
Herald (sp?) system (and modified Carl Herald numbers) that we now
use? *I hope so. *And maybe we here in the US can start using the IGC
handicaps for future Club Class races.

I flew in the First United States Club Class Race in Cordele, Georgia
just a couple of weeks back and it was real fun to line up on the grid
and not see a bunch of ASW-27's, Duo Discii, Ventus V2's, Discus D2's,
JS1's, 304s', Diana's, etc in our class. *The weather cooperated one
day for a real assigned task to be called. *Hallelujah!
Unfortunately, the Cordele weather of legend didn't show up and the
three other days we flew, we had Turn Area Tasks. *But at least our
CD, Sam Giltner, kept the circles small which gave us more of a chance
to stay and race together rather than spreading us out over many
square miles that really big circles can do.

I'm not concerned about "big boy" tasks. *Of course, any of my friends
who might be tasked to come get me might have a bit more concern...

Sincerely,
Ray Lovinggood
Carrboro, North Carolina, USA

I'll second all that. *Having flown in the same contest, it was really
cool to share thermals all the way around the course.
At one point I think there were 6 gliders (out of 17) all in one
thermal out on course. *At the end we all ended up
in adjacent fields (since only about 5 made it around thanks to a big
cloud shadow shooting most of us down).

The contest ended up being much more competitive than sports class
contests I've flown. *Being that it was
the first in the US it took on something of a "national competition"
character, and it attracted pilots
from all across the country and Canada too. *Many mentioned 15+ hour
drives to get to the contest.

Sports class still has its place. *It might be a better venue for
someone starting out to have easier tasks
to fly. *If our assigned task had been called as a 3 turn MAT a larger
number of pilots may have made it back
after 1 or 2 turnpoints because that would have been less challenging,
but where's the point in that when
you're trying to call a strong challenge for everyone?

-- Matt

Mostly I just thought I'd provoke a discussion. I'm pretty sure it HAS
been a past argument in favor of Club Class that older gliders can't
keep up with the new equipment and so need a narrower handicap range
so we can call ASTs without a lot of landouts. A portion of that
argument now appears to lean in the opposite direction, that having
more landouts is a good thing. Certainly ASTs generally lead to more
landouts, but it's not so much due to range of handicaps - the big
variable in task speed is pilot skill/experience, not glider
performance (with the exception of something like a Twin Astir - XS/TF
you listening?).

The argument in favor of ASTs and landouts reflects a renewed
Darwinian fervor in the sport. The general trend in soaring is to try
to reduce the number of landouts as it is generally viewed as raising
the luck factor and reducing competition over the length of a contest.
The recent rule changes to increase distance points is indicative of
this viewpoint. Increasing landouts also has safety implications. I
think it stands to reason that contests with a lot more landouts would
drive down participation as "crewless" pilots (whose numbers have gone
up dramatically since the mid-90s) would race less frequently. To make
it work in the FAI classes ASTs tend to get called on days when the
conditions are predictable and the times on task tend to run lower
that the other task types as a way to ensure fewer landouts. I
personally like ASTs on occasion when the weather is good, but I also
feel like they are lesser tests of piloting skill because there is a
lot less decision-making involved because there is less opportunity to
read the weather and pick a course that takes best advantage of
conditions across the task area. Much as we all like the social
experience of seeing a competitor or two out on course, AST's also
tend to lead to more leeching, which reduces the test of individual
skill. The trend in the sport is to try to split the field up more not
bunch the gliders together.

Of course the Europeans tend to call longer tasks, perhaps more ASTs
too. They also have more landouts, but they either don't have or are
unconcerned the way we are about the effects on safety and
participation. It is a reasonable question whether we should call more
Euro-style tasks in the US and what that would mean for participation
and testing of pilot skill. Should we be testing for physical stamina
in a contest?

I agree with BB's assessment - we would be well advised to monitor the
trends. Cordele had good participation and a good outcome - despite
the weather. The fact that it drew from such great distances
underscores the passion of it's adherents, but also raises some
questions about the impact of expanding Club Class to Regionals
broadly. I continue to have serious concerns about the fragmentation
of contests (by having Sports AND Club Classes represented), or the
progressive exclusion of pilots who have Sports Class, but not Club
Class, gliders. My bigger concern is that we start hearing arguments
for restricting WGC Club Class team member selection to pilots who fly
in Club Class gliders. I for one would want to make sure that we draw
from the bigger pool of pilots to ensure that Club Class doesn't serve
a narrow agenda of reducing competition to win that team spot.

9B