One alternative would be to expand Club Class beyond the FAI definition to include motorgliders, longer wingspans and a wider range of handicaps. Then we could retire Sports Class because it would be totally redundant.

Some people seem to not like keeping Club Class close to the FAI definition. Others seem to want to keep Club Class pure to the FAI definition (no recent generation Standard Class ships, for example). How far afield should we go in expanding Club?

Discuss.

Andy Blackburn
9B

I fly a Glasflügel 401 Kestrel (which has 17m wings). It was "grandfathered" into club class last year, after it was neglected to be removed from the list when the club class was restricted to a span of 15m.

In my opinion, the purpose of the club class is to take old, inexpensive, and accessible gliders and make them competitive in a racing class. The club class should stay true to this spirit.

The Kestrel fits in the [American] club class handicap range. So does the Open Cirrus. My Kestrel might be worth $15k, and there are numerous Open Cirri listed for under $10k. Despite this, neither of these gliders can compete. Apparently an extra two meters of wing is a bigger advantage than another 25 years of airfoil/structural design evolution found on the Discus 2 or ASW-28.

I can immediately think of two US clubs that own Open Cirri, but these clubs can't send these gliders to compete in the club class nationals. I know of zero US clubs that own an ASW-28 or a Discus 2.

As I see it, we should either adopt the FAI club class definition and conform to the rest of the world, or expand our definition to be more inclusive. I'm not sure where span/motor restrictions came from. These seem like arbitrary and unnecessary limitations, particularly because the spirit of the club class has already been lost when gliders designed in 1967 that cost $10k are racing against gliders designed in 1997 that cost $70k.

To be clear, I'm fine with the new stuff remaining in the class. However, given that the list is already completely whack, there is *no* basis to limit the rest of us from having fun, too.

Rant over. I'm extremely grateful to UH for letting me borrow his ASW-24 to compete this year. But it feels wrong to be going to the club class nationals with something 20 years newer and 2-3 times more expensive than the poor Kestrel who gets left behind.