IGC 13.5m class discussion

On Jan 28, 8:04*am, Andy wrote:
On Jan 27, 9:39*pm, RRK wrote:



On Jan 26, 4:15*pm, Tim Taylor wrote:

On Jan 26, 11:25*am, T8 wrote:

A new thread, for Rick and John (and me and anyone else):

On Jan 26, 8:56 am, John Cochrane
wrote:

Rick asked about the insane (my opinion) 13.5 meter class, including
the momentous issue of water ballast.

People will race anything they can. *I support that.

I don't support supporting more than about 3 classes at the
international level though. *It's absurdly expensive and just dilutes
the intensity and prestige of the thing. *My own personal view is that
any sort of handicap racing is a waste of time at the international
level. *No handicapping system is truly fair and at that level of
competition arguments of "low cost" and accessibility really don't
wash. *So I'd toss all the handicapped comps. *Oh, and I'd prohibit
motor gliders... or at least restrict them to one of those three
classes. *Have I offended everyone yet?

My three: open (pure glider), 18m (motor permitted), 15m (pure
glider). *Feel free to explain to me why this would not be sufficient.

So: you guys want to race lawn darts or handicapped club class or 2-
seaters, have a ball. *But I object strenuously to sanctioning so many
classes for international comps.

I realize these comments fall outside the current igc agenda. *What
the igc should realize is that their willful deafness on this issue of
class proliferation hasn't caused general acceptance.

-Evan Ludeman */ T8

Evan,

I mostly agree with you, with slightly different classes that should
be supported by the US.

First the US should refuse to join the IGC in the “we have never met a
class we won’t approve” syndrome. *The US should NOT recognize the
13.5 meter class and should not support it at all. *We should also
ignore the new 20 meter class as it does not bring anything new to the
table that is not already represented in the current open class.

From just a numbers standpoint the US should support 15M, 18M and Club
class in the future. *Why these three:

15M and Standard class are essentially one class in performance and
price. *There is no reason to support two classes here and the
representation at the last few Standard Class Nationals says this is a
dying breed. *The 15M continues to be the strongest and best
represented class in the US.

The open class should be allowed to die or at least no longer be
support by US funds because there are too few pilots flying in the
class to make it viable and the competition level does not provide
“World Class” pilots to represent the US. *The era of pushing the
boundaries of soaring by making bigger gliders is mostly over. *The
average pilot is not going to fly a 30M glider and the places you can
safely fly one is limited. *The performance difference over a good 15
to 20M glider is minimal.

The 18M class is here to stay, but could be lumped with the 20M and
called one class. *It is the ideal class for Motorgliders that have
too high a wingloading at 15M.

The Club Class has the potential to be a very strong class if the US
is to embrace it like the rest of the World. *It is the one class that
allows pilots on an average income to race on a fairly even field.
The US needs to start scoring the Club Class as a separate group in
the Sports Class Nationals and to call speed tasks for the pilots
rather than just TAT’s.

If the US made these changes we might be able to focus the limited
resources to truly support the US Team and the competition level would
increase the quality of the pilots representing the US in the World
Championships.

15m, 18m & Club Class in Worlds and
15m, 18m, L/D Up to 1/43 *Sports *in USA
please
Pw-5 pilot

Maybe everyone is missing the point. *Isn't the vote on whether to
allow disposable ballast in an already existing 13.5m class?

http://www.fai.org/gliding/system/fi...finition_13_5m...

Andy

Yes, but... There is the following related item on the IGC agenda:

13. Strategy for the future management of FAI sanctioned competitions
(Eric Mozer/Brian Spreckley/Dick Bradley)

From what I understand the intention actually is to have an open
discussion on the report that will be provided. At least a couple of
us have been suggesting to look at possibly having an agenda item for
further important dicussion topics that might be of interest for many
of us, it is a work in progress to see if we'll be adding additional
item(s) for discussion.

I have been doing a bit of homework as part of this process and wanted
to know some hard facts. Here some interesting statistics I came up
with after some research that might give some food for thought:

WGC 2010 Prievidza
Total: 27 countries, 106 participants
Club: 25 countries, 47 participants
Standard: 23 countries, 46 participants
World: 7 countries, 13 participants
Average team size (pilots): 3.9

WGC 2010 Szeged
Total: 33 countries, 143 participants
15m: 28 countries, 49 participants
18m: 30 countries, 51 participants
Open: 25 countries, 43 participants
Average team size (pilots): 4.3

WGCs 2010 Combined
Total: 34 countries, 249 participants
Average team size (pilots): 7.3

7 countries fielded teams in all WGC 2010 classes
16 countries fielded teams in all WGC 2010 classes ignoring World
Class
0 classes had participation from all WGC 2010 participating countries

~39 countries are with 2010 scores in the OLC

58 countries are represented in the IGC
98 countries are affiliated one way or another with the FAI
12+ FAI countries with gliding activity are not represented in the IGC
2+ FAI countries not represented in the IGC are interested or in the
process of starting up gliding activity
3+ non-FAI countries have gliding activity

~75 countries should be of interest to the IGC

58.6% equal to 34 out of 58 IGC countries participated in the WGCs
2010
~46.6% equal to 34 out of 73 countries with known gliding activity
participated in the WGCs 2010
34.7% equal to 34 out of 98 FAI countries participated in the WGCs
2010

~3.4% equal to ~2 of 58 IGC countries have indivdual National Gliding
Championships in all FAI classes
~17.2% equal to ~10 of 58 IGC countries have individual National
Gliding Championships in all FAI classes except World Class

This means that 82.8% equal to 48 out of 58 IGC countries are not
capable of fielding individual National Gliding Championships in all
FAI classes and are combining classes likely using in almost all cases
handicap systems, many of them homebrewn. The US might soon join this
group due to the increasing challenge of holding national
championships with sufficient participation in all classes... As a
tidbit, e.g. in Argentina (a much smaller gliding community than the
US) the rules require 15 participating pilots in a class to have a
valid national championship, the last one for World Class had to be
canceled due to not having sufficient pilots. The last US Standard &
Open Nationals had 10 and 8 scoring US pilots...

2 continents have FAI Continental Championships
1 continent has FAI Continental Championships with all FAI classes
1 continent has FAI Continental Championships using two handicapped
classes via FAI waiver

South America started having continental championships in 2008, the
first continent outside Europe to do so. Because of the equipment
available the South American continental championships are currently
flown in two handicapped classes, the two held until now using the
homebrewn Argentinian handicap system with an FAI waiver from what I
know (both were held in Argentina)...

Markus Graeber
Aeroclub de Colombia/Albuquerque Soaring Club
IGC Delegate Colombia

On Jan 28, 9:36*am, Markus Graeber wrote:
...
~3.4% equal to ~2 of 58 IGC countries have indivdual National Gliding
Championships in all FAI classes
~17.2% equal to ~10 of 58 IGC countries have individual National
Gliding Championships in all FAI classes except World Class

This means that 82.8% equal to 48 out of 58 IGC countries are not
capable of fielding individual National Gliding Championships in all
FAI classes and are combining classes likely using in almost all cases
handicap systems, many of them homebrewn.

The 82.8% is ignoring the World Class which is pretty much history
anyway, if you include World Class it is a whopping 96.6%. Now if you
add the 13.5m class as a replacement class for World Class you
probably end up somewhere inbetween those 2 numbers assuming it will
be at least a bit more popular than the World Class. All these numbers
are not yet including the new 20m class that is being introduced on
the World Champoinship level...

Markus

Maybe everyone is missing the point. *Isn't the vote on whether to
allow disposable ballast in an already existing 13.5m class?

http://www.fai.org/gliding/system/fi...finition_13_5m...

Andy

Yes, but when they ask, "should we put roses or tulips on the coffin?"
it's certainly worth asking, "well, ok, tulips, but do you really have
to shoot the patient?"

John Cochrane