Forget Dying; Is Soaring Dead?

Ka6 is just fine. Basically if it is wood and fabric, you can come.
Some of us love the smell of spruce and fir...

And if your trailer isnt up for the trip, just airline it over, we will
find a ship for you to fly! God knows there are plenty of qualifying
gliders around here that mostly just sit waiting for their weekly
saturday afternoon local flight

Graeme Cant wrote:
Tony wrote:

To fix this, I am organizing a contest. Only "crappy" gliders will be
allowed. Im thinking capping the L/D at something like 28. No
fiberglass, no water, no GPS or cambridge glide computer thingymabobs.
Pellet Varios are fine, Total Energy if you want to get high tech.
Basically you, your glider, a sectional and a task. We will do
triangles only, designed to make it back to the airport so that we can
tell lies and drink beer into the evening. First guy to make it back
is the first guy on the list to retrieve land outs, and so on. If its
windy, the only task will be to stay upwind of the airport. No score
will be kept, except the days winner will have to buy beer. So we are
looking at next spring/summer sometime, in Central Iowa. So far Im in
with my Cherokee, Matt Michael will probably compete with his Woodstock
(Which has done 400 km Hilton Cup Triangle in IOWA!) and a few others
from the upper midwest. Who else wants to come?

I do. But will you allow a Ka6? It was 30 odd when it was new forty
years and 3 coats of paint ago.

How far is Central Iowa from Bathurst New South Wales? Is the road OK
because the trailer's as old as the glider?

I wish I could be there!!! Go Tony!

GC

Orion Kingman wrote:
wrote:

Only 21 planes on the grid at storied Uvalde, TX for the U.S. Std.
Class Nationals, even with three non-U.S. guests. This was apparently
Uvalde's smallest contest of any kind, including regionals, and smaller
even than most U.S. regionals.

A "get your entries in while they're still available!" posting today
from the folks at New Castle, VA...6+ weeks after the preferential
deadline for what has been an oversubscribed contest and "must attend"
social event for as long as I can remember.

The only U.S. contest I know of where seeding still matters (or
preferential deadline, for that matter) is the spring kickoff in Perry,
SC, where pilots crazed from a long winter of inactivity still flock in
droves, apparently not having gotten the word that soaring, or at least
competitive soaring--whose adherents have traditionally been more
willing to expend the vast sums needed for the latest equipment--is
dead. OK, maybe Mifflin, PA, but with this renowned venue being more
recently notorious for uncertain weather, it's not impossible to
foresee a dropoff there, too.

True, entry fees are up a bit. And so (not uncoincidentally) are
gasoline prices. And our core competitive pilot base continues to age,
notwithstanding wins this year by "junior" masters Liz Schwenkler and
Chris Saunders. But is that enough to explain these two startling
events?

What's going on?

Chip Bearden
ASW 24 "JB"


A few numbers to consider:

In 2003 there were 111 US Pilots registered for the OLC, 250 in 2005,
550 in 2005, and 660 this year.

On the 2003 Pilot ranking list there were 551 ranked pilots, 636 ranked
in 2004, 636 ranked in 2005, and 590 ranked in 2006. If a pilot
doesn't fly a contest for three years they are droped off of the list.

So the question presents its self: is soaring on the decline, or is it
competitive soaring? From the brief look that I took, its appears that
it is competitive soaring that is suffering. So how do we as a comunity
correct this trend? What is the UK comunity doing correctly to have
such high atendence numbers? Clearly the distance is a significant
issue; for a west-coaster to drive to Mifflin, or for a an east-coaster
to drive to Montague, can mean the difference in competing in the
contest.

This dialouge never has a magic cure, but it is good to keep it alive,
becuase it does keep us thinking about the future of our sport.

Orion Kingman
DV8

I wonder if some who might otherwise attend a contest are getting their
jollies by posting their flights to the OLC??

Paul
ZZ

Jack wrote:

I think the 1-26 Association ought to open itself up to _all_ gliders
under approx. 1/25 performance -- 2-33's, your Cherokee II, everything.
Jack
#588

Jack,

I'd much rather see the PW-5's open up their contest to our brother
antique flyers, and offer to fly the PW-5's around the course with the
spoilers half open. Or make all the plastic racers promise to fly with
their gear down all day...

I like the idea of brotherhood, but the 1-26 Association has THAT name
for a reason.

And FWIW, the 1-26 Championships and "local" contests have some
difficulty with participation, in many cases for similar reasons.

My excuses are work, family, time, distance and skill (lack thereof)
for not participating in the contests. Well I guess I left out the
element that most folks are griping about on this thread: money. That
too. I can't get the scheduled time off, and it's difficult getting
the wife's company to allow her to schedule the time off.

Kudos to Tony...I'd have an easier time getting there than Graeme, but
Iowa is still a big set of vacation days to trailer to for me...so I'll
be there in spirit (especiall the beer part).

-Pete
#309

Chip I think you meant to ask "Is Contest flying dead " .

Not if some effort is put into promoting contests and making them
interesting, inexpensive and especially for the younger folks new to
contest flying, easy to participate in .

At our club, Central Indiana Soaring we have established a "Club
Contest" that can take place every x/c flying day of the year at our
field . So far this season we have had 6 contest days and 10 pilots
have participated ( out of a total club membership of around 65 ) .
There is no cost to members, there are 2 classes ( Advanced and
Beginners ) and the rules are simple . The idea was not entirely ours ,
in fact we copied a lot of the rules from the Chicago Glider Club's
successful contest system. You do need a "sparkplug" type to do the
scoring and e-mail out the results after each contest day - We have DT
who does a great job there .

The contest makes for a lot of extra enjoyment and discussion between
the members, certainly improves x/c flying skills and I firmly believe
will lead to more participation at Regional contests in the future.

To attract more pilots to Regional and National contests they need to
be motivated to spend the time and money to do that successfully -
Local Club contests that become interesting to new pilots stimulate
that motivation.

My 2 cents worth .

Ron (ZA).

P. Corbett wrote:
Orion Kingman wrote:

I wonder if some who might otherwise attend a contest are getting their
jollies by posting their flights to the OLC??

For me - no. Contest flying (lets call it "racing") and the OLC are such
different experiences, one can not subsitute for the other. In the air,
racing with other gliders, especially on assigned tasks, is quite
different from flying by myself. There is also the ground side, with all
the competitors gathered in one place at the same time for the race,
flying the same tasks, so you have a shared experience that you don't
get in the OLC.

While the competition aspects of the OLC are interesting, it's not
exciting like a race, at least for me; interesting, but not exciting. I
really like to see what others are doing and how differet areas of the
country and the world work for soaring pilots, so I do follow the postings.

I don't seriously compete in the OLC, but I do post all my flights.
Serious competition would involve carefully planning a course for each
day to best fit the OLC task rules, along the lines of Badge and record
tasking. While I enjoy these kinds of flights, the experience is still
very different than a race, and I don't plan my flights to optimize my
OLC score.

So, perhaps someone that's never raced a sailplane might think the OLC
was a substitute for racing, but I don't, and I'm guessing most pilots
that have raced wouldn't, either.

--
Change "netto" to "net" to email me directly

Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA

www.motorglider.org - Download "A Guide to Self-launching Sailplane
Operation"

Schreder sailplane reunion......?

This may be a bit of the subject; however, it has been the subject of a
thread in the Yahoo hp-gliders news group.
(http://groups.yahoo.com/group/hp-gliders). The hp-gliders group consists
of 300+ HP/RS sailplane builder/owners/enthusiasts.

Recently the owner of a HP-14T took his bird to Marfa, TX and had some great
flights. The presence of HP-14 precipitated Burt Compton's memories of
helping is father build a HP-11 (which is now owned by a club in Canada.)
Burt suggested the possibilities of holding a regatta of Schreder designed
sailplanes and suggested Marfa as the location.

This proposal had drawn a lot of interest. The choice of location has been
debated. Marfa is a long way for many. Living in Idaho it is only(?) 1400+
miles. However, for our friends from Eastern Canada, it is really a loooong
trip!

Many feel to get a good representation of the Schreder community will
require a couple of years lead time to schedule vacations, etc. (back to
the old time/money problem) One of the first thoughts that came across my
mind was; "wouldn't it be great to schedule this in conjunction with the SSA
convention." There are so many of you who have raced these birds in their
hay-day and could add so much to such a gathering. However, the thought of
dragging my HP-14 in its' trailer across the Rockies in the late
winter/early spring is not a pleasant thought.

If we are going to have such a gathering it will included a little
handicapped competition, technical forums, and stories from the past and
present.

There seems to be a lot of interest in HP/RS series and I am continually
amazed to see the superb quality of workmanship of birds that were once
raced and have been in storage for years. Many of these appear on the
market for below $10,000.

When I purchased my first HP there was very little information available on
the web. At the time I was working at Albertson College of Idaho and they
allowed me a little space on their website for personal use. Angie Schreder
sent me a packet of information that became the foundation of the site.
When the College's allotted space was filled everything was moved to
http://www.soaridaho.com/Schreder. Currently the site has archived almost
100 megs of HP/RS related information.

The traffic on the website and hp-gliders news group indicates that Soaring
is not dead. Could Schreder designs become another 1-26 type organization?
Dick sold over 700 kits.

Wayne
HP-14 N990 "6F"
http://www.soaridaho.com/photogallery/Mackay_2006

Tony wrote:

Some of us love the smell of spruce and fir...


I was thinking of Sprucing up the cockpit of the Woodstock with some
Fur. Will that help with that stale urine and powerbar smell?

MM

wrote:
Tony wrote:
Some of us love the smell of spruce and fir...

I was thinking of Sprucing up the cockpit of the Woodstock with some
Fur. Will that help with that stale urine and powerbar smell?

I'd suggest a raccoon hat. Adds fur, keeps the sun off, goes well with
the spruce theme and could be used if the relief system blocks...

GC



MM

Eric Greenwell wrote:
P. Corbett wrote:
Orion Kingman wrote:

I wonder if some who might otherwise attend a contest are getting their
jollies by posting their flights to the OLC??

For me - no. Contest flying (lets call it "racing") and the OLC are such
different experiences, one can not subsitute for the other. In the air,
racing with other gliders, especially on assigned tasks, is quite
different from flying by myself. There is also the ground side, with all
the competitors gathered in one place at the same time for the race,
flying the same tasks, so you have a shared experience that you don't
get in the OLC.

While the competition aspects of the OLC are interesting, it's not
exciting like a race, at least for me; interesting, but not exciting. I
really like to see what others are doing and how differet areas of the
country and the world work for soaring pilots, so I do follow the postings.

I don't seriously compete in the OLC, but I do post all my flights.
Serious competition would involve carefully planning a course for each
day to best fit the OLC task rules, along the lines of Badge and record
tasking. While I enjoy these kinds of flights, the experience is still
very different than a race, and I don't plan my flights to optimize my
OLC score.

So, perhaps someone that's never raced a sailplane might think the OLC
was a substitute for racing, but I don't, and I'm guessing most pilots
that have raced wouldn't, either.

--
Change "netto" to "net" to email me directly

Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA

www.motorglider.org - Download "A Guide to Self-launching Sailplane
Operation"

this year the 1-26 Assoc and World Class will be having their
Championships in Chilhowee Tenn the Last of April and first week in May
running seperate contests at the same site while combining many assets.