July 2004

From the President

By Kathy Taylor

We had a fruitful discussion of operations procedures during the June 30 meeting. We noted that if the Operations Log is not filled out properly, the club can lose money. In the future, any flight that does not have an altitude filled in will be charged for a 3,000 foot tow and any flight in a club ship with no flight duration will be charged for 1.5 hours flying time. So you can see how important it is to check the ops logs after you land to ensure that the correct information has been entered.

Our towplane had been scheduled to go to Hobbs to help with contest tows, but Jim Wier has arranged to fly the National Soaring Foundation airplane instead.

The next club meeting will be Wednesday, July 28, but not at the SkyBox Bar. We are changing to a location where our Student Members will be allowed to attend. We’ll notify the membership when we have found a new place.

In the near future, look for a small, blue Safety Suggestion box in the clubhouse. This will be locked and only the Safety Officer and Al Santilli will have keys. Feel free to report safety issues in confidence. Thanks to my husband, George, for donating the skilled labor to craft this box.

Club Notes

The On-Line Contest continues to encourage lots of cross-country flying by Albuquerque pilots. Albuqerque Soaring continues to dominate the US contest and is back into the middle of the top 10 clubs in the world. We have 21 pilots logging flights in the OLC but there are other club pilots flying cross country who are not filing their flights. Remember, fly often, file every flight. We need the points.

Parowan region 9 contest, the first at the site, was a blast. Well run, friendly, and great soaring. One daily class winner complained that at one point he had no choice but to stop for a 9 knot thermal. Jim Cumiford ( 8^th in 15 meter, in spite of a landout) saw 15 knots, and Carl Ekdahl (13^th in 15 meter) and H Banks (6^th in Sports) also wore big grins after every flight. Top winning speed at thos no-water contest, over 100 mph. Getting an entry for the Sports Class Nationals at Parowan next year is going to be tough.

Lots of talk about ELT's and other safety issues at Parowan. Many recommendations for using a portable ELT, following Peter Mazak's fatal crash in the 15 meter nationals at Miflin. Any club member out there with experience and knowledge of this area? Please let us know so we can inform all of us correctly. There are portable ELTs that can be hooked to a parachute harness and they were talked up at Parowan -- are they the best way to go. What other items should be in our emergency kit -- one suggestion, a battery powered strobe light. Another, a whistle.

Buy those Tee shirts

By Mitch Hudson

Clothing embroidered with the ASC logo are now available to club members. An initial run of t-shirts and baseball caps was produced recently and the results were very good. Within a weekend of selling the items to club members around the airport, most were gone. Keep your eyes out for some club members wearing the new items and contact Mitch with your orders. He can take requests for various types and colors of shirts, hats, and jackets with the new embroidered logo.

OLC: Winning Tactics

By Chip Garner

[*Chip made the first 1,000km+ OLC flight from Moriarty, didn't land until 8.30p and seriously thought about flying some more -- there were still cus, he said. Ed.]

As an avid competition pilot for the past 20 years, I have often been frustrated by short tasks that don’t use even half of the soarable weather on a good day. Flying in World Championships, we are not as practiced at using the last lift of the day as our European rivals. The OLC is the perfect antidote – there is no excuse for being on the ground if soaring flight is possible! The few OLC flights I have made are some of the most challenging and rewarding in my experience.

The OLC task has been worked out over several years and is very simple and well designed. You are scored on distance only, and can use up to six legs. The fifth and sixth legs are devalued to %80 and %60, respectively, and scores are handicapped for glider performance. This is essentially it for flight rules, no 32 pages of fine print, no time limit to meet precisely, no remaining below start gate altitude with 50 other gliders all watching altimeters.

The on-line scoring program figures out when you release (or turn off your engine) and land and optimizes the number of leg distances for you. Feed back is almost instantaneous, submit your flight on the web and compare your results to the rest of the world right away. The simplicity and fast feedback make for great fun. I also enjoy flying to contribute to the club score.

The strategy is simple, fly as long and as fast as you can and keep count of the legs. All you need is a glider, a tow, a data logger, and drinking water. Flying from Moriarty you will also need oxygen, lunch, and dinner.

A look at the OLC scores reveals that it is mostly being won by Germans flying in Germany. They are frequently making 9 and 10 hour flights at moderate speeds. (Klaus Ohlman is flying wave in South America. You may need to travel to beat Klaus.) Long flight times are a must to do well and flying for many hours safely requires that you build up to it. It is very important to learn to relax throughout the flight. Think about relaxing your body while cruising. You can learn to remain physically relaxed in most flying situations. A low save can be very stressful; remind yourself that you have a safe place to land, that another retrieve will probably make a good story, and find the lift!

If you fly for more than about 8 hours in Moriarty you will probably do very well on the OLC. If you fly for more than 8 hours fast you will kick some serious butt. Flying faster is the subject of another article.

Because the fifth and sixth legs are devalued, the task should be flown in four legs if possible. It is generally best to pick the direction that will give the longest first leg. This will, hopefully, put you back in the vicinity of the airport late in the day with two full point legs left to work with. In Moriarty it is often possible to fly the last two hours within gliding distance of the airport. Starting downwind is also usually a good idea. If you have to be downwind of home, do it early in the day rather than late in the day. (There is no penalty for landing anywhere, so the most competitive strategy is often just to keep going downwind. However, in my experience, it is usually more convenient to land in the same state or country that you take off in, and even more convenient to land near where your car is parked.) Plan the flight for the distance you hope to do using two legs and be a little conservative. This should put year near home before the day dies, and give you two more legs to work with as the lift becomes less reliable.

Another potential benefit of planning for two legs is that you can fly through very good lift four times. Excellent streets sometimes persist for several hours, especially along the mountains. If you hit a great street, double back and use up your two extra legs in the good stuff. Note that, if you get home early, you can fly straight past home, still on the fourth leg which counts 100%, and come home on the fifth %80 leg without much penalty.

You don't have to be a hero

By Renny Rozzoni

You don't need the latest top-dollar glider to take part in the On-Line Contest and to score surprising numbers of miles and points. And the rules allow you to record those outstanding distances and points without having to fly to Leadville, CO. Keep in mind that the contest automatically scores your six best legs (legs 5 & 6 are devalued a bit) and then applies a handicap to come up with the points for your flight. The best rule of all is that turn points do not have to be pre-declared. (The club website has detailed contest info.)

So, let me give you two scenarios:

A. You take off in your trusty 1-26 and fly to the booming metropolis of Estancia. You then head north to Stanley and then West to Sandia East. You determine that you are getting brave and fly to Chilili. You then head NE to the Otto VOR and after an exhausting 6 hour flight you return to Moriarty. That flight would score 88 miles (about 141.5km after legs 5 & 6 are devalued). Adjusted by the (approx) 1.5 handicap for a 1-26 you get 212.25 points. Not bad for staying within 15 miles of the Moriarty airport!

B. You take off in RU and conditions look good. You head South. to Willard (28 miles out) and as you circle over the world famous Willard Cafe, you watch Mitch and Brian head off to the South. They are heading towards an obvious land-out. You determine that a retrieve was not really in your plans so you head back North. You head back over Moriarty and keep going to the old RR town of Lamy. After circling the town you head SW towards Mountainair. You only get as far as Torreon and decide to head ENE to Clines Corner. You turn CC and head for home making a bee-line for the runway. You get home that night to download the flight. See-You software "optimizes" your flight and scores the adjusted distance as 201 miles or approx 323km (Leg 5 is devalued). The 1.0 handicap for a Std Libelle gives 323 points. Amazing given that you were never more than 35 miles from the field and, on a decent day, always within gliding range.

There are many other possible turn points not far from Moriarty. You can plan using the club computer (guidance available from Brian and Mitch). So, read the rules, understand the contest, and go rack up some serious On-Line Contest points for the home team. Heck, you will have fun at the same time. Be safe out there!