THE LAST DAY

Friday and the end of the course is nigh. Following the usual recap of yesterday's flights, (this bit is great as we always get a chance to learn from someone elses good decisions or mistakes). We settled to a brief from Adrian Cable on wave and ridge flying. Excellent stuff , as have been all the other briefs with some great tips. A great tip on getting caught in cloud, hopefully reasonably well trimmed. Just open the airbrakes fully and let the rest of the controls go. Down she will come pretty much stable.

Today's task is a shortish triangle and as the sky had been looking good and I was with John Baylis in the Duo Discus, I was looking to long flight with plenty to learn. John gave me a great rundown on the Duo as well as a look at his landout kit and a neat tip on drink bottle stowage, a thin rope round the neck and tied to the straps at the right length to have it sit in the foot well but not inot the rudder pedals.

We launched earlyish, hunted around for something, anything and landed back after 15 minutes. relaunched and managed a further 30 minutes, hit the start and first turn circle but the way South looked as bad as to the North and we called it a day.

We all got back, no one had a great flight. Time to pack up and go home from a very good course. It achieved all of my goals, I comfortably went out of gliding range from the field, did my first landout, got better at reading the sky and did some great flights. A very worthwhile course.

End of the week wrapup

Friday's sky was looking very promising and a simple "Land back at the field please" type task was handed out. In the classroom we talked about some issues that can come up with ridge and wave flying. One thing that stuck in my head was that if you trim the glider to say 70 knots and then open the airbrakes and take your hand off the stick the glider will level out and be stable. Then you can look at your compass and use your rudders to steer the thing. If you get stuck in a cloud for any reason just set this up and point yourself away from the ridge. I tested it out in VF and it works nicely.

The task for the day was a short one and we were all confident that we could make it. My one personal goal was to land back on the airfield. I didn't want to have 100% of my solo flights end in outlandings.

I launched and released into a great building cloud and was quickly up above everyone else even though I launched in the late middle of the pack. There were scrappy looking clouds out towards the turnpoint but at cloudbase I was the first one to start pushing out. Remember my goal of not outlanding today?

I managed to push downwind towards the turnpoint maybe 10kms from the field but I was presented with a huge blue hole with not even the slightest trace of cloud. I pushed into the blue to sus it out a bit but scampered back with my tail between my legs.

I hung around on the edge as everyone else started trying their luck but everyone came back. The Piako PW-6 landed out with Fin in the back so I decided that today would be a nice sight seeing tour of the area and I landed back on the field after a good couple hours. Mission accomplished.

After packing up all the bits that we brought we were back on the road to Auckland after an intense 5 days of gliding. I can now say that I have the confidence to make the proper decisions to outland if needed. I am not a master outlander but have the basic skills to feel safe progressing with pushing the boundaries of gliding.

Thanks to everyone at the Piako gliding club for their time and effort and to all the instructors that took a week off and came to teach us the skills. I must say that after 5 days of getting up at 6:30 in the mornings and finishing at 9:00 every night I am beat.

I did the course with about 40 solo hours under my belt so it is not only for high hour pilots. We should try to push members into the course every year as a goal in their training.

A LONG DAY

Todays task Matamata to the swamp down to Awapuni and home. The weather brief promised thermals to 6000. Looks good and its my turn for the Libelle.

Post launch soon showed the forecast thermals were optimistic and we scratched around for over an hour trying to get enough height to get established and away. I took a look over the ridge side but it ws not much better so ended up going up the Centre cloud to cloud taking climbs where I could and got to Abeam Te Aroha and low. Picked out the first paddock at 15oo, and ran under a wisp nearby, woohoo climb and eventulally worked up to 3200. Push on and out towards the swamp in a big blue hole. The edge of the swamp looked good but I found nothing to helo get there and at 2000, inside the turn circle I headed back. Down to 1500 abeam Te Aroha and the second paddock of the day selected. Again checked out a nearby wisp and got away. I tracked over to Te Aroha for a look at the faces of the Mount. Not much here and came out 1500 again and the third paddock selected. Around here I heard both Adam and Andy land out. Again I got a climb needing two clouds to get up to 2500 and started back down the valley. Two short climbs got me within final glide, but I had picked out the fourth paddock for the day, and got a bigger climb to 3200. Decided this might be do-able and went on. Abeam Matamata again down to 1500, its 5pm, roast dinner tonight, sod it Im going back. 3 hours 13 minutes and my longest solo flight. My drink container was empty but I was satisfied.

Well if he can do it....

The thermals for Thursday were predicted up to 6000' for most of the day so a biggie task was given out. It came out to a bit over 100km. Something like that isn't so scary once you realize that when you get out of glide range from the airfield that it doesn't matter how far it is.

We all pushed onto the grid and I was about four gliders behind Andy and Graham but today we had two tow planes so that would reduce the wait times. Everything prepped and ready to go.

The sky was blue as a smurf with only the occasional wisp of cloud to break it up. It didn't look promising although people looked like they were climbing. Looks like we were going to have a blue thermal day.

I released from tow and hunted around for a couple minutes and instantly found a climb to over 3000' which put me well above most everyone else but with nowhere to go. It was all blue out towards our first turnpoint and I really didn't want to outland today.

Andy and I were both within range of the field but then I lost sight of him. Next thing I know I hear a radio call "Matamata traffic MP 5 miles north of the field climbing through 3000'" I can't be outdone so off I go.

I get into the same thermal that Andy hit and climbed back to 3000' and continued on. I was always one thermal behind Andy but keeping up ok. There was negligible wind so there wasn't a larger performance difference between MP and VF today.

Andy took a slight right turn and headed to Te Aroha but the radio calls that he was giving didn't sound promising so I stuck in the central valley. BEEP, my GPS tells me that I made the first turnpoint. WOOOOOO! It should be no problem getting back.

I turn around and attempt to fly back through the thermals that I just came from. Sink sink sink sink sink..... What the !@#%! Ok, down too low to go anywhere now, picking paddocks. Ok, there is my new landing strip for the day. When I turned downwind I realized that I was high and too close in and I tried to open it up a little. I had a short base and quick finals over the fence with a little too much speed. Flared and with a reasonable touchdown but the opposite fence was coming up on me. I probably could have stopped before it but I dropped a wing and did a gentle groundloop to wash off the rest of the speed. I ended up stopping going almost the wrong direction about 2/3 of the way down the paddock. Not too bad but there were a number of things that I would have changed about the outlanding.




I think that I was so focused on the paddock selection that I didn't even think about proper circuit planning and speed control. That cramped my circuit and didn't allow me the time to get set up for landing. If I am put into the position where I have to outland then as soon as I pick my paddock I will instantly switch to circuit planning mode to get properly set up.

About 10 minutes after I landed out I get a phone call from Andy who said that he was on the ground as well. It looks like the weather cycled out right at the wrong time and dumped us both.

After a short walk to the farmhouse and a talk with a nice farmer to get permission I pulled up a spot in the shade and chilled out. The retrieve crew was there in short order and it was back in its box. Then we were off to help derig MP as he had landed about 3km SE of me.

His paddock was a nice 300m smooth strip right into the light wind. A quick derig and we were back home safe and sound.

The moral of the story is to always pick the paddock and plan your circuit. If you don't do both then you will have problems like I did.

Can we final glide from here?

Wednesday started shaping up to be a decent gliding day. There was a bit of high cloud that was slowing thermal production but the forecast was good. After some briefings we went out and hit the grid.

Today I wanted to fly in a twin to get some pointers on my flying and decision making so I chose to ride with John Bayliss from the Auckland club in their Duo Discus. After sitting on the grid in a blue sky with other glidings struggling we got our chance to go. The tow pilot turned around and towed us right into some fresh development which took us to 3500' and we were off. A quick snap through the start gate and we were heading up north.

As we were flying north I had the tendency to try to turn into every little blip of lift that I hit. Supposedly this is a bad idea in competition flying since the goal is to get as far as possible without turning. Each turn that you make is time lost on the task. It does take a bit of wits to leave a perfectly good thermal behind.

After very little work we were up over the swamp and through our first turnpoint. To my surprise he suggested that we head over to the ridge even though there was little to no wind. What we found on the ridge was interesting. When we flew over the little valleys on the ridge we would get big lift. Supposedly this is from all of the thermals on the ground getting funneled up the valleys.

We flew the ridge all the way down to the golf ball with very little turning. The GPS in the glider told us that we were through our last turnpoint although I think that it was improperly configured so we were a bit out.

From there I could see the field and asked "Can we final glide from here?". I could hear a little laugh from the back. I kicked it up to 100 knots and pointed it at the field. We got back to the field at 2000 feet so from the golf ball to the field we lost about 800 feet at 100 knots. Not bad.

Full airbrake and sideslip to get down and we were back on the strip. 2.5hours and a great flight.

I learned that even though the wind isn't on the ridge that it can be working through ridge assisted thermals. Oh yeah, and that the PW-5 performance is scary bad compared to modern gliders.

DAY THREE IN A TWIN

Today looks good activity building and a 120km triangular task. Warahoa to Lower Waitoa up by the swamp, down to Tirau and home. I would be with Trevor Terry in his Duo Discus. Last off the grid and we found lift hard to find scratching around down as low as 1000ft before finally getting up to 3000. It took an age but everyone was struggling. We eventually crossed the start and headed north stopping a few times on the way to top up, not something Trevor approved of but we Whenuapai folk are used to taking whatever we can get. We took a big climb up by Waitoa Dairy Factory before heading for the middle of the swamp and a booming 9 knot thermal. We moseyed out the far side of the swamp and back across to the Te Aroha corner for another boomer and on to the ridge. Around high point we followed out under a cloud street catching a 4 knotter on the way and onto Tirau. By Tirau we were getting down and promising looking clouds turned out to be disappointing. Here I experienced first hand the debilitating effects of dehydration. I had not drunk anywhere near enough and my flying had become very ragged, my decision making poor and slow. Trevor had recognised the symptoms some time before and waited for me to do the same. He passed the drink and I felt better. We headed back and picked up a weak thermal around spud patch enough for a final glide home. Not my proudest moment, made worse as Trevor had spoken of dehydration effects that morning.

FIRST LAND OUT

Tuesday and our first task day. Also my first landout. The day promised partly cloudy with a northwesterly breeze and some showers, looked like the ridge was working and there seemed to be good thermals. Towing out on the grid it looked like the Libelle and I were going to be front of grid. Nah said Trev Terry more to come and they will go in front of you. By the time I got back from hooking up the car to the trailer I was still front of grid. Standing beside me, the glider launch bloke told me the other row was not ready and could I get going first. A quick don of parachute and glider, strap in, pretakeoffs and away, so quick. The GPS then packed a sad and needed a reset.

Once I got sorted out and went looking for a thermal and found a weak one up to 2300, down to 1900 and into another weak thermal that I worked to 2500. I started looking towards the ridge but found nothing and by 1700 around Wardville looked to come back towards Matamata having picked a paddock. Hopefully coming under another possible cloud produced some weak lift half to one and a half knots that built as I climbed until cloud base at 3300. From here onto the ridge and good ridge lift took me up to 3600 just under the clouds.

Im here, Ive crossed the start line might as well get going, so I headed north to Te Aroha finding the low cloud forced me off the ridge and out over Te Aroha round the cloud and onto the North Face. I recovered height to 2600, again cloud base and pushed on North towards Paeroa working some weak thermals as I went. Trevor Terry with Terry Dagnin in the Duo Discus came underneath well below with the motor out and turning, climbing up to me before putting the noise away. We worked what we could but were both in and out of rain and soon the inevitable decision that I would be landing out. Terry T had the motor out.

I had a paddock identified and crossed at 1000ft for an orbit when a I spotted a windsock ahead ....and a farmers strip. Alright! Ill go there even with the cross wind. The approach was over trees one paddock back and finals revealed a couple of surprises. Looked like cows had been there real recently and there was what looked like a short cross fence either side. On the suspicion theremight be a wire strung across I landed beyond and stopped in 130 meters, yes the cows had been there recently, we will need to wash our baby tonight. The cross fence turned out to be touchdown marker boards for John Bubb's strip and no wire.

John wasn't there but his farm worker was most helpful. Eventually the retrieve crew arrived and home we came... washed and rigged.

The course managed a 100% landout record today so not a good day and the rain around Paeroa really finished me off. Im pleased that I have my first outlanding under the belt

Well I'm glad I got that out of the way

We woke up Tuesday morning and things were looking promising. It wasn't pouring down rain like it was expected to. I prepped my PW-5 so that I would be ready just in case but I had every intention of flying in a twin with an instructor.

The briefings were talking about soaring techniques and I pulled an important bit out of it. You don't want to fly through the same sink twice. One way you do this is when you are turning in a thermal and one portion of the turn is in sink then try to estimate the center of the sink and look down your inboard wing and pick a landmark. As you continue your turn when your nose is pointing at the landmark straighten up for a second and then turn back into the thermal.

It was something that I was constantly trying to do before but I didn't really have a method, I was always just doing it by feel.

The briefings were relatively short compared to Monday's. All of the instructors were looking at the sky and were mumbling to each other then out came the task. Oh, only a simple 70k task to start off the course.

Then came the list of who was flying what and with whom. I must not have been paying attention because when I looked up there was only one twin left and Terry and I both had our hands up. I can tell you that my stress level shot up at that point. The whole beginning of the course I was saying "I just want to fly the single and get it out of the way." but when it came down to it I think that having an instructor in the back would have treated me fine.

Since Graham was flying IV then Terry was the obvious choice to go in the last twin since he didn't bring another single. Well here we go.

Everything was prepped luckily so we towed VF down to the grid, when we got there Trev Terry said, OK you are in front. I laughed and he said "I'm not joking." Ok, first cross country attempt and I am first to launch. No stress. I had all the gear prepared so that wasn't a concern so I strapped on the parachute and hopped in. Then Andy came rolling up with MP and slotted in front of me. Ok, that will buy me about 10 minutes to get my wits about me.

It ended up that I was 4th to launch after Graham, Terry in TT, and Andy. Trev said that there were thermals near the waterfall and that the ridge was working. Well BANG I am released and pointing my nose at the waterfall with blatant disregard for getting back to the field with the hope of finding lift. 2000' feet I am cool and waiting. 1900' I am wondering if this was such a good idea. 1800' I am picking paddocks. My luck hits and I catch a thermal up to 2800' and am feeling good. Now I need to make the decision to either head upwind to try to catch another thermal or head to the waterfall to see if the ridge is working. Bad decision #1, lets head upwind and look for thermals. Sink sink sink sink sink and going nowhere.

There were blips of lift but nothing that I could turn in. Down to 1600' and the angle to the airfield was not looking good. Now I was at a point where I couldn't get back to the field and things weren't looking good for staying up. This was the point where I let go of all stress. It wasn't about the question of if I would land out but where and when.

At 1500' I had a paddock picked and had already done a couple passes by and it looked good. Now I would try to stay up. At 1200' I climbed back to 1300' then my luck gave out. I was in position to join at 1000'. At 900' (700' AGL) I turned into a quick downwind, base, finals half airbrakes directly into wind and the PW-5 dropped out of the sky. 20' over the fence was a bit high but fine with the length of the paddock and the wind. Flair and touchdown with an amazingly short roll but smooth as anything. So why was I scared of this before?

Once I got my wits about me I tried to call Andy to get him to relay a message that everything was fine but could barely talk because of the adrenaline. A quick call to the retrieve crew and a bit of a wait and we were back at the field.

I learned more today in 25 minutes of flying than I have for a while.

Wish me luck

I didn't get my hand up quick enough for a twin so I am off in VF for my first 80k task. No stress.

PADDOCK LANDING PRACTISE

I guess this an essential part of flying a glider cross country, there is always a chance that you will run out of lift and height and not be able to get to an airfield. A suitable farmers paddock, or similar length of flattish ground has to be found and used as a landing strip. Unlike an airfield, this one will be invarably small and with minimal under or overshoot options. The circuit has to be planned and flown accurately so you get over the near fence but do not plow through the far fence, both are bad for the health.

With weather threatening to rain, a brisk 15 knots on the ground and 25knots aloft and low cloud, not a task day but OK for some airfield based practice. Today's exercise had us landing across Matamata's main runway 28. This gives around 180 metres fence to fence. My first shot was from the back of Trevor Terry's Duo Discus. First time I have flown a Discus and from the back seat to boot, with a 25 knot wind up high and about 15 on the ground. Funny how a whole airfield throws out the perspective and I started way to wide. A quick adjustment and got to where I needed to be flew a base and finals to a good landing. All right. After letting the rest have a shot in the twins it was time to roll out the Libelle and do one by myself. Positioned nice and close giving plenty of options as to where I turned base to finals and a half airbrake approach to a good touchdown and stop in plenty of time. WOOHOO.

So far so good

End of day 1

The weather for the first day of the cross country course wasn't the flashest but it did allow us the luxury of spending most of the day in the classroom cramming our brains full of outlanding techniques. We talked about the order of decision making as your height decreases. Things change as you get lower and learning the changes will help us along the way.

Later in the day they decided that we would do cross strip landings with a 25 knot NE wind. There was no shortage of stress in the room. We towed the gliders out onto the grid and proceeded to take turns in the twins. They set us up to cross strip with about 200m of landing distance.

I was in the backseat of TT (Trev Terry's Duo Discus) which added a whole different variable to the equation. The wind was a direct 25 knot cross strip and even with full opposite aileron the downwind wing was perfectly happy where it was on the ground. After a little more coaxing it decided to give up and we were flying. The Duo Discus planes are amazingly easy to fly. The controls are light and it doesn't seem very twitchy with speed control.

We got set up on downwind relatively close in because of the wind. Turning onto base we had about a 45 degree crab to keep us from heading to Hamilton. Ok, everything looking good. Turn onto finals, airbrakes open half, flair, touchdown, stop. Wooooo!

New plane, sitting in the back, 25 knot wind, acceptable landing. That is a good start.

At the end of the day we had a briefing on how to use SeeYou to analyze our flights and we went through some actual competition flights to compare techniques between different pilots. We also had an introduction to competition flying and how the whole process works.

I am sitting out on the porch looking over the airfield and the sun just came out. It is threatening to clear up and allow us to start flying. Well, off to wipe down the gliders and get read for another day.

THE LEADUP TO THE COURSE

I've wanted to do this course for a year, ever since I got a chance to sit in the back seat while Robert competed in last years Northern Regionals. We got all the way round the course that day and I got to see what is possible. I got to help with the decisions but can I do this by myself, can I swallow a big enough 'brave' pill to go out of gliding distance to the airfield. This course will be my catalyst. Two weeks to go and the apprehension is starting to kick in just a wee bit. Looking forward to it though.

Matamata Cross Country Course

A few months ago a call went out for people interested in attending the week long cross country course at Matamata. Four Auckland Aviation Sports Club members made the cut and got invited for a week of learning how to cut the invisible rubber band connected to the field.

The members of our club who are going are Andy, Graham, Terry, and I. Andy and I will be taking the PW-5 and sharing that while Graham and Terry will take IV.

When I signed up for the course I assumed that we would do half a day of ground training and then half a day flying with instructors. From what I hear it is basically a little briefing in the morning and then heading out into the wild blue yonder to complete a task.

Wish us luck.