Now We Stay Established in the Thermal
While you are thermalling, you want to be predictable. No erratic movements. No fast changes in direction. At the same time, nothing so slow that the person behind you cannot see what you are intending to do. We all know you should keep your head on a swivel. You want to pay attention to the sailplane ahead of you and follow them while also looking inside of the turn to see if someone is there. You also need to keep looking behind to see the tail occasionally.
Cutting inside of someone is a very bad thing to do. You never want to be belly towards someone as you cannot see them anymore. You are then solely relying on them to see you. If they are watching the glider in front of you or behind you, they could miss you entirely and their path could overlap with yours.
Another consideration is the glider merging from the outside into the thermal as we discussed last week. Then someone could be climbing faster from below. Hopefully, they are looking up and working around you. Finally, you need to be looking above, in case you are the faster climbing glider.
Now that you are looking in every direction, you have to FLY THE PLANE!!! I am sure you have heard of this before. You have to maintain a proper airspeed for safe flight and safe separation. This speed will probably be faster then you would like aerodynamically, however safety overrules efficiency (it is always more efficient to not use the parachute).
When I am teaching new students to fly, their hands often follow their head. As they look down, they dive. With your head on a swivel, you do not want the nose tracking with it or your flying will be very erratic. If someone is below you, do not pull back on the stick trying to get more separation. You will have no separation when you stall.
When a side of the circle is obviously climbing better the gaggle will normally shift. It generally will take a few rotations to get everyone recentered. Unfortunately, you may not be able to just recenter whenever you want. You might be slightly trapped by someone outside of you. There have been times that I have shifted and nobody followed, keeping me on the outside and preventing me from merging back into the gaggle.
On the last day at the WGC 2010 Open Class in Szeged, I was 500ft below (read at) cloudbase just before the gate was ready to open. The spoilers were cracked and we were all packing into that area. Tactically I was in a perfect position, on top of the pre-start gaggle. I was already visualizing a top 10 finish at a WGC in the open class before I was 30. But then I got frustrated with the gaggle. I left, the sky cycled and I could not reconnect with the lift as the gate opened and the entire fleet started. I ended up doing a re-light to expedite myself back to 2000ft. I fell 11 places that day... And that is why there is a time and a place where you just sit back in the gaggle and wait.
Garret Willat holds a flight instructor rating with over 8000 hours in sailplanes. His parents have owned Sky Sailing Inc. since 1979. He started instructing the day after his 18th birthday. Since then, Garret has represented the US Junior team in 2003 and 2005. He graduated from Embry-Riddle with a bachelor's degree in Professional Aeronautics. Garret represented the US Open Class team in 2008 and 2010 and the Club Class team in 2014. Garret has won 3 US National Championships.
