cross country
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- March 10, 2026
For many pilots, cross-country soaring feels like a series of stop-and-go manoeuvres: glide, find a thermal, circle until you’re high enough, and repeat. While effective, this "classic" style can feel mechanical & also risky if you push it too low. If you want to transform your flying into a fluid, rhythmic dance, see your average speeds skyrocket, then it’s time to embrace the Dolphin Style of flight.
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- March 30, 2022
The genesis of this article was an email question, sent in by a new XC pilot to an XC program panel where I was a mentor. The writer wanted to know if his club’s new acquisition of a higher performance single place glider might mean that newer XC pilots like him could participate in a Regional contest with a plan for “airport hopping” on tasks and thus avoid the challenge of off-airport landings.
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- February 24, 2021
It happens all too often when we find a day where there are good soaring possibilities or life gets in the way which doesn’t allow for cross country. Too short a soaring window, restrictions on the sailplane because of club requirements, the wind is too strong, you’re not feeling up to it, etc.
Rather than just aimlessly flying around the local airfield, some of the below items can be practiced so
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- January 27, 2021
It happens to all of us, but how we deal with it is very different for everybody. Some will roll over & resign to an out landing far too early, others will get hyper-focused & climb away in the smallest of bubbles. You make your own luck, though occasionally there's nothing you can do & you'll be on the ground regardless. So what can we do to avoid getting low? What can we do to deal with being low?
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- August 26, 2020
Editor Note - With schools quickly getting fired up again in some form or another, I thought it might be nice for our readers to read a traditional summer essay written by a newly minted CFI-G who is currently going to college, and represents the future of our sport. Soaring is not dead, folks, it is simply going through a handoff from the baby boomers being the old heads and mentoring Generation
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- February 12, 2020
I had just turned 15 years old in 1991, weighed about 87 pounds and had to sit on two barbell weights to get up to the minimum pilot weight in 1-26 #368. However, this was my second-year flying, and I was now really getting the hang of this! I was not only flying the glider well; I was learning how to soar! I had gotten my Bronze Badge and studied cross country flying. I had realized that
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- September 18, 2019
Answer: We safely land out.
Going cross-country can be intimidating, scary, and intense. But it should be safe; if not, you are doing it wrong. Of course, you must have enough experience before attempting it. I am not talking to my newly soloed students here, but those who are competent at thermalling, finding lift, and spot landing.
Be Comfortable, Not Returning.
If you are unwilling to land out,
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- March 07, 2019
35:1 at 70knots
A typical flight in the ASW-19 I would see 35:1 at 70knts (I fly on the strong days). However, the glider is really only able to achieve somewhere around 20:1 at that speed. Either this ASW-19 is really good or I was selecting a good path. So a fun goal I set is 50% of the polar (not best L/D), but anytime you are better than the polar you are doing something right.
Lack of streets
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- February 27, 2019
What about practicing by yourself? Most of us end up flying by ourselves, many of my single seat flights are mid-week when it is slower with students. The problem becomes that you do not have any other pilots to base your flying against. There is no way of knowing if you made the best decisions. Thankfully we have SeeYou. A post-flight analysis is going to be key in figuring out how efficient your
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- February 13, 2019
Inspections
Currently, we are doing yearly condition inspection and inspecting the water system. The bags have not been used for a long time and the current owner has never used them. We decided to start out first by leak testing the bags, pulling them out of the wing and leaving them full for a few hours to make sure there were no signs of leaks. The next step will be checking the fittings, when the