Shalbourne Gliding – OLD WEBSITE
A friendly gliding club in Wiltshire
Tim flew 13 instructional flights including a half day course delivered in one hit; and ably supported by Ken P, Stephen O, Jim C, Richard D and self, supervised a day of 43 launches.
Carol, Phil and Chris B disappeared for over four hours somewhere overcast in the Midlands (gluttons for punishment?), the LS3 syndicate flew more comfortable triangles in the sun, while Selvam converted to the Vega and discovered classy soaring.
Apart from that, just another quiet day at Rivar.
Grunt, grunt, grunt, grunt, get the water system flowing,
Grunt,grunt,grunt, grunt, change a fan belt too
Grunt,grunt,grunt, grunt, lift an axle into place and
Grunt,grunt,grunt, grunt, cut some brackets through,
Grunt,grunt,grunt, grunt, fix the generator charging,
Grunt,grunt,grunt, grunt, lots still left to do.
These are things that happen weekly when the thermals fail,
Think of those who serve so meekly when better days prevail.
(with apologies to the Kipling Society)
Sincere thanks to many hands who turned up on an iffy Wednesday and worked their socks off to make it all work for us. (Also to doughnut man – without whom everything stops.)
A strange craft is rumoured to have appeared atop the airfield.
But another couple of weeks and we’ll be into the soaring season and mostly thanks to Andy, aircraft are all tidy and raring to go. But will YOU be? Take a look at the BGA currency barometer, https://members.gliding.co.uk/library/safety/currency-barometer-pdf/ to see how current you really are. Take a check flight (or two) if you’re below the green zone, but also spend 15 minutes reviewing these excellent Black Mountain clips, you never know they might save you some embarrassment.
http://www.blackmountainsgliding.co.uk/vid_stall1.php
http://www.blackmountainsgliding.co.uk/vid_stall2.php
http://www.blackmountainsgliding.co.uk/vid_spin1.php
http://www.blackmountainsgliding.co.uk/vid_spin2.php
If you are a Vega pilot (or similar) and haven’t made that big step to Silver Distance or 100k, then why not try a warm up exercise? Most good soaring days have a bit of N/W wind in them so a local 50k triangle – Rivar, Pewsey, Membury, Rivar (RIV,PEW,MEM,RIV) is never further than 15k from Rivar and is always within gliding distance from 2500ft QFE. You’ll always have a favourable wind if things go to worms and if it works out, go round twice – that’s 100k!”
For something closer to home try RIV,BUB,HNN,HUR,RIV that’s also around 50k.
Taking that one step further; some time ago I read an S&G article by the legendary Alan Purnell. In a nutshell, his recommendation was to go round a local 50k spending as little time thermalling as possible and flying as fast as possible. The second time round you’ve got a good idea where the thermal sources are, so you should do less thermalling and fly even faster. Repeat the exercise until you don’t have to thermal at all!
In the meantime I’ll keep gazing at my chubby foot, willing it to get better before the weather does.