wrote in message
...
"F.L. Whiteley" writes:

challenge, how to get the additional 500km+. It's taken several
years of research and attempts to complete these flights in
Argentina. Are 2500-3000km straight-line flights possible?
Downwind?

How do you define `straight'?

--
Paul Repacholi 1 Crescent Rd.,
Doesn't matter how I define straight, but how the FAI defines it for a
record. It's the distance between the start and finish, with no turnpoints.

See the sporting code http://www.fai.org/sporting_code/sc3.pdf
Free distance and straight distance to a goal are the only relevant
categories.

If you deviate off track, you'll gain no extra distance. If you wander much
further than 15 degrees off track on a goal flight, you reduce the chances
of making the distance in available daylight. For free distance, wandering
into the best lift may be optimal up to say 30 degrees if you aren't going
to reverse back to the original track and just accept a new finish.

Since the best wave conditions rarely exceed 1500km in span, downwind
flights transiting several mountain ranges may offer the better opportunity
of completing a downwind wave flight of 2500km or more. I believe someone
once surmised that when the jet developed a large deflection over the
northwest United States that an early departure into wave from Washington
State or British Columbia towards New Mexico into Texas for about 2500km
straight distance might be possible. However, heading south and east limits
available daylight and great wave conditions don't often happen during the
longer days in North America.

Frank