In article ,
Tony Verhulst wrote:

Mac, I'll call him Mac 'cause that's his name :-), had just gotten his
HP14 and wanted to get some landing practice by doing a couple of 2000
ft tows. I guess that there must have been some miscommunication with
the tow pilot who assumed a 3000 ft tow. Normally, the tow pilot will
deliver the glider to a point such that when the glider releases the
glider will be in gliding range of the airport. On a 3000 ft tow, the
tow plane may venture farther from the field, during the climb, and then
return to release at the proper point - and this is what happened here.

Gosh. What was the tow plane?? Isn't the HP14 close to a 40:1 glider?

I'm used to a Pawnee climbing straight out from the airfield with a Grob
or Janus two-up behind and *always* being within gliding range of the
airfield. Normal climb is about 600 fpm at 65 knots, or about 11:1.
Back in the old days those gliders behind a 180 HP supercub would only
get maybe 300 fpm but that's still 22:1 while they glide at over 35:1.
I do recall the practise back then (with the lower-performance Blanik on
the back) was to do maybe a half or three-quarters orbit overhead the
field before heading out, but straight out was fine after that.

--
Bruce | 41.1670S | \ spoken | -+-
Hoult | 174.8263E | /\ here. | ----------O----------