On Thu, 14 Jun 2007 10:27:08 -0700, Jim Stewart wrote:

This is something of a mystery to me as well. I've spent most of my stall
training dancing on the rudder keeping the nose pointed straight.

You're sure this is "stall training" as opposed to "slow flight"? The
latter serves a different purpose than merely learning how to recover from
stalls.

It's
occurred to me that rather than playing with an impending stall, I
should develop the habit of breaking it right away.

That's what my stall training was all about. However, this developed
something of a fear of stalls in me. I subsequently did spin training.
This helped a lot with the stall fear (since I'd experienced the "bad
thing that could happen"). But not completely.

Then I "checked out" a CFI before I let him fly with my wife. We did PPL
PTS stuff, including stalls. He noticed how rushed I was in breaking the
stall, and concluded - correctly - that I was too apprehensive. So we sat
in a stall for a while. Unlike my spin training, we stayed coordinated.
And nothing happened (but for some altitude loss {8^).

So while the habit of breaking a stall right away is a good one, it's also
a good idea to get at least somewhat comfortable with it as well.

- Andrew