I love how some pilots are so bull-headed and opinionated about exact
procedures. The whole point of receiving training is to develop
skills and JUDGEMENT about the best course of action under different
circumstances! As a glider pilot who flies a landing-pattern full of
semi-subjective criteria, you ought to KNOW that each case is unique.

All of these people huffing and puffing about what you "must" do or
"can't" do or what's "always" right or wrong are missing the whole
point. You have to remain flexible and treat each situation as a
unique one - giving it full consideration and taking into account all
of the variables (no matter how they come at you).

Here's a recent situation in my club that illustrates how poorly
blanket rules work:

I acquired a DG-300. I've never flown one, but I love them and have
sat in a few on the ground. I owned a Russia for a year before
upgrading. This year I put nearly 20 hours into flying an LS-4 at
Minden, plus some time in a Discus, SZD-55, and even a couple of short
flights in a Mini-Nimbus. I studied hard but was flatly REFUSED the
chance to fly with my club the first week I had the glider, because
the club was operating out of a remote airfield. A CFIG at the field
swore it was unsafe for me (a "low time" pilot) to fly a new aircraft
the first time at a "dangerous" airfield (even though I'd flown there
several times before). He would not take into account my preparation,
judgement, or the currency of my skills - he relied on blanket rules
and judged me on my total time.

So what happened the very next week? An extremely skilled former
airline pilot with thousands of hours was allowed to take up a club
ship. He's a friendly and helpful person who I like very much - but
he's been out of the area for most of a year. It is questionable
whether our club guidelines on currency were checked before he flew.
He landed a club glider short of the field and twisted it up
(thankfully no injuries) - AT OUR HOME AIRFIELD. Meanwhile, I was in
the desert at another remote strip that I'd flown at only once
before. I put almost 10 hours on my new glider in 1 weekend, racking
up a lot of safe miles.

Bottom line: Blanket rules don't work, and no one is immune from bad
judgement or poor preparation no matter their location, age, or past
experience.

You MUST be prepared and you MUST exercise good judgement in ALL
phases of your flying (pre-flight preparation through post-flight
storage) - and those are the ONLY criteria that matter in the end.
GOOD instructors (of which there are far too few) need to be teaching
those things, not hard-and-fast rules or robotic procedures to be
followed to the letter. Good instructors should also be judging
pilots NOT just on how they follow a checklist or repeat a set of
steps they've been shown; but rather how the pilot reacts to different
circumstances and exercises good judgement and decision-making.

If a pilot (be it a student or a veteran) can't show good judgement
and timely decision-making, they have no business being Pilot In
Command.

I would argue that by the time you take your check-ride, you should
understand the aerodynamics and physics of your aircraft well enough
to know safe inputs from unsafe control inputs. How ONE particular
aircraft responds to those inputs and what makes it fly best is a set
of judgements (...there's that word again...) that you can only
develop with understanding and experience.

--Noel
[rant over]