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Old August 21st 09, 06:39 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
Frank Whiteley
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Default USA: Regional Contest Entry w/ Drop Outs

On Aug 21, 6:14*am, Andy wrote:
On Aug 13, 7:00*am, Tony Condon
wrote:

As a pilot who has never flown a contest, I think the entry fees are high
enough. *Typically by the time you pay for entry fees and tows its
something like 600 bucks right? *That's what I recall paying when I
registered for the Region 7 contest that Paul Remde organized a few years
back. *I had to withdraw when I wasn't able to finish my Silver Badge in
time. *I really struggled coming up with that money at the time just to
register. *That 600ish dollars would pretty much pay for a seasons worth
of tows at home. *


As a matter of principle I don't think it's right to expect others to
carry the costs of our choices - even if our choices are forced on us
by personal life circumstances beyond our control. Signing up for a
contest is a commitment. With that commitment comes responsibility.

I think it would be reasonably straightforward to estimate the
marginal cost of a dropout to a typical contest - or at least within a
range. I think it is reasonable to charge last-minute dropouts this
amount, which could be reduced subject to drop-ins or last-minute cost-
reduction measures at the organizer's discretion. You could even put
the charge on a sliding scale from the preferential entry deadline.

Ferry costs, personnel lodging, meal deposits/guarantees and pilot
materials tend to be fixed costs. The bulk of the cost of a contest is
the tows themselves. Much of the cost of the tow is fuel plus an
allowance for maintenance, so you can argue that much of the tow cost
is variable. Since tow pilots already take some risk due to poor
weather, you could say that most of the tow fee is a variable cost,
though I'd be likely to want to cover some "opportunity cost" for tow
pilots who show up and get less than the expected number of tows due
to no-shows. Sanction fees are variable, I believe, as may be some
other costs. To the extent that things like meals cost are subject to
minimum commitments you could envision allowing the first "n" dropouts
off the hook, but charging "n+1" their full cost of going below the
minimum. This creates an incentive for pilots to drop out as soon as
they know rather than sitting on the information as costs mount for
the organizers.

To the extent that organizers want to subsidize the cost of dropouts
to make signing up a bit less of a commitment and potentially increase
participation, that should be their choice, but I'd favor trying to
reduce the financial cost to organizers of poor drop-out etiquette.

9B


The SSA sanction fee is $45/pilot for a regional and the event
insurance is ~$850 if unsanctioned and discounted to ~$550 if
sanctioned. Note that in many cases, local premises liability is
_not_ in effect during an 'air meet'. That detail killed our local
friendly contest.

Frank Whiteley