On Tue, 25 Jan 2011 11:01:34 -0800, lanebush wrote:

I can address the "does anyone bother with badges anymore?"

As one of the club CFIGs the badges are a motivator for our students /
members. I love the OLC and am a participant. However, the OLC is not
the same motivator as a badge and does not have the nostalgia or
duration of a badge. The badge program really seems to be getting
slammed by competition pilots and I just don't quite get it. Newly
certified pilots can ready the Silver requirements and it provides real
inspiration as does the ABC/Bronze program. There are plenty of
improvements that could be made to make the approval more user friendly
but as leaders in the cross country scene lets quit slamming the badge
program please.

+1

In addition I'd like to point out that the badge system, at least as my
club uses it, is a direct stepping stone to competition flying. This is
because we start out by encouraging the use of predeclared tasks for all
XC flying:

- Silver distance: fly to a designated gliding club and land there

- 100 km diploma: this is a UK qualification that requires a
predeclared 100 km task to be scored. 1st leg involves simply flying
the task. 2nd leg involves flying the task and achieving a handicapped
65+ kph task speed.

- Gold distance: we usually fly that as a Diamond Goal flight and claiming
for both

- Diamond distance: again we pre-declare it.

Our prime reason for pre-declaring an xc flight and leaving a written
declaration at the launch point is safety: if the pilot doesn't return or
ring in after a land-out we have some idea of where to search. Secondly,
flying a predeclared task and making correct use of FAI or beer-can
turnpoints is good for honing and keeping navigation skills.


--
martin@ | Martin Gregorie
gregorie. | Essex, UK
org |