On Monday, December 17, 2012 2:47:27 PM UTC-6, Bob Kuykendall wrote:
While I agree with Lane that such a rule would be too heavy handed an approach, I can certainly understand its utility on a couple of broad fronts: 1. I think that soaring contests are too often too insular. At too many contests you see the same old faces and no new ones. Putting in place measures that encourage pilots to bring crew would increase exposure of the sport to new pilots and also to not-yet pilots. 2. I can certainly agree that contests with a high percentage of crewless pilots can be a pain. Most such pilots do indeed take reasonable precautions to ensure that their crewlessness does not adversely affect other pilots or the contest as a whole. However, it doesn't take much bad luck or bad weather for things to go to worms in a hurry. 3. Despite protestations to the contrary, I persist in the conviction that crewless pilots typically don't bring their full game to a contest.. The measure of conservativity required to compete on that basis denies everybody the kind of contest experience they could be getting. I've seen time and again how one hot competitor will inspire everybody to bring it up a notch, and that is less likely to happen where the majority are tiptoeing between aeroretrive opportunities. Thanks, Bob K.

to the contrary, offering visiting pilots crew for a fixed cost per day may encourage new pilots to go to a contest.

Perhaps the better way to offer it would be something like "Crew is available for the low low price of $50 per day. A 50 point penalty per occurence will apply if you block the runway after landing."

btw i enjoyed reading through the RC Minutes and look forward to seeing the proposed rules when they are posted. Particular interested in the new rules allowing radio use at regionals. This will come in really handy at the regional i'm planning to organize this season, where I expect a 50%+ "newbie" rate.