Maybe I misunderstood, but Flub’s description of his approach technique seems very mechanical and/or contrived. To me it seems very similar to how I was taught in a 2-33 using Joy of Soaring, except instead of “being at 500 feet over the red barn” he keeps 50% spoiler and moves his ground track toward and away from the airport.

Tom Knauff transitioned me into my ASW-19 at Ridge Soaring, and of course he taught me to use TLAR. What I took away from him was to “always look and judge how the approach is going”, and to do what you had to do with the controls to put the glider into the proper position. Those of you who’ve flown at Ridge Soaring know that the approach to 25 is never amenable to recipe flying...

Tom’s TLAR has served me well during both routine and very tricky approaches. Honestly I couldn’t tell you where my spoilers are, unless I hit either the forward or aft limit while reacting to extreme sink or lift. But I can always tell you if I’m too high or too low! And during every approach I always hear my instructor Jack chanting “airspeed, yaw string”, over and over.

-John, Q3