Thanks to people like Ian, Robert, Herbert, Jack, Ruud, Janos and other
respectable guys, I am very much convinced now that it cannot be that an
excellent 1000 km performance is japordized by an FAI rule of which the true
intention has been fulfilled in a very convincing way.
I am talking again about the 1000 km performance of Ronald Termaat. His
flight can be seen at
http://www.onlinecontest.de/olcphp/2...hp?ref3=119825
The pilot visited the first turnpoint of his 1000 km flight also as his
third turnpoint after having flown a distance of over 800 km in mainly flat
country and about 7.5 hrs later. "Yoyo-ing" is what FAI says since the "10
km apart / only once rule" applies and so the 1000 km FAI badge cannot be
granted. To my opinion there is much more truth in saying that we are
talking here about a prestigious 800 km "out and return" as part of a still
larger flight rather then a "yoyo".
Flying back and forth several times between two nearby turnpoints to achieve
a large distance is not very sportif I guess, especially when done in wave
or along a mountain ridge. So there should be a rule indeed to prevent that
such a performance is rewarded with a respectable FAI badge. However the
rule should be clever enough to avoid that when "yoyo-ing" is completely out
of the question, a great performance is still japordized by it.
Is it difficult to have better wordings for a rule then "10 km apart / only
once" to avoid "yoyo-ing" and not having the desastrous effect on a great
performance in a "distance flight using up to three turn points" (1.4.5.b.
of the Code). Not at all to my opinion. The intention of "up to three
turnpoints" in the flight definition is that no more then three times a turn
point should be visited. Difficult to capture that in a simple rule; not at
all I guess.
What do you think of a rule like:
"In any sequence not more then up to three visits to declared turnpoints can
be claimed" replacing the "10 km apart / only once " rule given in 1.4.5.b.
of the Code.

Please give your comments; we are preparing an amendment for the next
meeting of IGC to have this disastrous rule changed. And of course we like
to give it a ''best shot".

Regards,

Karel Termaat, NL