In my opinion it's silly for the Silver Badge flight documentation to be
more onerous than the documentation of a flight in a (US) regional or
national competition.
Declare it
Fly it
Turn in the gps log
Put the pin on your funny hat

Brent

"Mark James Boyd" wrote in message
...
First of all, I don't know if "bollocking" is a nasty word,
but I certainly wouldn't want one.

Next, I want to make it clear that my main issue is that the
rules seem to be complex to account for the old "barograph
and people watching" style of badge flying, and have a lot of
requirements that are superceded by GPS loggers.

I also want to make clear that there is a large drop in
numbers as we go from local flying to XC, and I think that
some of it is because the Silver is daunting, and made moreso
by the complexity of the rules and the realities like mine.

It's also important to note that a Silver badge is a way to
qualify for Sports regionals and that plus gold 300km gets
one qualified for other classes.

I have heard my own club members naysay the badge program
because of the complexity, and when my PW-5 syndicate talked
about the Avenal regionals, I was surprised how few had
Silver badges and wouldn't even enter a sport class if it
had been available (in the 1-26 or 2-33).

So I really like the badge program for encouraging X-C,
and would like to see what I think are more consistent rules
which make common sense and are simpler (mostly with
regard to gps). I think this would ease that transition from
local to X-C flying.

First, despite the threat of a "good bollocking," if a pilot does
wander 50km from start and then lands (without having any
declaration), that meets the Silver. If one disagrees with this
rule, please start a new thread. I interpret this to mean
that Silver is more about the X-C skill than the finding the
exact turnpoint and doing photos, but also that this was the
only way to validate (historically) that the flight was done.
Only the altitude of the landing airport was known (how
can one show from a baro trace that the pilot was above
the airport at X feet?). If the pilot did an out and
return without a declaration, and took a photo of some
random point, how can it be verified?

A gps logger solves these problems. We don't need to
use the airport altitude, we can find a point 50km away
and see what it's altitude was. We don't need to look
at random photos, we know where the glider went.

Does it make common sense that a pilot who flies
50km out, then makes it halfway back and lands out
has less skill than the pilot who landed at the 50km
away point? No. If one ends up over the landout
airport with altitude gain but then lands there
with too much loss, does this show less skill than
a pilot who lands at an airport 300 feet higher but
never made any gain? No.

Is a wandering flight to a 50km away landing really
better than a wandering 50km x 2 out and return? No.

If you think the 50km undeclared flight to a landing is
wrong and would like this eliminated, I'd understand,
and this would make the rules consistent. Then
there is a goal flight required in the Silver just like
the Gold (which very specifically says pre-declared
O&R or triangle).

But I think the Silver distance is NOT a Silver goal
flight, and should not be treated as one. I think the
inconsistency violates common sense. I think that a pilot
who can show on a gps that there were two points during
a flight which were 50km apart and met the altitude
rules has earned Silver distance. That pilot either
flew twice that distance during the flight or had a
landout. Either way, that pilot's flight was just
as noteworthy as the pilot that wandered exactly 50km
away and landed. GPS loggers allow us to validate and
recognise this flight.