Attention US Standard Class Pilots

So I've been flying gliders since early 2007 and competing in
Regionals, in the Sports Class, around the western US since 2009.
I've placed well enough in 2010 and 2011 competitions to garner a good
pilot-ranking and am looking to compete in my first Nationals. Since
I'll admit that I was one of the first people UH approached about this
idea during the Reno Convention, I'll toss in my $0.02 here.

1) I would appreciate the handicap (since I own a DG-300) and I won't
turn it down if offered. I really like the idea of flying somewhere
technical like Montague, and its an easier drive for me than Parowan
(I can only take so much vacation time in a single chunk). I am sure
that with or without a handicap, I'm likely to get my ass kicked in my
first Nats. So this isn't about some grand illusion that I can win or
that this handicap suddenly levels the playing-field between myself
and the more-experienced pilots. But it does lessen the sense that I
can't *possibly* win, given that my ship just won't run with a Discus
2 or an ASW-28. On any day where we're cruising at ~75 to 80 knots,
I'm going to lose ground - its written into the polar curves of these
gliders. Its not as much fun to go to a contest to know that you're
at a physical disadvantage and that you have to _rely_ on the mistakes
of others, in order to do as well as them.

Here's what I mean, using some rough back-of-the-envelope calcs: Look
at the difference between my DG-300 polar and a D2 polar. I'm going
to ignore the magnifying effects of water-ballast and stick with dry
polars for simplicity. MacCready settings in the 3-4 range roughly
correspond to the 70-80 knot cruise speed range for both ships. But
now look at the sink-rate difference at those speeds. The D2 has a
30-45 fpm advantage in these speed ranges. Now imagine a 3-hour
thermal task, which will roughly have about 25% of the time spent
thermalling and roughly 75% in cruise. That works out to 135 minutes
cruising, and if we apply a 20+% fudge-factor for time spent
accelerating or horsing around we wind up with about 105 minutes in
cruise with the D2 taking advantage of its lesser sink-rate. 105mins
* 30fpm = 3150 feet! So over a 3 hour thermal task in my DG-300 I
have to basically find an extra 3000+ feet of extra climb, while
taking 0 extra minutes to do so. That's no small feat, considering
that normally a 3000 foot climb would take more than 7 minutes in a 4
knot thermal!

....And let's remember that the people who are most likely to have
built up their finances to the point where they can afford a latest-
generation ship are the same people who are older and more experienced
in the sport - so its not like you have a lot of people in hot glass
that don't know how to use it.

One of the upsides of the Sports Class is that it allows people (like
me) to buy our first glider with an eye on basic XC performance and
then go race whatever it is we bought. If we decide we like racing,
we don't *have* to sell our first glider and buy a different one in
order to be moderately competitive. But of course the "downside" is
that we may not consider the racing pedigree of our early aircraft
purchases because it doesn't matter a whole lot at the Regional/Sports-
Class level and that can box us into a corner when it comes time to
move up (for example, I bought my DG-300 because it had excellent
ergonomics and the safety-factor of automatic hookups, while being a
40:1 ship - its high speed performance was never considered). Now
when the price-gap between ships isn't big, its no great hassle. But
when you look at having to _double_ your equipment costs in order to
make any meaningful upward move in performance, this becomes a bigger
deal.

2) While I am hesitant about opening the Std Class up to handicapping
(yes, it could prove to be a can of worms and I too wonder about
multiple handicapped classes), let's look at the Standard Class
aircraft and participation for a minute -
First, don't cherry-pick two years and try to make some claim about
geography. If you look at the last 4-5 years of Std Class Nationals
(as I did), there have consistently been about 12 - 14 ships no matter
where the contest was held. This is lower than the numbers in the
Sports, 15m, and 18m classes (well, except perhaps the World Class -
ugh). Now let's examine why that might be. The performance
difference between latest-generation 15m ships and Std ships is not
that big; but the 15m ships definitely offer a lot more versatility.
With a 15m ship you can use the flaps to make slight gains in climb
AND cruise, as well as adjusting your performance to the conditions a
bit better. You can also use a 15m ship to be reasonably competitive
in 15m, Sports, AND 18m classes (if the 18m contest is held at a site
with moderate-to-strong conditions). Given the way that Nationals are
scheduled to happen on one coast or another (which is a totally
separate topic I'd love to debate some day), being able to compete in
3 classes is VERY nice for those of us with 8-to-5 jobs and/or
families that we cannot leave for 3+ weeks at a time to travel across
the country. Being able to always attend _some_ kind of National
contest in your local region is a boon. But what about the cost
difference? How much more do you pay for that 15m ship performance
and versatility (versus a Std class ship)? Almost Nothing. On W&W at
the time of this posting, there are ASW-27s and ASW-28s going for
almost the exact same price.

That's why I've been looking at selling my DG-300 and buying an
ASW-27. This would be a serious stretch for me, but if I'm going to
stretch why the hell WOULDN'T I get something that gives me more class
flexibility? A '27 isn't the ideal ship in all 3 classes, but its a
heck of a lot closer in all 3 than my DG is in any one of those
classes (much less all 3).

3) Since I mentioned Handicapping... Someone brought up the Club/
Sports class. I may be one of the less-experienced folks in the room
here, but IMHO if you think that the Sports/Club class is the
"beginner" class (at the National level), you're dead wrong. Go look
at the experienced accomplished pilots who are running in the Sports
Class Nats every year, trying to get selected for the WGC teams. See
them hunting the optimal handicap and buying a SECOND AIRCRAFT (or
third aircraft, in some cases) to optimize their chances? This class
may be great at the Regional level for encouraging participation and
newbies (something I have very much appreciated) - but its a whole
different animal at the National level. If we're worried about new
pilots being able to afford one competitive glider, how on earth can
more than a small handful of guys afford two or three gliders, and/or
change every few years as handicaps change? Its not like the current
Std Class ships are renowned for having the optimal handicaps for
Sports/Club class, either - so its not like new folks can run out to
buy a single latest-generation ship and be at the top of the pile in
both classes. And let there be no confusion: The people doing this
are not "evil" in any way. They're perfectly within the rules and
their rights to do so. You simply have the conflation of two goals
wrapped up into a single contest: US Team Selection and crowning a
National Champion. Each has their own set of incentives and side-
issues, and they don't necessarily overlap at all points; but it is
what it is.

4) There are some fuzzy gray areas in all of this, which you're going
to have to delineate by drawing lines in the sand. As John Cochrane
has pointed out in some of his writing, people adjust their behavior
based on how you measure their performance and what incentives you
provide them. For example: Do you handicap in order to try to allow
people to be competitive in less-than-ideal gear? Or do you refuse
handicapping and effectively make the statement that this is a
National Championship and a "serious deal", and just like other high-
order sports (whether its downhill skiing or open-wheel race-cars) you
have a really hard time winning without the absolute top equipment and
a budget to match? (A key difference with those other sports is that
they pay athletes and have TV deals; but perhaps you think that
shouldn't factor into the equation). It mostly comes down to personal
opinions and judgement in this area. The same tradeoff/judgements have
to be made about what the role of the Standard Class Nationals is.
There's not necessarily a right or wrong answer; but collectively the
soaring pilots have to come to a consensus about these topics and then
pick the course of action that supports or encourages the behavior an
the type of event they want to see.

--Noel