Absurdity of US Rules (in fairness to FAI)

Do you really want to go back to a start with no 2 minute limit, so the competitively right thing to do is to get up to about 1000 feet high, then manage a high speed dive to the edge of the cylinder, while watching altitude, distance to start, airspeed, oh and of course for other gliders? Then, argue each day with the scorer about whether you have one fix in/under the cylinder, and whether you went more than 115 mph after comparing true/indicated, ground/airspeed?

The Europeans have a remarkably sensible solution (in my opinion). If a maximum start height is set, it is simply required that pilots have a single fix BELOW the start height between the time of the start gate opening (usually ~20 minutes after last launch) until the time they actually cross the start line. So you can climb into wave as high as you like and start as high as you like, as long as you do it after the start gate has opened. If you're in the wave before the start gate opens, you have to come down and then climb up again like those who launched later.

This means:
1) Everyone has a fair chance of getting into the wave / getting to cloudbase.
2) No VNE dives to get under the start line.

-matthew