USA Proposed Rule Change on Start Time Reporting

On Wednesday, January 28, 2015 at 3:04:01 PM UTC-8, wrote:

The provision for allowing start times to be called in well after the start was put in to make it viable for a pilot to call his start in for the original intended reasons while minimizing the tactical issues. It also left in the ability for pilots to have a sense of how they were doing later in the flight which many really like. Whether I like it is directly related to how I'm doing, I admit it.
If you call in 30 seconds after you start, you are either a chump or making a false start. Or----- Maybe you are letting the guy you would like to fly with know it's time to go. Hmmmmmmmm!!!!!!
The process will still be there, just a little simpler and not mandatory.
UH

To elaborate on UH's historical context - here is little insight on the logic behind this change.

The original rule came about as part of the transition from start gate/photo evidence tasking to start cylinder/GPS evidence tasking. GPS marked the demise of ground controlled, visually measured, redline dive starts. As a guy who got to man the start line (more fun when Spratt was there) or start height (Maytag repairman lonely and boring) half of the gate I can attest this was a good thing.

As mentioned, the purpose of start time reporting was to provide enjoyment, peace of mind and expectations for finish times for ground personnel by knowing when pilots went out on course, but also specifically to minimize the tactical benefit to pilots by making it very hard to follow a competitor based on a 15 minute delayed call.

With the broad adoption of various forms of sailplane tracking (including now free, smartphone based ones - funny how these different rules interact), start time reporting is now of zero incremental benefit to people on the ground - trackers are superior in just about every way imaginable.

The recording of start time reporting is not reliable enough to be enforced by rule (radio transmission/reception issues, stepped on starts, garbled reports). It is also an additional work task for contest personnel as someone needs to stand by a radio and focus on nothing but careful listening and recording of every start. Ask anyone who has done this how much fun it is. (N.B. Adding an additional requirement for positive receipt of start time reports through return radio confirmation would make this burden even worse, and for no benefit based on the original logic for the rule).

The inherent ambiguity as relates to start time reports as described above makes enforcement by rule problematic. If your start wasn't recorded on the ground does this mean you didn't try to report it from the air or it just didn't get through for some reason? What if you misread your start altitude/time in some way? What if you exit the cylinder not intending to take a start? What if your start is disallowed after the fact (say, for a 2 minute rule violation) thereby making an earlier exit from the cylinder that you didn't intend as a start to become your official start and the one that needs to be reported? (Don't laugh, these things happen and get adjudicated). 2014 pointed the problems with the rule out in spades with a long, drawn-out and man-hour intensive protest and subsequent appeals.

At the vast majority of contests I've attended (maybe 100%) the CD has gone with the default, voluntary reporting regime, yet pilots regularly report start times without being required to. That is how it usually works. Pilots report, people on the ground who care (and other pilots who care) listen, but nobody is legally responsible for recording it. This state of affairs argues against making reporting of start time information illegal outright - plus the RC is not so much in the mindset of banning things these days.

Lastly, if pilots want to track starts Flarm is a far better tool. You can see practically the entire front half of the start cylinder with Flarm and therefore see who is really taking a start rather than just reporting a cylinder exit so the whole start roulette dance is reduced.

The change simply eliminates version of the rule that, 1) is rarely, if ever, used, 2) is an additional chore for contest personnel if it is used, 3) creates enforcement problems and 4) is no longer needed for its intended purpose to be served due to technological innovations in the sport (Flarm and sailplane trackers).

Feel free to continue to report your start times (or not) as you have always done. No one is going to stand in your way if you want to and no one is going to make a Federal case out of it if you don't.

Now, back to the MAT-ness.

9B