Contest Reporting (in "Soaring" mag)

On Tuesday, February 2, 2016 at 11:20:38 PM UTC-7, Eric Bick (ZN7) wrote:
Another longish post-

First, I greatly appreciate this thread. I get very little direct feedback from members on magazine content. It is easy to complain, harder to constructively critique, harder yet to be a part of the improvement process.

My biggest challenge taking over as editor last March was finding enough material to fill even half the magazine. I've written articles myself to ensure we didn't publish with blank pages. (We get many photo submissions, which are much easier to generate than articles - but it is actually as hard to get an outstanding and interesting photo as it is an article. I hope everyone enjoys the March issue article about Maria Szemplinska's approach to photography in soaring.)

There is no budget to solicit articles such as published in Gliding International, which provides a modest stipend to contributors (I will be asking for such a budget for this year, but don't think it will appear).

I, too, long for the days when Dick Johnson provided his test reports of the latest and greatest, or when Bob Whelan was writing his monthly tech articles. I pored over every word written by Joe Lincoln. I devoured these reports. And stories of soaring at "exotic" spots such as Rosamond, or the Sierra Wave project. But times change. Social media have become a "voice of the people" and posting short snippets has, in many instances, replaced thoughtful writing (as opposed to sharing personal, spur of the moment, thoughts). I know many younger pilots who can't read past a couple of sentences in the first paragraph, lose patience, and go onto other things.

I've made requests in the magazine and elsewhere for specific articles on specific topics of the type I used to find so interesting, but with minimal responses. It really is true that writing an article is hard - it is time consuming, can require research and focused thought. And the editor might not like it, even after all that.

My goal is to have a stack of articles to choose from and even reject some. Not sure when/if that time will come. It is getting better, and I have been seeing some good articles, but there is much room for improvement. In my mind, the magazine is the place for more thoughtful and in-depth articles.. The SSA website carries more the social media type content. The magazine has a different purpose, partly in presenting articles of interest and depth, and partly in providing a photographic experience.

I have personally made trips to various soaring activities in order to write articles about what was being experienced by myself and those that attended (such as cross country trip), and wrote a series of articles about a neophyte flying in a first contest. This is fun for me, but I have limited time to do this. I also like to just go out and fly - and being editor does interfere with this at times.

The membership is diverse. The articles reflect that diversity. Contests are a part of the experience. I am contemplating specifying a format that summarizes the results and focuses more on the "Here's what I did" experiences from the pilots to give a flavor to non-competition pilots what it is like to fly in a contest. I've flown in one and thoroughly enjoyed it. Currently, it is a challenge to find someone who is willing to write about any particular contest. This is understandable. A contest is a high energy, focused event. Asking someone to write about it is asking them to divert their energy and focus from the contest itself. And to gather inputs from participants is asking for even more effort. Is it worth it? If it can put a reader at the contest to share in the excitement - and frustrations - it can be worth it. But it takes effort.

We've had some great articles from the likes of Mitch Polinski about his record setting attempts. I like these because they share the challenge of going after records. And we've been getting more articles about flying at different locations, which I think helps motivate pilots to get away from their home fields and accept the challenge of flying where they don't know where the house thermals are, or the safe landing spots - without doing some research.

Finally, we are faced with a series of challenges in soaring, this year and for the next few. Aging pilot population, declining SSA membership, new ATC/FAA dictates (ADS-B, etc.), changing face of competitions (to FLARM or not to FLARM), more airspace constriction/density, increasing use of drones, and other challenges. The magazine is the logical place to discuss these topics in-depth, backed up with solid research to enable intelligent decisions. Further, most of us just want to fly our gliders - but these other topics keep popping up and sometimes interfere. So who's going to write those articles that induce neophytes to really become a part of our sport? Convey the challenge and excitement of contest flying, or going on that first cross country flight? And who is going to write the in-depth articles that enable our membership to intelligently help make decisions about how we fly? If SSA members don't, then it won't happen.

Again, thanks for the inputs in this thread. They are helpful. I can use more help.

Editor, Soaring Magazine

Great response Eric, thank you. I have contributed articles in the past and I know it does take effort, for example I am currently into my third year of writing a book about my soaring experiences. I follow many people on the various media sites and they report on their efforts. With a little expansion many of those reports could be Soaring articles. I would encourage those "reporters" from the Williams, CA site at the Hollister group as well as Avenal reporters to give it a shot. I certainly enjoy reading all of their reports on the sites and I am sure others would like them as well in the Mag.

gary kemp "NK"