Hard Deck

At 18:02 30 January 2018, jfitch wrote:

On a day when most people can stay high, true. On a day when
only a few make it home, not true. In a contest where that day
determines the winner, a single low save can determine the winner.

The 1958 WGC Open Class was won on a day like that, except that
E.G. Haase (as relayed personally to me) made a string of very
low saves (albeit all over very landable terrain) and was thus able
to tiptoe his way to victory that day. He was then able to defend his
lead until the contest ended. It was a brilliant flight, not luck. Some
pilots are just better at that kind of flying than others. For example,
in Belgium, they have a maximum altitude of 3,000' due to
controlled airspace over the entire country. Those guys fly low a
lot.

The 1985 WGC STD Class was also won that way on a very difficult
day where a lot of us landed out. LB found a small thermal at
around 100 meters, (possibly marked by a team mate?) which
eventually got him high enough to get back home. This gave
him enough of a lead to win the contest. Leo later even wrote an
article about "the thermal that won him the WGC".

I am sure that there are more examples of this.... I am just
personally familiar with these two right off the top of my head.

Contests are most often decided on the difficult days. In general,
the performance on those days separates the best from the rest.
If one just wants to race on the nice days, it seems like an OLC
camp would be the place to go. If you want to pick a national
champion who will have any kind of a shot at being competitive
at a WGC, then one can't eliminate the difficult days.

RO

On Tuesday, January 30, 2018 at 11:00:07 PM UTC-5, Michael Opitz wrote:
At 18:02 30 January 2018, jfitch wrote:

The 1958 WGC Open Class was won on a day like that, except that
E.G. Haase (as relayed personally to me) made a string of very
low saves (albeit all over very landable terrain) and was thus able
to tiptoe his way to victory that day. He was then able to defend his
lead until the contest ended. It was a brilliant flight, not luck. Some
pilots are just better at that kind of flying than others. For example,
in Belgium, they have a maximum altitude of 3,000' due to
controlled airspace over the entire country. Those guys fly low a
lot.

Did he mention his thermal detector?! This is pretty good stuff, especially the last two paragraphs. The good ole days
https://www.flightglobal.com/FlightP...20-%200010.PDF

At 14:58 01 February 2018, Clay wrote:
On Tuesday, January 30, 2018 at 11:00:07 PM UTC-5, Michael
Opitz wrote:
At 18:02 30 January 2018, jfitch wrote:

The 1958 WGC Open Class was won on a day like that, except
that
E.G. Haase (as relayed personally to me) made a string of very
low saves (albeit all over very landable terrain) and was thus
able
to tiptoe his way to victory that day. He was then able to defend
his
lead until the contest ended. It was a brilliant flight, not luck.
Some
pilots are just better at that kind of flying than others. For
example,
in Belgium, they have a maximum altitude of 3,000' due to
controlled airspace over the entire country. Those guys fly low a
lot.

Did he mention his thermal detector?! This is pretty good stuff,
especially the last two paragraphs. The good ole days
https://www.flightglobal.com/FlightP...58/1958-1-%20-
%200010.PDF

Thanks for the link. No, E.G. never mentioned the thermal detector
to me. He talked very extensively about the HKS-3, and what they
did to tune it though. They used wing warping as opposed to
ailerons in order to minimize interference drag. The canopy
didn't have a vent or window so as not to disturb the air in front
of the wing root. He had a vent air exhaust in the tail-cone, but
could only get ventilation air through a scoop in the wheel well
when the gear was down. So, he generally thermalled with the
gear down for cockpit ventilation, and cruised with the gear
retracted. He said that everyone thought he was crazy to
always thermal with the gear down, but that was his only access
to fresh air as the rest of the glider was sealed up so tightly. He
told me to always have a vent air extraction exit that was 50%
larger than the inlet vent so as to prevent positive pressure
buildup inside the glider.

That was back in 1972 when I was 21. I stayed at his house as
a guest for ~a week, and flew with him and his club in Vogtareuth
Germany. I even became the first person other that E.G.
or his partner allowed to fly his ASK-14 motorglider. I think I
logged about ~20 hours flying in the German Alps with it. Those
were very good times for me...

RO