WAGA X-Country Lectures En-Route Decisions

2 What’s here?  What’s the best Secret for Success  When to start?  What ring setting to use?  What speed to fly?  What thermals should we take?  What changing conditions can we expect?  When should we dump water ballast?

3 Practice Everyday you can

4 Secret to success MORE PRACTICE!!!!

5 When to start?  4000 feet above ground level for your first X-countries  3000 feet AGL if you are desperate to go far  6000 feet AGL if you want to go fast  but you have to start at 3280 feet (1 KM) to set records.

6 McCready Ring Settings 2kts 6kts 0kts 2kts

7 What thermals should we take?  In the best part of the day, only the best  the best way to increase your x-country speed is to increase your climb rate  use other gliders as visual variometers  if they are doing better than you  join them

8 Ring Setting  Rule of thumb should be half your best average rate  should be the reading that you leave the thermal  and the minimum strength that you take the next thermal  if under 3000 feet AGL, wind back to 1 Knot.

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10 Inter-thermal Speed Control  Generally McCready averages a speed  Some guns fly constant speed (Ingo)  then slow to 60 knots looking at lift  then back to thermalling speed when decision is made to take it  be fussy about what you take  fly fast in sink, fly slow in lift

11 Watch for Changing Conditions  Around pm get high, stay high  3 o’clock pause often happens because air mass gets homogeneously hot  then convection resumes normally  Watch out for late afternoon increase in lift  usually in the pre-seabreeze mini-trough  plan for a sea-breeze final glide

12 Water Ballast +3 knots = keep it -3 knots = lose it Finally another hot tip:

13 Even more practice!!!

Questions?