Living at a tow park, you're exposed to this stuff on a daily basis. Some things seem to pop up pretty regularly.
Here's some of my favourites.
Staying up.
A huge topic for sure. There's just so much to it. But, where do you start? What's really important?
In a word? ... well, it's two actually.
Lapse Rate.
If there is one thing that dominates all others for staying up, that's pretty much it. After all, what does it really matter how you fly if there are no thermals or if they're too weak to use? Start with the lapse rate. It's too easy and natural to judge yourself for sinking out. "Why can't I stay up?"
Where to find it?
Dr Jack.
There are plenty of other sources, but Dr Jack's Blipmap is clean and simple.
http://www.drjack.info/BLIP/
It will also help you to understand when to fly, rather than just worshiping at the altar of "2pm".
I could write a book on the 2pm myth... the weather is no where near that simple.
Coring.
This one simple rule of thumb will keep you in the air better than anything else...
If the lift is increasing, turn less. If the lift is decreasing, turn more.
Here's a wonderful article about it...
It is truly magical...
The 270deg correction.
This goes hand in hand with that coring rule of thumb.
If you follow the rule, you will do this without realizing it.
When you hit lift... DO NOT TURN!
This is probably the #1 mistake people make when learning to thermal. Remember that rule of thumb? The lift is increasing... fly STRAIGHTER... wait for it to decrease... then turn. The direction of the turn doesn't matter. You use the same plan either way... that golden rule.
If you guess correct, the lift will increase and you'll flatten out a little... you're already in lift and finding the core at this point... carry on.
If you guess wrong, the lift will decrease.
OH GOD!
Don't panic... follow the plan. Disaster awaits those who don't.
The lift is decreasing?... turn more.
Still decreasing?... turn more.
You will eventually find that you do a 270deg turn.
A 270deg turn is like turning the opposite direction. If you were going to turn left, but instead turn right three times, you still wind up going left.
BUT
You spend less time in sink.
When you hit the lift again, you're already in the correct position to core it.
Follow the plan.
It works.
Practice makes Permanent.
Most people don't have the luxury of revolving their lives around the good weather. They instead fit hang gliding into their lives.
So, you get whatever weather lines up with your schedule.
This is very apparent when people come out to "practice" landings.
A difficult reality of running a school is cancelling students. I call it "the bad news phone call". We call them Friday night and let them know that Saturday morning's lesson isn't going to happen because of the weather (the weather reports are published around 8pm). It sucks for both of us. It's frustrating for sure. But trying to learn in bad weather not only doesn't help, it hurts (sometimes literally). For those that view it as a "challenge"... sorry, the reality is that It's harder and it actually takes longer... way longer. And you don't "come out ahead", you actually come out behind.
So as much as you want to "work on your landings", realize that you need good weather to do so. Practicing in less than ideal conditions makes things worse for you.. way worse. Not only does it make it far more difficult to learn, you learn the wrong things. The more you practice the wrong things, the harder it becomes to learn the right things. It is far more productive to learn the right things first.
To "learn" landings... you want no more than 5mph and steady wind. Landing in 10mph not only teaches you nothing, it teaches you the wrong things. Landing in switchy winds or gusty winds is a trainwreck for learning.
You can extrapolate this idea far beyond the weather.
Don't "learn" to land on a high performance glider. Learn on a Falcon. When you can pull off no-wind no-steppers with correct form in your sleep, then move on. Until you can, you're making your life harder and will progress slower.
Lift Lines
We've all heard of "Cloud Streets".
Clouds line up for a reason (bigger topic than I'm getting into here).
An other way to say it is that lift lines up.
So does sink.
So, if you're flying along looking for that next thermal... upwind and downwind of your last one is the place to look... even if the sky isn't "Streeting".
This also holds true when you're just searching.
If you're flying along searching and you hit less sink.. turn into wind a little. Lift is less dense than sink... which means that it's the path of least resistance... which means it's where the thermals will gravitate towards (which is part of why clouds street). If you nudge towards upwind and the sink gets less.. you're on the right track. If it gets worse, turn away from the wind direction and see what you get.
Soon enough, you'll be wandering into thermals without thinking about it.
Well, that's my $.02 for now.
I'm probably wrong... usually am.
Jim
