While in Valle I decided to try my very first FAI sanctioned competition. I felt I needed to challenge myself—that competing would force me to improve and reach a new plateau in my flying much as becoming an instructor has significantly improved my flying skills.
But I had my doubts:
• What would it be like flying in very large gaggles—nearly 100 gliders waiting for the race start.
• What would the other competitors be like? These are world class experienced and agressive pilots. Would they be dangerously aggressive?
• Would I get in the way? As my first comp I planned to fly slow and carefully and didn't want to be in the path of the big-dogs with their fast and unstable comp wings.
• Would I embarrass myself on launch? I had a few of those pre-exam stress dreams. You know, the ones where you show up to the exam late and then realize you are naked... I saw myself on launch with 50 people waiting behind me as I flubbed inflation after inflation.
• How would I work the GPS? Would I screw-up so that even if I flew well, nothing would be recorded?
Add on top of that the I was sharing a house with, among others, Eric Reed, Josh Cohn, and Len Szafaryn (US 1, 2, and 3) and couldn't easily hide if I screwed up!
It turned out that Eric, Josh and Len were incredibly supportive. They are eager to get new people competing. Not only is it is fun for them to help newbies out, but more competitors improves the US's overall rankings in the world (and helps them get a better team for the world championships).
Peter Rexer, SF pilot, was also in our house and he was a first time competitor as well. So we were able to share experiences and fears and flew a good chunk of the comp together.
So how did it go? Did I find myself naked on launch flubbing inflations? Fortunately no.
Launch
It turns out that competition wings are pretty hard to launch and those of us on more stable wings had the least of the troubles on launch.
Gaggles
The pre-start gaggles were pretty intimidating, but everyone worked together to keep them safe. No one wants a mid-air and so everyone tries to stay in pattern.
Being in the way
Well, I did have a few moments in the large gaggles when I felt I crossed someone else's line, but I wasn't as much of a terror as I feared. And a few conversations with more experienced competitors like Eric and Tim gave me good pointers on how to stay in the clear.
GPS
Turns out working a GPS is easy. That said I did get fancy one day and ruin my track (I was trying to save memory...) and learned a couple things:
• Don't try to get fancy. Turn the thing on and beyond advancing way-points, leave it alone.
• Make sure the firmware is completely up to date before you leave for the comp. I had memory problems because my old firmware is inefficient with tracks. When I upgraded it (after the comp) all the problems went away.
So did I achieve my goal? Did the comp improve my flying? ABOSULTELY! And now I'm hooked. I'll be flying both the RatRace and the U.S. Nationals.
