It's always great to talk with Gerolf as it is his stated opinion
that the rigid wings have little to no performance advantage over the flex
wings. I love this because whenever I happen to be in competition and I'm in
with the flex wings (like in Australia in the good old days and lately at
Maryland) and I clobber the flex wings, well, I can just recall Gerolf's
statements and feel great. It's the pilot not the glider kinda thing. Makes me
think that it would be great to have the rigids back in Class 1.


He said that he had been at a competition recently at Larange flying with the
rigids and noticed that Christian Ciech with twenty kilos of ballast was able to
out perform all the rest of the ATOSes on glide. He said that he was above
launch up with all the rigids (apparently above all the other flex wings) and it
seemed like Christian was able to just go ten kmh faster. Faster even than
Jacques Bott.


Gerolf felt that Christian could handle the ballast as he was tall and could
land and flare the glider with more ease than Jacques, who is not as tall. This
made it easier for Christian to carry so much ballast. BTW, the limit for all
equipment including ballast (and clothes) is twenty five kilos.