Gary Osoba <<email>> writes:

Unlike the Austin Statesman article (http://ozreport.com/12.147#1) which referred to a "freestyle" flight, this was a free distance record. The reporter, in addition to several other inaccuracies in the article, wanted to focus on total ground covered, including circling. She derived the 615 miles from the igc file which showed 22% circling flight, multiplying that times the average ground speed, and coming up with her figure. She had a hard time understanding why we couldn't simply fly point to point without circling. The graphics reporter who produced the two charts with some coaching by cell phone while I was on the highway and help from a good friend, Davis Straub (who was sitting at his computer), did a much better job of representing what happened. Even so, it was a pretty good flight for the lowly 11.89 meter span Woodstock- a max glide of 24:1 and a maneuvering speed of 67 knots- pretty limited in that regard.

The straight line distance of a little under 500 miles exceeded the prior world record of the Silent II (39:1 L/D) by about 100 miles. This was set by Leo Benneti Lhongini, who is possibly the nicest person in all of soaring. The year following his record, I flew that same glider (Silent (( WR prototype which was built sxpecifically to fit my flying weight) to 992 km free distance, but decided not to file it for FAI homologation since: 1) I wanted Leo to enjoy his record for a while; 2) that glider is easily capable of 1000km to 1250 km from this site when flown accurately. With the Woodstock, I was on pace to get another 120-150 miles but flew into the stagnant remains of a front.

The Woodstock is a very good climber, and I enjoy flying it very much. It possesses wonderful handling and balance. Jim Maupin and the genius Irv Culver really got it right. In the low performance class, I am certain that I can easily beat 1-26's and even Ka-6's every time when you understand what the glider performance envelope is and isn't. It requires the right flight techniques which are not necessarily found in the textbooks, but it is quite reliable. About 1/3 of my 15 world records for DU General Category FAI have been set in this glider.

Flying out of Zapata is a challenge, but as Oz Report readers know we picked this location for the weather particulars. Out of Zapata, hang gliders and paragliders have multiple landing options but for a sailplane here is simply no place to land safely for the first 40-50 miles- at that point, there is an intersection of the Interstate and a state highway if you had to land.

Most days, you are leaving at 1200-1500' agl at 9:30 to 10:15 am. In a sailplane, you either have to know what you're doing, or have lots of guts, or a healthy mixture of both. Guts only will destroy a glider, hopefully without injury to the pilot. After the first 40-50 miles, on the course flown, its not very landable for another 100 miles or so early in the day and low but there a few landing strips here and there. Otherwise, the flight was lots of fun and it was a good day until running into the stable atmosphere.

With the good conditions, I was able to leave much higher than I normally have from this location. I deferred to Dustin Martin on the launch or would have left about 15 minutes earlier. I'm glad I did so, because in the end it made no difference- no matter how fast I would have flown or when I started, I got all the path would allow. With Dustin, he had a wonderful flight and but for one or two zigs or zags could have easily had the world record by another 50 miles or so.

Re early starts in "sailplanes", 750' agl at about 8:00 am in the Carbon Dragon would work here. I have developed some dynamic lateral energy harvesting maneuvers for light gliders which prove efficacious on a flight like this but didn't really resort to them much on this particular flight because the conditions were quite good for most of it. This was in part the subject of a study I was a special consultant to Paul MacCready on until his untimely death last year.

I'd be happy to answer any other questions that might be of interest to your readers and useful to foot-launched glider. All of this pales into the mourning of the wonderful Dick Johnson, who was a good friend to me.