A hang gliding competition is not like a soccer match, a gridiron football game, a basketball game, a baseball or cricket match. You are not faced with an opponent that you must defeat by engaging with them physically. In these matches you are beating your opponent. Not just performing better, but doing things to encourage your opponent to perform less well.

In soccer and football your players go one on one against the one team players and try to get around or through them, to over power them. You try hard to stop your opponent. You have a team game plan that requires you to beat down the other team.

In a sprint, say like the 100 meter or 200 meter race, the kind of races that we saw recently at the Olympics, where Usain Bolt set world records, the runner is not so much running against the other competitors, who are basically running their own races, but against the records of past races and against his past performance. One runner wins the race, but doesn't beat down the other runners, who really are not appropriately seen as opponents. All the runners are striving to do their best and let the judges and the clocks determine who does the best on that day.

In longer races, the runners work together to set and keep the pace. One runner will be out in front, helping those runners behind conserve their energy by reducing the wind for them. This runner may stay in front, if he is stronger than the others, or may drop back to have some other runner take over the task of pacing the race. The runners cooperate because it is beneficial to each and all of them.

In a long distance bicycle race, such as the Tour de France, teams and individual riders work together both in the peloton and in the break away groups that try to stay out in front of the peloton. One rider or a group of riders will get to the front and set the pace. They will drop back and the lead will rotate, giving everyone a chance to conserve energy. Those who don't take on their fair share of the lead are looked down upon.

Bicycle races have a high level of cooperation. Both within the teams and between teams and individual racers. Everyone knows that cooperation helps everyone. Everyone knows that the race is not to the swift on one day, but to the team and rider who can do well enough over the long period of the race.

At the end of the day, there is a sprint, and one rider wins the day. The sprinters have conserved their energy and are ready for a fast finish, usually only a few seconds in front of the peloton. They get a few points for winning the day, but not enough to sway the outcome of the overall race, if they are not already doing well overall, and can handle the climbs and the time trials.

In a hang gliding cross country competition, your fellow pilots are even more crucial to your success than your fellow riders are in a long distance bicycle race. Likewise team members are even more important.

You need your fellow pilots to greatly increase your odds of finding the next invisible thermal. No matter how good you are at finding thermals, two pilots double the odds (approximately). Three is even better, four even more.

Not only that, they help you find the best core, when you are happy with the core that you are in. This very much speeds up your flight.

The value of fellow pilots varies depending on the conditions. A day full of cu's marking the thermals means that you might have all the help that you need finding thermals, so you might be able to make a break away on your own. Of course, your fellow pilots can also try the same trick.

Given the high value of cooperation in flying a task, it means that hang gliding competitions are among the most cooperative of competitions. Add to this the high value of team communication during a task, hang gliding can be seen as a team sport (see the results of the British team at the 2007 Worlds) as well as an individual sport.

You do not "beat" your opponent in a hang gliding competition. You are competing against yourself. You are doing your best to have your best performance on any given day. Your fellow pilots provide a yard stick with which you can measure your performance.

Your fellow pilots show you what can be done on any given day. You are shown how well you could have done and how you need to improve if you wish to match their performance.

This means that you have to be able to absorb disappointment and be ready to come back for more. You have to deal with envy and frustration. You have to be willing to learn and willing to approach other pilots to ask for help and their thoughts about the day.

We all realize that we are all in this together. We know that making our fellow pilots better will only wind up helping us as we'll have better skilled pilots to help us find the next thermal or race to goal.

My message to all those pilots who have not entered a cross country competition, is to take your ego in hand, and come join up with us at the next available meet. Enter the Sport Class. Think of a competition as a big get together/fly-in with extra added excitement and a learning opportunity.

I would love to hear from anyone who has good ideas about how to get pilots who are new to competition to come join us.