Discipline
Hang Gliding
What do we want ?
Less stress and dangerous situation due to congestion and too many gliders.
How do we achieve that ?
Limit the number of pilots to 80
Issue category :
Comments
Not a HG pilot here but this seems so natural. Typical "hard to adopt" proposal when the institution is more positioned as an organiser than a ruler and a representative of the sport. It's clear lowering to 80 pilots represent less fee.
another approach would be to have a higher minimum ranking request to qualify (to CAT.1) - also in PG XC ?
Also both approaches are not contradictory.
Hi,
I don’t think reducing the number of pilots will result in less stress or fewer dangerous situations.
When did we last have a mid-air collision in a large group before the start? The last HG Cat. 1 incident was just a wing-to-wing touch, and I think it wasn’t even in a big crowd (ask Gordon).
When we thermal before the start gate in a Cat. 1 competition with 110 registered pilots, there are usually a maximum of 70–80 pilots in the air under one cloudbase— not everyone is there at once. At any given altitude or proximity level, there are about 20–30 pilots.
If we cut the maximum number of participants to 80, the start gaggle will still have the same stress and density. We’ll just be cutting out the pilots who aren’t even part of the dense gaggle.
What can actually be improved by reducing the number of participants in Cat. 1 HG competitions?
We could be in the air sooner (especially considering mixed Cat. 1 Flex and Rigid Wing categories), giving us a bigger window for the task. Longer tasks are, in my opinion, safer — pilots have more time to correct errors and feel less pressure to push too hard. This year, we had too small a flyable window (too many pilots + mixed classes).
How can we create less crowded/dense situations before the start?
We should encourage pilots to take the second or third start gate. Nowadays, with “leading points” scoring, pilots who take later gates are significantly penalized. Possible solutions:
Cheers,
Robert
Hello Robert,
Thanks for your ideas! Always great to hear from you.
The start gaggle is just one of a congestion problem. In Ager you had a congestion after the start, where quite a lot of pilots reported "hairy" situations.
Reducing the number of pilots doesn't solve a single occurance for sure, but it reduces the chances as such or you can say statistically.
I agree, reducing the number of pilots solves also quite some other problems
- The number of "special cases" to treat gets reduced by a lot, special cases could be everything the organisation has to deal specially with
- The NAC has to make stronger selections on who has to join (hopefully rising the pilots level)
- The weather window does not need to be that big
- Take-Offs needs less space and are less of a hassle
Remember, there are plenty of beautiful Cat 2 events where pilots can get better. "We" don't need to take everyone to a Cat 1 event, where learning how to fly in a comp should not be the main argument to join. Rather perform is the main focus.
In my experience beeing in quite some comps on the organising side, reducing the number of pilots by 25%, it reduces the number of overall problems by 50%.
And what I am against, since there is a lot of voices makeing tasks and scoring more and more sophisitcated, don't make it too complicated that only a little set of pilots understands. Already now, we have quite a system, which seems complicated. Those problems can often be solved by good tasksetting and organising.
Hi Robert, hi Tony
I am the first one to vote against so many pilots in a category 1 competion.
The more pilots in a comp, the more risks of accidents and incidents. Not only mid-airs, overcrowded starts and stress on launch.
It is simply a statistical problem, it is something that I have personally verified in Ager.
Most of the accidents at Ager have not been due to errors on task setting, nor due to unlandable areas, most have been due to bad decisions made by the pilots themselves and others have been unfortunate accidents.
I have been in hang gliding for over 42 years, I've been through competitions with similar and even higher number of pilots and we never reached these high number of accidents and fatalities.
When many of the accidents have been, let's say unfortunate, maybe we have to consider other factors.
The average age of our athletes is getting higher and higher, and we no longer react the same way we did when we were 20 years old and in aviation,
anticipation is very important. If you react in time, nothing happens, but if you react late, it can end in a scare or severe damage.
But there is another factor that is really important, let's say that it forces us to have many pilots in the competitions and it is just a bureaucratic and/or financial problem.
In sports like ours where the CIVL fees and requirements for category 1 competitions are so high it is really difficult to run a competition with a short number of pilots it is not economically viable. This has been the reason of why class 1 and class 5 pilots have been jointed again.
Category 2 competitions are really much easier and cheaper to run.
But what happens when there is a World or Continental Championship, eveybody wants to participate.
I beleive that it would be much easier to run category 2 competitions League type as preliminar rounds.
From these smaller comps we could select the higher ranked pilots that would be selected for the final round that would be the World or Continental Championship.
Hello Juaki
Thanks for your clarification. Very nice to hear from yourside.
As long as financial arguments are predominant, the sport itself will get in trouble.
(I see some comments, that we want to get into Olympics as well. Well, I followed closely the entrance of Sport Climbing and was actively involved in Ski Mountaineering and yes, that happened there. I doubt we want what it really means to get into that Olympic thing. But thats another topic)
It raise some question, do we / you or Fabio know the age of the pilots that had incidents? Just out of curiosity.
And yes, we are not in the 2000-2010 with HG anymore. The average level got weaker i am sure and the top pilots got stronger. Thats also why I think we should reflect this level development in the selections and number of participants in Cat 1 comps.
Before makeing selections on the side of CIVL - thats what I think - by just descreasing the number of participants, it will be solved without makeing a complicated thing, where we need to make a lot of exemptions (I wonder how many Cat 2 Petr did before winning the Worlds, he would have needed such an exemption).
And yes, limiting to 80 will not help solveing the financial problem, this needs to get compensated by other measures. Germany had a proposal to reduce the staff of CIVL by 2. Maybe we can also say, one CIVL person per 40 pilots? The rest of the members can get consulted online if required.
Finally, the idea is to protect the pilots as well as the organising staff. This would be good (once the financial problem is solved) for every participant and organising staff member.
I would like to respond to Juaki's comments. I flew in the Words for the first time in Ager this year. I thoroughly enjoyed the flying. At 63 I don't think the age is an issue. I would like to see some analysis of the incidents/accidents/fatality to make a better informed decision about the factors contributing to these unfortunate events that otherwise have marred a great Comp. The 'statistical' argument that too many pilots in the air at once doesn't appear to stack up, spreading out the comp over a few 'leagues' will make it impossible for some of us to participate, and the number of pilots flying may be less in any particular comp/'league' , but you will need to run more comps to short list the top pilots for a final round (Worlds) thus equating to more 'airtime' per pilot, at least equal to or more airtime per pilot , which is therefore equal to or even a higher probability of accidents/incidents, not less. From what I observed, I can only say that I saw good pilots pushing themselves to limits that increased their individual risk taking in the given circumstances on the day, ... I might call it the 'Do or die' thinking, and therefore individual pilots making decision to push themselves to or beyond what they might otherwise consider a safe limit (not wanting to be disrespectful to anyone given the fatality.
Hey guys,
I completely agree with Toni and Juaki : less pilots = less accidents. It's a statistical fact. There would be also less pressure on the organisation and the rescue teams, who can concentrate on the special cases, like Toni said. I would even say, less pressure on the pilots as well. Also less pressure for the task setting, as less pilots gives can use fly in a shorter time window if the weather is tricky.
Ideas to reduce the number of pilots (not considering the financial aspects, which belong to another discussion I would say) :
- Separate class 1 and class 5 (I think everyone would agree on this one)
- Not allowing teams more pilots than they are normally allowed (for example, GBR, JPN and USA teams had 7 pilots this year)
- CAT1 selection based on WPRS ranking
- CAT1 selection based on past performance (for example, 6 (random number) goals achieved in the past 2 years in a CAT2 or CAT1 event, a top 20 in a CAT1 event in the past 4 years, etc).
I don't think, that we need a general limit.
The capacity is depending from flying site, cloudbase, lift and crossing zones of the task.
Hey everyone,
Less pilots = less chance of problems, that's for sure. There is a beneficial effect for everyone
- better for the organization team : less people top take care of and maybe the ability to provide better services
- Medical assistance
- Less stress for the pilots on take off, in the air, in goal
- and so many more advantages...
One of the problem is the selection of the pilots, WPRS is not very representative, performance as well... We all know some pilots going to a CAT1 comp and doing their 1st flight of the year overthere.
A lminimulm number of flying hours could be an idea, an HG-SIV mandatory...
When you look at aviation, to be allowed to fly, you need to keep current with mandatory training, you need a minimum of 3 take offs and 3 landings within the last 3 months, etc...
For solveing financial problems I suggest following (assuming 80 pilots instead of 120, cutting 1/3):
- The entry fees per pilot that are payed by associations to raise to the extend that we already pay in total (paying for 4 people the same amount we pay for 6 now)
- For pilots without association paying: make it cheaper
(- optional make CIVL send per 40 pilots one person)
As Association, for who I work, it will be cheaper anyway like that; it will compensate the costs an organiser has. Additionally that cutting 1/3 of the field will be for the organiser also a bit cheaper (maybe 20% cheaper?)
The pressure we have with all the Cat 1 in all categories CIVL has and plans, sending less pilots will help also us.
BTW: That's also one of the reasons I am again Cat 1s in Sport Classes HG and PG.
I also believe that significantly reducing the number of participating pilots is one of the most effective ways to improve both safety and the overall quality of competition flying. A smaller field naturally decreases the risk within gaggles, allows for longer and more technical tasks, lowers the likelihood of accidents, and opens up more potential event locations – after all, very few sites can still accommodate 140 hang gliders. In my view, a field of around 80 pilots would be ideal. Of course, this needs to go hand in hand with financial solutions such as those Toni suggested and/or additional sponsorship.