1996 PASCO League Handbook1996 PASCO League HandbookThis guide book has been produced with a few simple aims in mind. The intention is to provide an easy to understand set of guidelines for running the PASCO League weekend events that will establish both minimum expectations for the organizers and participants alike. Experience has shown that a minimum level of organization and disciplined participation is necessary for a satisfactory meet. This document also provides a reference for anyone new to the League, how to run a meet or how to fly in one. Included in this document are guidelines for the following;
The PASCO League is intended to encourage competitive cross- country flying on a less formal basis than National and Regional competitions, involving pilots at all levels of cross-country competence. It is a team based competition with teams being entered from various soaring sites in the PASCO area.
The competition takes the form of weekend 'Meets' between the teams in the League. A 'meet' wlll be hosted by each of the host sites in turn throughout the season, giving pilots and crews an opportunity to visit and fly from other sites in the area. Typically, there are 5 full meets approximately one month apart, throughout the Summer season.
The intention is not to give great glory to individuals, but to promote rivalry between the teams. The honours each weekend, and over the season, will therefore go to the team amassing the highest total score for all its pilots.
Special emphasis will be put on the performance of the Novice Pilots and as well as the trophy for the winning team there will be a trophy for the team with the best Novices.
The host site or club for each weekend will be responsible for providing the organisation for the competition, so there will be an opportunity for people to learn contest direction, task setting, start and finish line control, scoring etc...
The host site or club must undertake to provide appropriate launching facilities for each task group, although it is intended that there should be a minimum of interruption to 'normal' site flying.
Charges incurred by the pilots will be the normal tow/tiedown costs charged by each site. There is a nominal charge per pilot to cover organisation expenses. It is confidently expected that hosts will vie for the honour of organising the best party on the Saturday night of their meet.
The PASCO league liason officer is responsible for supporting and working with the PASCO members to establish or execute the following duties;
The role of the team captain (usually the team pundit) is to assist his/her team mates with flight planning, assist in strategies, help them out if theyre struggling on course and naturally, fly the course for themselves. Team captains must be experienced cross country pilots.
Many novices are learning a lot in the process of flying in the league and the team captain can help considerably by helping ensure that team members have not missed anything important in the planning process, and that their experience level is suitable for the task in hand.
The main expectation of team captains is that they will help organize their team, help them plan courses and strategies, and provide support and encouragement to their team mates. This includes helping ensure team members know how to get to sites and ensuring that team members have filled in the PASCO League waiver forms, and are sufficiently experienced to be able to participate safely.
Most of our PASCO League meets attract 15-25 participants per weekend so three towplanes are required to launch within 1 hr. The organizers should check with team captains ahead of time to confirm the anticipated number of participants; Fewer participants enable two towplanes to handle things with ease. Normal tow altitude is 2000 agl unless conditions are poor.
Adequate line support has proved crucial to a well organized event. Most pilots are unable to find crew in this day and age and so ground staff volunteers are needed to help speed the launch and assist with pulling gliders off the runway once theyve landed. Both these roles are very important as typically we have many gliders landing in quick succession. There is a tendency to focus only on the launch. Ground support needs to be there all day. 2 or 3 line staff volunteers are recommended for full time duty. Also included in the ground support are the retrieve tracking individuals who will keep track of the status of any retrieves in progress during the day. (see retrieve procedures in the Pilot Guidelines section.)
During the pilots meeting the event manager needs to figure out a launch order for the teams. What seems to work best is for the teams to launch together in order... pundit, intermediate, novice. Team order can be randomly selected. All gliders MUST be gridded by the specified launch time. This means READY TO FLY. Teams can pull out and go to the back of the line if they wish.
One person can run the gate but its hard work and the volunteer doesnt get any rest. Two people are recommended, one to sight the gliders and work the radio, one to record times. Roll times, (take- off) start times and finish times must be recorded. PASCO has a standardized sheet for recording these. These are available from the PASCO League Liason officer. Start gate opens usually on the first takeoff. The start and finish directions need to be clearly established in the pilots meeting prior to launch.
Start height is on the honor principle. A gate sight is made with two pieces of string aligned with the start line, usually across the main airfield runway at a predetermined location. The pieces of string are run diagonally downwards from a pole , to the ground, pointed along the gate line. The gate keeper sits behind and below the pieces of string in such a way that they are aligned when viewed from behind. In this way the strings strike an imaginary vertical plane across the field. This is the gate.
When participants call their intention to start (e.g 2T, right I.P) the gate keeper locates the glider and confirms visual contact. As the glider approaches crossing the line of sight through the strings, the gate keeper calls 3... 2....1...MARK!...Good start 2T (for example) or bad try, as the case may be. When the keeper calls out MARK, the recorder writes the exact time the glider went through the gate.
The process is similar for finishing. Participants will call the gate a few miles out, e.g 2T, 5 miles out. This gives the gate keeper time to make sure everything is set up to record the finish. The gliders will appear much more suddenly than at the start since they are flying fast and low prior to the finish. When the gate has sighted the glider approaching the finish gate (usually the opposite direction to the start direction) the gate will call out 3...2...1...MARK... good finish 2T. The recorder records the time at the mark and the glider makes a normal landing.
Most people have a good idea how to throw a good party. Traditionally these are barbeques of varying sophistication. Some sites provide live entertainment, and high quality beer always goes down well. The parties are very popular and are a lot of work so organizers usually asign a couple of people minimum to do the preparation. The parties are a strong tradition of the league, with a prize for the best one at the end of the season.
This is a fiercely contested award.
PASCO has Ty Whites excellent Sports Class scoring program modified for specially for the League format for the 1996 season. This is a nice intuitive package and will help scorers dramatically. There is also a Excel spreadsheet designed to do the scoring as well, but this needs a little more pilot skill to use. Tys scoring program runs on a Macintosh. Traditionally, PASCO has made a computer and printer available for each meet. This can be coordinated through the PASCO League Liason officer. Posting the day results on a board works well too.
Traditionally, the scores for the first day are calculated while the BBQ is being prepared, with day winners announced at the party. On the second day, scores are calculated while pilots and crew pack up and pay their bills. The contest organizers are responsible for sending the final scores in electronic form to the League Liason officer, who will forward them to team captains and publish results in West Wind. Scorers MUST provide the following;
These roles are needed at various stages during the event. In practice, several roles will be performed by one person. However, many hands make light work. Roles & duties will be coordinated by the C.D.
Tasking is the make or break issue for any meet, and there are a few recommendations here learned from experience over the last couple of years.
The tasks should be set by an experienced cross country pilot accustomed to evaluating the cross country soaring potential of a given day. At most events, the team captains have been consulted to approve the tasks for each class before they are announced at the pilots meeting. This is a good practice to maintain. The task setter may want to do this with some less experienced pilots as a good training experience.
Two tasks should be set for each day, one for the Novice class, and one for the Intermediates and Pundits together. The two tasks should have as many legs/turnpoints as possible in common. This is to help maximize the interaction between Novices and their team-mates and help in getting round the course.
Tasks are assigned speed tasks. Lap tasks, cats cradles, triangles, quadrilateral and dog leg tasks have all been flown successfully.
It should be remembered at all times that these events are fun and learning oriented. Tasks should be set accordingly. If flying cross country looks impossible, duration days are a permissible way of competing; under these conditions, there is a max tow altitude and a maximum time aloft for which each pilot will get maximum points. (max = 400 pts to devalue the day). This must be agreed up front, but is usually something like 3 hrs from roll-time.
These major points should be addressed as a bare minimum for each meet. These minimums are required to promote safety and increase the comfort level of novice pilots and pilots who are new to the site. It is recommended that a MARKED SECTIONAL is posted where it is freely visible so that pilots can use this as a reference for marking their own maps with turnpoints and known good landout sites. A summary sheet of runway orientation, patterns, radio frequencies, to be given to each pilot on day 1, is HIGHLY RECOMMENDED. The contest organizers will be expected to have the required information prepared PRIOR to the meet so that things will run smoothly on the first day. Day 1 is usually fairly hectic as people arrive, rig, brief, grid, and prepare for the flight all by 12 noon. Advanced preparation and organization is essential.
1. Each team shall field a team of three Pilots Comprising one Novice. one Intermediate and one Pundit. The team shall nominate a team captain who need not be a participant but should be a pilot. Definition of 'pundit' ('skilled practitioner').
2. The pilot classes are defined as follows: -
It is recommended that there be 2 available members for each class in each team if possible, so that if a team member is unable to attend a contest weekend, they will not prevent a team from competing by their absence. This is a recommendation, not a requirement.
3. If desired a pilot may fly in a higher class, e.g. a pilot qualifying for Intermediate status may be entered as his team' s Pundit.
3a. As a last resort (eg unexpected no-shows) a team may be allowed to fly a pundit in the intermediate class. In such a case, the pilots score will be reduced by 30%.
3b. No-one may fly in Novice class unless they qualify as Novices.
4. Pilots may fly any class glider. The Carl Herold Sports Class handicap system will be used to equalise sailplane performance. No water ballast is allowed.
5. Task setting will be done by the host team's Contest Director assisted by the Team Captain. It is recommended that the Intermediate and Pundit classes should be set the same task where appropriate.
6. A weekend Meet shall be declared a contest when pilots in either the Novice or Intermediate classes have a scoring task.
7. SCORING: Each class will be scored as a separate task group using the 1000 Point system for each day of a weekend Meet. These daily scores will be added for the weekend, and the weekend League points will be awarded in EACH CLASS as follows. For 'n' teams competing, then;
1st team gets 'n' points
2nd team gets 'n-1' points
3rd team gets 'n-2' points
4th team gets 'n-3' points etc etc.
The league points achieved by each class in a team will be multiplied by a weighting factor, as follows;
Pundits; score x 0.8,
Intermediates; score x 1,
Novices; score x 1.2
For example with 4 teams competing, the winning pundit earns 3.2 points, the winning intermediate earns 4 points and the winning novice earns 4.8 points. In this way the emphasis is placed on novice and intermediate performance and a teams placing is less dependent on the skill of the team pundit.
7a). In the event of a tied place, league points will be awarded jointly for the average of the places; eg if two pilots place equal first in their group, they will both be awarded league points for the average between first and second place. (ie (n+n-1)/2) Similarly, three joint seconds will each be awarded joint points for third place. (average of 2nd, 3rd & fourth). This is prior to the handicap application.
8. Negative points cannot be incurred.
9. Any team failing to take a contest launch scores zero.
10. The weekend League Points are added together to determine the Team scores for each Meet, and for the season.
11. In the event of a draw at the end of the season, the winner will be the team with the greater cumulative points on the daily 1000 point system.
12. Any No-Contest weekend (or scoring but disappointing weekend) may be re-run in all classes or in part if all team captains and host site or club agree. If this happens it is recommended that all scoring flights are counted towards the total season scores.
13. All matters of flying safety remain the prerogative of the host site or club standard operations. Team Captains should ensure that the standard of competence of their pilots is adequate, but the need for check-flights should be discussed with the host club or site. It is recommended that novices have a bronze badge & PASCO cross country camp training, and/or a silver badge as minimum experience requirements.
14. The Contest Director in committee with the Team Captains will act as Stewards, whose ruling on any matters in dispute will be final.
15. Non-competing gliders will be encouraged to fly the competition tasks wherever local operating conditions permit this. Competing gliders should have launch priority.
16. Each competing pilot may be asked to pay a nominal entry fee, which will go towards organizational expenses such as postage and trophies. This needs to be reasonable, and determined in advanced by the host team. Pilots are responsible for settling their own launch/tiedown etc fees.
17. The host team's organizer is responsible for getting the scores out to all participating teams within 10 days.
18. These rules may be modified at any time by agreement between Team Captains.
19. Start and finish gates will be used. Suggested start height is 5000' AGL on the honour principle. Minimum allowable finish altitude should be determined by the host club or site.
20. Turnpoint photos will be required except on the last day of a meet. These will, in general, be examined the evening of the flight. Only blatant violations or errors will cause the preliminary results to be changed, and then at the team council discretion. The event organizers may want to develop and print photo's professionally, at their discretion.
20a Hand held cameras are acceptable.
21. Every contestant is responsible for his/her own safety and equipment. Contestants enter of their own free will.
22. Every contestant shall provide proof of insurance.
23. Tasks will be set appropriately for each class in the meet. Wherever possible, tasks for each class should have as many common legs as possible, such as similar triangles or quadrilateral courses. Intermediate and pundit classes should be given the same task wherever possible.
24. All participants must be members of PASCO and must have completed, signed and handed in to PASCO, a waiver form.
25. Grid List; We expect some team members to change between the
first and second days of a meet so;
a) Every pilot intending to participate must sign up on a grid list
each contest day with name, number, team and class.
b) TEAM grid positions will be determined by random draw at the pilot
meeting each day.
26. Landing at the contest site; Each pilot appearing on the grid list must turn in a landing card, regardless of whether or not he or she launched, finished etc.
27. Landing Away from the Contest Site
a) It is a pilot's first duty, after landing and securing the
sailplane, to fill out a Landing Card and then telephone the contest
site, supplying all information on the Landing Card.
b) A pilots team is responsible for ground retrieves.
c) If a pilot fails to report in, the pilot's team will coordinate
search and rescue.
28. A team's total score will be the sum of the 5 highest scoring events for each team in any season. Scoring will be done using the league point totals. League point ties will be settled by totalling the day points for the chosen events.
A note on Dead Ringers; any locally obtained 'make up pilots at a given event should be approved suitable for the class by council of team captains.
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