I would like to continue from 2 years ago with my thoughts on being an ex paraglider pilot. Looking back I have about 1600 hours of paragliding and my best flight was about 100k from Golden which has been bested by many of you. What I remember so clearly was that one never left a thermal even if it was weak unless you really had a chance of getting to another thermal that was stronger. With sailplanes with much greater L/Ds you must have a different strategy. On a good day you figure out what the typical good thermal lift might be and just ignore the weak thermals. This, of course, only works if you have sufficient altitude, otherwise you take anything.

So I used to report soaring to Ely, a distance of about 470k from Minden and taking 5 hours plus because I never left a weak thermal. Well even though I am very old I am improving I did it this year in 3 and a third hours. I also achieved a 780k flight, Parowan to Hadleigh out and return in about 6 hours. These figures are kind of typical for a serious sailplane pilot.

The SparrowHawk is a miniature sailplane and has a performance much better than the best foot launch glider but also much less than a glider of twice the wing span. Aspect ratio is all important for L/Ds and Reynolds' numbers are always better for a large glider. So why do I like the SparrowHawk so much? It is a joy to fly and provides its own challenges. It thermals as well as the large gliders but on the run outs it is outclassed. So I have to be a little more careful in rejecting a weak thermal than if I were flying the DG or Stemme. Its a little closer to flying a bag. I set myself a task a week ago to fly from Minden to Truckee in the SparrowHawk, with the 25 mph winds from the west and in blue thermal conditions this can be difficult. Every time you approach the Sierras the down wash normally kills your effort. Today, after 3 previous attempts I made it by going east to the Pine Nuts and getting up high to 16k and just making it west over Slide Mountain to landing at Truckee. Enjoy your paragliding but there may be a time, an age, where you too may possibly consider sailplaning. What you have learned from paragliding will mostly transfer over and you may even be cursed by the never leave a thermal syndrome.