NS54 team guidelines

[AlastairW]

In view of the impending inaugural round of the N54 series, Brian Paul and myself have been having some discussions over the practical application of the new competition rules for the N54 Competition, and how these will work in practise.

The starting point is the pairing of pilots to form a “team”. Each pairing will consist of an “Experienced” Pilot (A) and a “Novice” Pilot(B). To ensure there are no ringers, the B pilots must be flying a dhv1/2 or lower classification rating wing, and should be no more than CP rated(open to discussion?)

The competition will then consist of two tasks, one to be completed by the B pilots, and one to be completed by the A pilots.
The best way to understand this is by way of practical example.

Imagine a comp at Model.

The B comp task would be a run to Hasty and back, without landing en route, but with the possibility of as many attempts at the task as time allows (there will be a window open time and a window close time). We do not want to create pressure by introducing a race to goal or anything like that. The idea is to introduce people to the idea of competitions without overloading them.

The A comp would be either a race to goal (Say somewhere 20k over the back), or open distance type task.
Each team of two people must complete their task to be in with a chance of winning the comp.

Which introduces the coaching element – does the A pilot hang about, flying with his B pilot to make certain his B pilot team mate completes the Hasty run before setting of xc, or does he leave him to it, having given detailed briefings to the B pilot on how to do it, and tries to get as big an xc as possible? The onus is on the two team mates to work together.
If the A pilot just sets of, flies 100k, but then discovers his B pilot has not completed the Hasty run, his xc does not score, and a team where the B pilot had been helped on the hasty run by his A pilot, and the A pilot then only flies 10k xc would beat them.

As each team consists of two people, each club can field as many teams as they like. We appreciate that this will skew the odds in favour of the team hosting the comp, as the probability is more of their pilots will attend, but over the six rounds this should even itself out. If the Club captains have any thoughts on this we are more than happy to listen to suggestions (which we will then discard....) possibly limiting to 5 teams per club? To a large extent it depends on the site size, and how many people turn up.

There are loads of other questions which need answers – what if no B pilot gets to goal is one. We will mull over the answers to these problems, but from my personal view, the B comp would always be set at a level where people were going to complete it.


And Finally finally, please don’t turn up on the hill for the comp without at least having some idea about pairings! We want to fly, not sort out who your bestest mate is.