FINDING LIFT

Imagine you have glided some many miles and expended nearly all the altitude you could afford to arrive at a pre-selected point, but the lift is not where you expected it.   This is no time to become discouraged; it’s an opportunity to learn.   Now you can discover not only where the lift was all along, but also why your first guess was mistaken.   Here the real fun begins.In soaring, the most satisfying results spring from logical analysis and inspired guesswork, based on experience.   This is perhaps most true when improvising search patterns to find lift.   On any Saturday, somewhere in the sky, one sailplane will carry its disappointed pilot down to a premature landing while another from the very same airspace hangs on, scratching tenaciously, and eventually climbs away.   The difference is seldom only a matter of sailplane performance, or even luck. The pilot who stays up is utilizing all available energy in the most thoughtful manner, extending glides to and through every potential lift area within range at precisely the right speeds, refusing to abandon the search.   This is another area of soaring savvy where the cream separates from the crop.