Back from Utah...
We flew three sites during the clinic: Point of the Mountain (South), Camel's, and Commodore...most of the aero work was done at Camel's and Commodore with video analysis after each session. Camel's is located just above Springville, UT along the Wasatch Mountain Range. Commodore is located just outside of Stockton, UT, and Point of the Mountain is, of course, in Draper, UT...The picture above is of Mitch McAleer just before launching at Commodore...
Mitch critiqued each flight as if we were flying in an actual aero comp. We had to pay attention to flying along a particular axis and within the "box", just like the real world. Each maneuver was critiqued on steepness of bank, smoothness, where we entered and where we exited the maneuver. The post flying video critique was a lot of help as the footage was taken either at the top of the hill looking down or mid-way up the hill. It seemed to give a better perspective than from the landing area. I came away from the clinic with a better understanding of what my glider is capable and what I am capable of doing...and...no...I didn't loop my glider.
Pilots traveled as far as the east coast, Las Vegas, Portland, and of course the Bay Area and Modesto areas, to attend the clinic.
Mitch had a great teaching style and offered a lot of analysis with respect to each pilots skill level and so forth. There were some pilots with 20 hours of airtime and others well into hundreds of hours...Falcons and topless gliders were tearin' it up...Both Mitch and Ryan did a great job herding the cats / pilots and always having Plan B at the ready in the event of the winds not cooperating. Ryan's girlfriend, Desiree', was great at organizing the trip with all of us, and Ryan's dad, Paul, helped out a lot, too.
And, of course, it was great to hang out with the McClure boys (Brian, Will, and Glen)...KM unfortunately couldn't make the trip...