Original message: ...We simply have to do a better job of letting the public at large know we out here....
================ > Will it matter what the format is... if very few, if any, show up to > compete? ...it is pretty easy to get bored and wish for new contests > formats, I think it is very hard to recruit new guys to flying ... which > is the only way we are going to increase contest attendance. ================== This is the key point. The general contest practices have evolved to wide acceptance. To say that changing something will bring out new guys implies that there are lots of guys just itching to become soaring pilots but won't because they want different competition rules. We all know that's not likely. As I keep saying in posts here and elsewhere, our club has recruited numerous new members over the past couple of years, and activity and attendance continues to grow. There are a few key drivers of this growth: our website (www.mvsaclub.com); HL participation; and the availability of used moldies and excellent RES planes that allow a guy to get a really excellent plane plus radio for under a grand. The website, and our club's on-line discussion group, have been excellent sources of recruiting leads. When a guy does come out, usually with a wood-wing 2-meter, we don't urge him to come back over and over trying to learn how to winch the damn thing; instead, we try hard to get him to upgrade to a better plane as quickly as possible. This has worked in every case I can think of. We've added a half-dozen guys in their twenties and thirties, as well as older guys who are trying or re-trying soaring; virtually all of them have flown in club events, and the younger guys really love to throw those HLs. The club contests, and the trimming and preparation sessions for them, are a major focus of our club's activities (the website has a list of flying reports for recent fun-fly days, and you can see just how active our membership is). I can't say that it would work for every club in every locale, but for us the key has been that once a guy learns that he too can get a good launch, follow a thermal downwind, and stay up for a long time, he's hooked. Fun = airtime, and our focus is trying to show the new arrivals at the field how they can get a lot of airtime. To try to get more golfers out on the course they don't make the hole bigger or the greens fees cheaper; they sell the idea that you too can learn to play the game well enough to have fun. If what we are after is recruiting more enthusiasts, the success we'll have will be proportional to the number of young prospects who hear our message. The messages that you can get into it for a few bucks with a GL and some surgical tubing, or that the contests don't allow skegs, are not messages that excite anybody. The excitement comes from the thermals -- that's what we have to sell. "Young feller, you too can learn to fly one of these cool hi-tech machines that launches to cloud base and will ride thermals all day." Or: "Believe it or not, this 5-foot span plane weighs only 9 oz. and you too can throw it over a hundred feet in the air, and then by golly you can ride thermals all day. Costs a few bucks and takes some practice, but boy is it fun!" Make that pitch, make it to as many prospects as possible, and soaring will grow.
