From Thad Spencer:
How an Addle Brained Idiot from Minnesota Flew 228 Miles
Learning to fly a paraglider in Minnesota is certainly not ideal. It’s really flat here. I mean glacially scraped within an inch of its life flat. Years back, when I had decided to take up the sport, there was a complete lack of paragliding culture in the state, a profound absence of hills or mountains, and no available training. All of my early years of training and flying required traveling on a jet to somewhere more suitable for paragliding. This made my learning progression kind of stunted and staggered. I would get these concentrated bursts of flying experience followed by months of inactivity. If I was going to progress more quickly I decided that I needed to figure out how I could fly where I lived.
Around this time, while on a flying trip with friends in Washington and Oregon, I had the opportunity to tow behind a truck using a payout winch. Up to this point I had only launched my paraglider from hills and mountains. The idea of launching via tow was revelatory! So I got busy trying to put together some method of towing back in Minnesota.
My first attempt was to make a homemade scooter tow. I found a vintage Honda Elite 150CC scooter. I removed the front wheel and took the tire off the back wheel and welded two plates on the hub to turn it into a receptacle for tow line. I then mounted the entire rig onto an old boat trailer so I could move it around. I found a small grass strip ultralight field outside the city. The guy who ran it, Dan Mattson, said he would be willing to help tow me up on the thing. I knew absolutely fuck-all about pay-in towing. So Dan and I just kind of figured it out through trail and error. Pay-in towing on a 1700 foot grass runway is no easy task. Given the length of the field and the physical limitations of pay-in towing, I was unable to get more than 300 to 400 feet per tow. This made every flight a full on seat of your pants low-ass save. It did climb out to base a few times, but more often than not each tow was a sledder.
The next evolution towards my goal of towing in Minnesota happened while I was looking to purchase a pay-out winch. During my search I found someone on the internet who was making a winch that used an electric particle brake to apply precise tension on the line drum. His name was Steve Serine and he lived in Minnesota. I couldn’t believe it!
Meeting Steve changed everything for me. He had this amazing tow winch, he was retired and therefore available to go out flying any time, and he was a proficient paragliding pilot. We became fast friends and began towing and flying all over the state. We used google earth as well as driving around to various parts of the state to find suitable tow roads. We found that two mile roads without wires and trees are optimal.
Things I’ve Picked Up Over the Years
Let me start by saying I’m an idiot. I’m not being humble, It’s a fact, I am a complete idiot. When I came into this sport you could have filled the library of congress with what I didn’t know about flying paragliders. After all of these years flying there remains mountains of knowledge I have yet to obtain. But thankfully I survived the early years in the sport when I thought I knew plenty but really knew jack. I have had the opportunity to fly my paraglider in many beautiful places around the world, and I have had the pleasure of achieving a couple distance goals.
Flying distance, good distance, involves mastering so many more skills then I had ever expected. I had to learn weather, wind, best time of the year to fly, learning to fly fast, knowing when it’s time to fly slow, climbing efficiently and quickly, learning to identify the best part of every climb, reading the clouds, reading the land, knowing when it’s time to launch, and most importantly I had to become a competent enough pilot to fly with grace and confidence during the riggers of a long XC flight. This last bit was obviously the hardest for me, and required the most time and effort.
So here are a few of the things, (in not particular order) that I’ve learned trying to fly distance in the flats of Minnesota:
-On good days I launch as early as possible. Every season I experiment with earlier launch times. The trick of course is that if you launch too early you dirt and loose the day. Launch too late and you miss that time in the air making distance. I know I’ve hit it just right when the first hour of the flight takes every ounce of my concentration and skill to stay in the air. But during that first hour of scratching and struggling I’m flying down wind making distance, and I’m putting myself in the strongest possible position when the day begins to turn on.
-Flying the flats has two important perspectives: Micro & Macro. When I’m high I’m looking at the macro view-When I’m low smaller details become relevant. The micro view. When I’m high I can afford to look well into the distance and plan the line I would like to fly. When I’m lower getting the next climb and getting back to base is all that matters. Obviously the tools we use when we are low are very different than the skills and mind-set we employ when we are more established and enjoying a wider perspective. When I’m low 100% of my focus goes into finding a good climb and staying in it. I’m not thinking about the next big move I’m going to make, or how much altitude I’ll need to to glide to the next thermal. All I’m thinking about is getting back to base as fast and efficiently as possible. I get into trouble when my little raccoon sized brain starts to think about too many things at once. When I’m climbing 100% percent of my attention is focused on that. When I’m gliding all of my attention is on gliding efficiently and fast.
-Confidence in the day is critical. After I launch if I find a good climb I know there are many more good climbs waiting for me down wind. Too often pilots flying the flats become hesitant about finding the next climb. This hesitancy causes them to fly more conservatively as they look for a sure signs of the next climb. Some days are blue days with no indication of the next climb. But if I’ve already found a good climb or two the next one is waiting for you. This idea also helps me to stay more relaxed when I’m low. I remind myself “I’m low, but the day is on, there is a climb out here and I’m going to find it”.
-Know that you’re good enough to stay in the air. So much of this sport is confidence. Confidence allows us to hang from string under a nylon sack 11 thousand feet in the sky. It can also help quiet our mind when it’s time to focus. As a newer pilot, finding a good climb and staying in it often felt like a game of chance. I can remember countless times climbing in good lift only to loose it a minute later. Because I was new to the sport I hadn’t experienced many hours under the paraglider feeling all of the nuance and shape shifting of thermal flight. It was easy for me to settle into a climb that I thought I had mastered only to have it disappear moments later. Maturing past that point was hugely important to me. Now, when I fly, I know that if there is suitable lift out there I will find it and I will use it for everything it’s worth. It’s no longer a question or a mystery, it’s fact. I can climb well under a paraglider. That confidence frees my mind to do so many other things during a flight. It also helps me to feel less stress when I’m getting low. We fly poorly when we’re gripped. We make bad decisions and our physical reaction time slows under stress. Feeling confident and sure of our abilities is a huge advantage.
-Find a mentor. I’ve had amazing people in my life giving me guidance and advice. Without their help and experienced wisdom my progression would’ve taken twice as long and been half as successful.
-Only climb to the altitude you need to get to the next climb. I have flown in the flats with experienced pilots who waist time topping out each climb. It’s important to top out climbs in the early part of the day as we are learning the day’s potential and feeling out the strength of the climbs. It’s also good to top out climbs in the latter parter of the day when everything is slowing down. But as the day builds. and the climbs become more consistent, it’s time to fly faster. If base is 9K and I only need 7K to safely glide to the next booming cloud a few miles down wind, I’m going to leave at 7K. I know this sounds elemental, but many pilots loose site of this and end up waisting precious time topping climbs they don’t need.
-When there are clouds flying the flats is obviously easier. Clouds give great insight into what line to take, but they are not the only thing to consider. I’m constantly looking at the land and the sky in equal parts as I’m making course decision. The look of the cloud, it’s shape and whether it has a dark bottom gives me insight into whether that cloud could be pulling, but I confirm my decision by looking at it’s shadow on the ground bellow me. If the shadow is solid, game on. If it’s starting to show holes, it may be dying. At base It’s much easier to see the trajectory and health of clouds street by looking at the ground shadows rather then looking out horizontally at the clouds in the sky. Looking at the ground I’m also able to easily see if the clouds are developing into a streets.
-People who spend more time in the mountains often become frustrated with the strength of the climbs often found in the flats. Without large topographical features like mountains coalescing lift into larger more powerful thermals, the flats may provide lift to the inexperienced flat land pilot that feels less stout, less proper. Knowing that lift of 600 ft a minute can be a good climb in the flats may help to stave off frustration and keep a pilot from getting inpatient and leaving a climb early.
-Towns are great sources of lift. Here in the midwest the land we are flying over is mostly farms, fields, lakes, and small towns dotted about every 10 miles in any direction. These towns can be a lifesaver when low. The buildings, cement parking lots, and roads are great heat collectors and can produce consistently good climbs.
-Tow rigs are like mobile mountains. We can move our mountain launch site to the part of our state, or neighboring state, that has the best weather potential.
-The windward edges of lakes are fairly reliable triggers. The trick is that you may need enough altitude to push out over the water a bit to catch the climb that is triggering from the windward edge of the water. If you’re low this may not be a great option.
-I’m not an engineer. I’m as dumb as a post, and barely passed 7 grade algebra, so focusing more on my innate senses and gut feelings have served me well in this sport. I rarely look at my instruments, and I couldn’t tell you the first thing about MacCready theory, but years of spending time under a paraglider have helped me develop insights into flying that may not always be apparent to the conscious mind. For me this comes into play when I use something I call “auto pilot”. If I’m having a difficult time in a climb, maybe I’m falling in and out of the lift, or I’m just not able to find the best core, often it’s because I’m thinking too hard. When I think too hard I often manhandle the glider and fly poorly. When I notice this happening I tell myself to turn on the auto pilot. I relax, slow everything down, and let my body control the glider, not my mind. We know so much instinctively about the invisible climbs we are mapping. The glider and harness are giving us so much valuable information. If we just quiet our minds and listen to this subtle information we often do better.
Misshaps
There have been many. One that stands out is tossing in France.
Early in my progression I made a serious miss judgment of wind direction and ended up tossing in a box canyon in the Alps between Saint Vincent and San Andres. I came down in bad spot, uninjured, which was a miracle. After hiking up to the top of the mountain I was able to call a friend in France and request a helicopter rescue. (it’s actually a pretty good story with a fair bit of laughs) This experience changed the way I looked at the sport. I realized how little I knew, and how quickly things can change from a fun day in the sky to a dangerous disaster. I slowed down after this event and made careful decisions about what gliders to buy moving forward, and what conditions to fly in as a developed my skills.
