Hi, I'm gonna be straight forward: If you continue flying like this the chances of gonna get seriously hurt, or get killed are pretty high. 1) Don't fly so close to the rocks! 2) Don't fly so close to the rocks with VG ON! You have no control authority! If a bubble puts you in the rock trajectory you're unable to recover it in time. 3) Life is to short for Acro. Spins, loops etc. Been there, done that. Just fly, enjoy the beautiful views, do cross country. Improve thermal skills. Believe, you're already a 'super-human' flying , no need the extra Acro silly stuff at all. 4) although it's a Laminar, glide ratio is something to count on. If you're struggling to get to the landing zone, you already made a bad decision prior. This is even more important with low altitude and Valley micro meteo with venturis ( wind channeling and accelerating) which can put you in really bad situation. 5) landing, prepare way before. It's not so cool to get in the uprights to early, but it's safer. Low, if one hand fails doing the transition you wack ugly, and a beautiful flight is gone. Cheers, and please fly safe. Ps- thank you for your humility to share your errors . Plz learn something with them.
Hi. As you could see, Your comments are about similar to mine .... in the video. Acro is exiting, but for sure you should be careful. And as I get older, a lightweight glider With superb performance and handling is wanted. I might og for a Piuma! Enjoy, if you can:-) th-cam.com/video/gqiVERG2FG0/w-d-xo.html
I loved the scenery, but could not enjoy the video being so worried about the safety of the pilot. There was a lot of bad choices that he GOT AWAY WITH on this flight. I've learned in my short H2 experience that you can't predict the wind currents that good to do this every time and GET AWAY with it. It's like the guys that don't run their ass off during take off. Yes,, You can GET AWAY with it most of the time. But,,, It only takes ONE time NOT getting away with it to end your flying career and put a bad spot on our sport.
Good to hear. I want to calm Down and I dont like quick Clip. I am supersencitive to noise so silence is better then Music. I love my country, as I get used to it, and find the best way use what surrounds me:-)
That was scary... please fly with more speed. you are lucky to get away with that. Notice how much input you have to do to get the glider to turn, because you are flying so slow. otherwise... what a beautiful place to fly.
Beautiful country! Thanks for posting the video. Not trying to be mean, but I am an advanced HG and PG pilot of 17 years and I was terrified watching you fly that Laminar. You are flying a glider that you are not ready to fly!!! Your control inputs look like someone who should be flying a Falcon or some other single surface glider. For your own safety and loved ones. Get rid of that glider and buy something you can control and PLEASE get some training regarding your weight shift inputs. You are a tragedy waiting to happen. Sincerely!
Hi Steve:-) Thanks for Your comment and good thoughts. Quite a few pilots agree With you. With a bit different editing, I could of course post a Magic video of this flight witch would give more applaus from the audience. Yes, my twisting shall be changed, but take a closer look to the angle of the hangloop and to the position of COG. It's easier to push out Your body, sideways, then it is to move sideways parallell. Of course its better to use the Whole range of movements, to do a beautiful turn. The tradgedy has waited 30 years to happend and I have had quite a few advices from the E-team in aerosports. Most of them don't post any videos that can discredit themself. So they must be good, even if they have not been flying more then 10-20 years:-) Keep Your legs together and make good landings! (And Falcon will not be added to my hang glider garage. An RX2, might?)
Yes. Big fault to fly slow with full vg, close to hard rock. Wrong: I did survive, by doing an "ALL IN" movement moving all body to the side, by PUSHING my feet out of the harness. Try to move your carabiner as much as I did, by moving your body sideways. You will not manage. Anyway: The fault was there, and my manouver was not pretty, but it did the job at this occation. Of course I like to fly with better style. But I did show my error. I could easily cut it away.
In fact feet ARE YOUR RUDDER because when you move feet to the side it means all your body went to the side. Common mistake is cross steering - when your arms go to one side, and feet to the other, not changing COG at all. So what he did was perfectly good albeit full VG made steering delayed and clumsy
Oeff, the start, where was the rotation? Then the steering. If you're flying straight to the rocks, don't push out and try to steer, it won't.. People already wrote about it, but it was painful to see. The environment looks pretty and I can imagine you want to fly there but I'd recommend taking some lessons. Hope you stay safe!
Hi:-) The gopro hit the ground and there was nothing more then green gras recorded. I might put that out. You got a point anyway! In my acro video I was put Down on my ass after landing. I did not show that. But I really think I show both good stuff and errors. I could have filtered out the errors. Then Learning potential would decreese.
It seems like you're just moving your butt sideways to turn, not your whole body (gravity center). In general, a very scary video. Wish you great landings, man, don't risk so much.
Thanks for Your comment. I am not proud of my flying style, but if you make a snapshot and Draw lines straight Down and along the hangloop, you will see that I can not come futher out With my COG. Stupid flying slow, Close and With full VG. DON'T! I might learn.
To those who commented on this video: If you have flown with Olav as have I, you would know that the "feet-out" thing is his flying style and it serves him very well. He is an incredibly talented light-lift scratcher. Among the best I've seen. He stays up while others go down. The only part that had me concerned was starting 4 steps back from the edge at launch. This mistake killed a very good friend of mine. On a sheer cliff launch, start no more than 3 steps from the edge. The objective is to "throw" your glider and yourself off the cliff while keeping wings level. The 2 or 3 steps is meant to provide momentum to carry you away from the cliff. Airspeed on the level run is meaningless. The glider starts flying after you get off the edge and pull the nose down. If there is more than a light breeze, then keeping the wings level cannot be assured. It is most important to pass the edge wings-level and yaw-straight. Starting too far back gives the wing time to roll before you get off the edge, leading to the possibility of dragging a tip.
First: Find some friends that hang glide and show this video to them. Might save your life. Too bad the landing was cut--could have been another "what not to do" that could save someone else's life. Second: .....why bother.
Thanks Rider.Yes, why bother? But you did.Why? The landing was good. Gopro hit the grass and was twisted downwards. Agree: Communicate with skilled pilot's. I did. With the best.Feet kicking is ugly, but for sure effective. Flying close to vertikal cliff is dangerous.Full VG close to cliff is stupid. Most valuable comment from those skilled skilled pilots??Maby John Heiney, commenting about the danger of vertical cliff launch? 4 step was 1 to many, he said.So: Where is your video's?
Base jumpers organize Heli Boogie once a year. If you contact them, you might get a ride and transport for Your glider.Search for Stavanger Base klubb.And look at TheFjordflier's video:th-cam.com/video/XbuzRkKAz2Q/w-d-xo.html
Are you kidding. What could possible be better than soaring above one of the most beautiful scenerys Norway have to offer ;-) BTW, the video is from summer.
Yeah it was on Wednesday that year. Try rowing, trike hang gliding.. . Beautiful scenery without sharing it with others, looks to me twice as odd .. I'm kidding all right; way to go!
The launch made me shiver, the left wingtip got pretty close to the ground. I may put tape on my down tubes now as I can see that his right hand was higher on the down tube than his left, hence the left wing dropping. This has happened to me and I don't want it to happen again!
Hi Tontar. I was searching for your good launch at the world wide web, but could not find any. Is there? Agree. First second is not level. And where am I at that moment? A bit scared, with vertical 1000 meter air under me. But what did I do? I Guess you will agree : RIGHT at once, in one second. That was enough. May I suggest: Go fuck yourself?
Sorry that I pissed you off, or that you have such a thin skin that you cannot accept proper criticism. If you'd prefer a better breakdown to better qualify the "crappy launch" comment, I'll indulge. First, you let the glider sit on your shoulders, nose high, WAY high, with a weak, claw like grip where your hands merely wrap around the front of the downtubes. You don't "grip" the downtubes in order to strongly control your pitch. With that kind of non-grip, you can't get your angle down low enough without losing balance on the glider as it sits on your shoulders. Considering that the moment you leave the ground, you will be essentially falling steeply with so little chance of running, pretty much no real slope to accelerate, and so the downward direction of fall, which you can call your path or glide angle, combined with your high attitude, means that you will leave the edge of the cliff in deep stall. What happens with deep stall? Strong nose down response from the glider, which is typically not a good thing when you have so little actual airspeed. That loose grip and high angle, the moment you take your first step yo drop the left wing. Good thing it didn't drag. Maybe you can see these problematic things, and maybe you can't. Hang gliding is a bit of an ego sport, and that often means people don't take well to advice or criticism. You tell me I had a crappy launch, well, we could talk about it without me telling you to fuck off. You have a sweet glider and a sweet harness, but (yes) a crappy launch there. Maybe it works better at other sites, but this particular site is not responsible for your weak grip and weak pitch control. Oh, and if the message is only as good as the messenger to you, you can check my channel for a few videos of my launch technique. If you watch any, check the grip. th-cam.com/video/uJs-MZzIkHU/w-d-xo.html
@@olavmartinbratveit7849 By the way, thanks for posting this video with all of its good and bad parts, and for being willing to field both good and bad comments! I commend you for that!
Hi Tontar. I usually or never answer in a bad way, as I did here. But I am a bit tired of crappy comments expecially if the comments are far from what Professionals already have commented. If you look again at sec 46-50 you can see me lifting the glider to tension the harness connestions. Not to good balanced wing in the fall. John Heiney strongly reccomended me to minimize the steps in horisontal to vertikal "jump" or "fall". Max 3 steps, he said. So if I shall reccomend anything from my experience I would say 1 - 3 steps and lean over for a fall. I had 0,5m/s backwind. Cold air sinking down from the mountain. Quite a few have d bad experiense running flat and exposing themselt for vertikal random air. Take care, you too.
@@olavmartinbratveit7849 John's a great guy, and a good friend of mine, although I have not seen him in a number of years. I can tell you without any doubt, than in a situation like this, tight harness lines mean next to nothing, and angle of attack means everything. I suspect you'e coming around to that with all of the various comments saying similar things. In fact, there have been quite a number of harsh comments about this video. I would not get too upset with all of them, I think that most sound rough but are meant to be good advice. Nobody who is a good HG pilot wants another HG pilot to meet with disaster, and while the words might sting, the sentiment is for your own good. Here's where the concern is warranted, meaning, you may reject what people who you do not feel are "professional" enough to be giving you advice, and only listen as gospel what you consider to be a "professional" tells you, even if you hear the words you may not understand the concept. The words mean nothing if the concept is not understood. You hear John say "Maximum of three steps", and so next time you only take three steps, and possibly (or likely) have the same exact problem. It is not the number of steps you take. You could take 15 steps and do great, as long as what you do with the glider during those 15 steps is correct. Or you could do only 2-3 steps and have it be disaster if what you do with the glider during those 2-3 steps is all wrong. What is MOST important to any launch is the proper angle of attack. Let's take another example of how such literal acceptance of advice is a bad thing. You like aerobatics, right? John and I know an aero pilot who had recently been doing loops. His method at sea level was to dive for a count of four seconds, then pull up. That 4-count was working well for him, so he believed that a count of 4 was the secret to getting enough speed to loop. Then we all went to Telluride for the World Championships. He made terrible loops, stalling them on top. He could not understand why, because he counted to 4 like always, and it just wasn't working. Of course the air at 11,000 feet is much thinner than at sea level. It takes much longer to generate enough airspeed to produce maneuvers at high altitude as it does at low altitude. So this pilot says he will count longer, but how long? 5 seconds? 6 seconds? How many seconds? Here's his problem, similar to yours. It is not the number of seconds you dive to get airspeed for a loop, it is the AIRSPEED that is important, not the time it takes to achieve it. You don't need to be able to count, or need an airspeed indicator to know how fast you need to go to do a loop, you KNOW it because you understand the concept, and recognize the feel and the sound and the texture of the air how much is the right amount for a loop. For a loop, it is not the number one counts to that makes the loop successful. Just as in a launch it is not the number of steps it takes to run. The concept is far different from a number of steps. Your angle of attack has to be correct whether you fall off the cliff or run with more speed off the edge. When the glider gets moving, it needs to be at the correct angle of attack, and when you ultimately leave the ground, it STILL has to be at the correct angle of attack. That is the concept your "3 step max" mantra is missing, and it is the most vital part of the equation of all.
![เปิดบ้าน นาราเครปกระเทย 1 ไร่ ขายขาดทุนหลัก10ล้าน เอามาใช้หนี้!!! l [Nickynachat]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/0jz84VFWVP4/mqdefault.jpg)
Hi, I'm gonna be straight forward: If you continue flying like this the chances of gonna get seriously hurt, or get killed are pretty high.
1) Don't fly so close to the rocks!
2) Don't fly so close to the rocks with VG ON! You have no control authority! If a bubble puts you in the rock trajectory you're unable to recover it in time.
3) Life is to short for Acro. Spins, loops etc. Been there, done that. Just fly, enjoy the beautiful views, do cross country. Improve thermal skills. Believe, you're already a 'super-human' flying , no need the extra Acro silly stuff at all.
4) although it's a Laminar, glide ratio is something to count on. If you're struggling to get to the landing zone, you already made a bad decision prior. This is even more important with low altitude and Valley micro meteo with venturis ( wind channeling and accelerating) which can put you in really bad situation.
5) landing, prepare way before. It's not so cool to get in the uprights to early, but it's safer. Low, if one hand fails doing the transition you wack ugly, and a beautiful flight is gone.
Cheers, and please fly safe.
Ps- thank you for your humility to share your errors . Plz learn something with them.
Hi. As you could see, Your comments are about similar to mine .... in the video. Acro is exiting, but for sure you should be careful. And as I get older, a lightweight glider With superb performance and handling is wanted. I might og for a Piuma! Enjoy, if you can:-) th-cam.com/video/gqiVERG2FG0/w-d-xo.html
I loved the scenery, but could not enjoy the video being so worried about the safety of the pilot. There was a lot of bad choices that he GOT AWAY WITH on this flight. I've learned in my short H2 experience that you can't predict the wind currents that good to do this every time and GET AWAY with it. It's like the guys that don't run their ass off during take off. Yes,, You can GET AWAY with it most of the time. But,,, It only takes ONE time NOT getting away with it to end your flying career and put a bad spot on our sport.
One of the best videos I have seen. Thanks for not adding music ! Beautiful country.
Good to hear. I want to calm Down and I dont like quick Clip. I am supersencitive to noise so silence is better then Music. I love my country, as I get used to it, and find the best way use what surrounds me:-)
That was scary... please fly with more speed. you are lucky to get away with that. Notice how much input you have to do to get the glider to turn, because you are flying so slow. otherwise... what a beautiful place to fly.
Nice , You should be happy that you have such a beautiful place like this for flying.
Hi Sohrab. I am happy! I am alive and I can see the beauty around. Thanks:-)
Hi Olav, Nice video! For a security video for HangGliding, Do you authorize to use some seconds free of charge ? Thanks !!! Cheers. Ariane
And do not hesitate to give me your contact, I can send you the video edited... thanks
Beautiful country! Thanks for posting the video. Not trying to be mean, but I am an advanced HG and PG pilot of 17 years and I was terrified watching you fly that Laminar. You are flying a glider that you are not ready to fly!!! Your control inputs look like someone who should be flying a Falcon or some other single surface glider. For your own safety and loved ones. Get rid of that glider and buy something you can control and PLEASE get some training regarding your weight shift inputs. You are a tragedy waiting to happen. Sincerely!
Hi Steve:-) Thanks for Your comment and good thoughts. Quite a few pilots agree With you. With a bit different editing, I could of course post a Magic video of this flight witch would give more applaus from the audience. Yes, my twisting shall be changed, but take a closer look to the angle of the hangloop and to the position of COG. It's easier to push out Your body, sideways, then it is to move sideways parallell. Of course its better to use the Whole range of movements, to do a beautiful turn. The tradgedy has waited 30 years to happend and I have had quite a few advices from the E-team in aerosports. Most of them don't post any videos that can discredit themself. So they must be good, even if they have not been flying more then 10-20 years:-) Keep Your legs together and make good landings! (And Falcon will not be added to my hang glider garage. An RX2, might?)
A glider is controlled by shifting your bodyweight not by using your feet as a rudder. You are lucky to be alive. Fly safe.
Yes. Big fault to fly slow with full vg, close to hard rock. Wrong: I did survive, by doing an "ALL IN" movement moving all body to the side, by PUSHING my feet out of the harness. Try to move your carabiner as much as I did, by moving your body sideways. You will not manage. Anyway: The fault was there, and my manouver was not pretty, but it did the job at this occation. Of course I like to fly with better style. But I did show my error. I could easily cut it away.
In fact feet ARE YOUR RUDDER because when you move feet to the side it means all your body went to the side. Common mistake is cross steering - when your arms go to one side, and feet to the other, not changing COG at all. So what he did was perfectly good albeit full VG made steering delayed and clumsy
I have wanted to do this before I saw this video! Amazing! how did you get your wing up there?
Oeff, the start, where was the rotation? Then the steering. If you're flying straight to the rocks, don't push out and try to steer, it won't.. People already wrote about it, but it was painful to see. The environment looks pretty and I can imagine you want to fly there but I'd recommend taking some lessons. Hope you stay safe!
Nydelig Olav :-)
Har ventet lenge på denne.
Synd med kamera som slo seg av etter en liten stund.
You almost died... stalling glider with full vg near the rocks is a NONO ;)
You are obsessed with hugging those rock walls? Very dangerous
-- and flying too slow.
-- and with too much VG.
Can we ban “you’re lucky to be alive” comments? Those are so annoying over and over gain 🤦♂️
Are you hiding something?
Why not show the landing?
Hi:-) The gopro hit the ground and there was nothing more then green gras recorded. I might put that out. You got a point anyway! In my acro video I was put Down on my ass after landing. I did not show that. But I really think I show both good stuff and errors. I could have filtered out the errors. Then Learning potential would decreese.
why is the water green?
Algae makes the sea green. It happens often during the summer.
It seems like you're just moving your butt sideways to turn, not your whole body (gravity center). In general, a very scary video. Wish you great landings, man, don't risk so much.
Thanks for Your comment. I am not proud of my flying style, but if you make a snapshot and Draw lines straight Down and along the hangloop, you will see that I can not come futher out With my COG. Stupid flying slow, Close and With full VG. DON'T! I might learn.
Dangerous take-off
manometre nope
Nope:-)
To those who commented on this video: If you have flown with Olav as have I, you would know that the "feet-out" thing is his flying style and it serves him very well. He is an incredibly talented light-lift scratcher. Among the best I've seen. He stays up while others go down. The only part that had me concerned was starting 4 steps back from the edge at launch. This mistake killed a very good friend of mine. On a sheer cliff launch, start no more than 3 steps from the edge. The objective is to "throw" your glider and yourself off the cliff while keeping wings level. The 2 or 3 steps is meant to provide momentum to carry you away from the cliff. Airspeed on the level run is meaningless. The glider starts flying after you get off the edge and pull the nose down. If there is more than a light breeze, then keeping the wings level cannot be assured. It is most important to pass the edge wings-level and yaw-straight. Starting too far back gives the wing time to roll before you get off the edge, leading to the possibility of dragging a tip.
Thanks John. I agree, on my take off.
The glider is going left. I do something to turn right.
Better next time.
Vol excellent et magnifique !,,
Good
2:45 second fear :)
lucky. Never fly with a high angle of attack to tighten the plane.
Fly to safe.
Correct!
First: Find some friends that hang glide and show this video to them. Might save your life.
Too bad the landing was cut--could have been another "what not to do" that could save someone else's life.
Second: .....why bother.
Thanks Rider.Yes, why bother? But you did.Why? The landing was good. Gopro hit the grass and was twisted downwards. Agree: Communicate with skilled pilot's. I did. With the best.Feet kicking is ugly, but for sure effective. Flying close to vertikal cliff is dangerous.Full VG close to cliff is stupid. Most valuable comment from those skilled skilled pilots??Maby John Heiney, commenting about the danger of vertical cliff launch? 4 step was 1 to many, he said.So: Where is your video's?
Base jumpers organize Heli Boogie once a year. If you contact them, you might get a ride and transport for Your glider.Search for Stavanger Base klubb.And look at TheFjordflier's video:th-cam.com/video/XbuzRkKAz2Q/w-d-xo.html
I think, you should try to spend the winters, in more optimistic climates... There are more important things to do with your live..., or maybe not..
Are you kidding. What could possible be better than soaring above one of the most beautiful scenerys Norway have to offer ;-)
BTW, the video is from summer.
Yeah it was on Wednesday that year. Try rowing, trike hang gliding.. . Beautiful scenery without sharing it with others, looks to me twice as odd .. I'm kidding all right; way to go!
It was really scary!
Nice flight , great launch & Land
"Why", someone ask. "Because I can", I reply. Dangerous? Yes! As life is....
The launch made me shiver, the left wingtip got pretty close to the ground. I may put tape on my down tubes now as I can see that his right hand was higher on the down tube than his left, hence the left wing dropping. This has happened to me and I don't want it to happen again!
waaaaaaaacck
Man, what a crappy launch!
Hi Tontar. I was searching for your good launch at the world wide web, but could not find any. Is there? Agree. First second is not level. And where am I at that moment? A bit scared, with vertical 1000 meter air under me. But what did I do? I Guess you will agree : RIGHT at once, in one second. That was enough. May I suggest: Go fuck yourself?
Sorry that I pissed you off, or that you have such a thin skin that you cannot accept proper criticism. If you'd prefer a better breakdown to better qualify the "crappy launch" comment, I'll indulge. First, you let the glider sit on your shoulders, nose high, WAY high, with a weak, claw like grip where your hands merely wrap around the front of the downtubes. You don't "grip" the downtubes in order to strongly control your pitch. With that kind of non-grip, you can't get your angle down low enough without losing balance on the glider as it sits on your shoulders. Considering that the moment you leave the ground, you will be essentially falling steeply with so little chance of running, pretty much no real slope to accelerate, and so the downward direction of fall, which you can call your path or glide angle, combined with your high attitude, means that you will leave the edge of the cliff in deep stall. What happens with deep stall? Strong nose down response from the glider, which is typically not a good thing when you have so little actual airspeed. That loose grip and high angle, the moment you take your first step yo drop the left wing. Good thing it didn't drag. Maybe you can see these problematic things, and maybe you can't. Hang gliding is a bit of an ego sport, and that often means people don't take well to advice or criticism. You tell me I had a crappy launch, well, we could talk about it without me telling you to fuck off. You have a sweet glider and a sweet harness, but (yes) a crappy launch there. Maybe it works better at other sites, but this particular site is not responsible for your weak grip and weak pitch control. Oh, and if the message is only as good as the messenger to you, you can check my channel for a few videos of my launch technique. If you watch any, check the grip.
th-cam.com/video/uJs-MZzIkHU/w-d-xo.html
@@olavmartinbratveit7849 By the way, thanks for posting this video with all of its good and bad parts, and for being willing to field both good and bad comments! I commend you for that!
Hi Tontar. I usually or never answer in a bad way, as I did here. But I am a bit tired of crappy comments expecially if the comments are far from what Professionals already have commented. If you look again at sec 46-50 you can see me lifting the glider to tension the harness connestions. Not to good balanced wing in the fall. John Heiney strongly reccomended me to minimize the steps in horisontal to vertikal "jump" or "fall". Max 3 steps, he said. So if I shall reccomend anything from my experience I would say 1 - 3 steps and lean over for a fall. I had 0,5m/s backwind. Cold air sinking down from the mountain. Quite a few have d bad experiense running flat and exposing themselt for vertikal random air. Take care, you too.
@@olavmartinbratveit7849 John's a great guy, and a good friend of mine, although I have not seen him in a number of years. I can tell you without any doubt, than in a situation like this, tight harness lines mean next to nothing, and angle of attack means everything. I suspect you'e coming around to that with all of the various comments saying similar things. In fact, there have been quite a number of harsh comments about this video. I would not get too upset with all of them, I think that most sound rough but are meant to be good advice. Nobody who is a good HG pilot wants another HG pilot to meet with disaster, and while the words might sting, the sentiment is for your own good.
Here's where the concern is warranted, meaning, you may reject what people who you do not feel are "professional" enough to be giving you advice, and only listen as gospel what you consider to be a "professional" tells you, even if you hear the words you may not understand the concept. The words mean nothing if the concept is not understood. You hear John say "Maximum of three steps", and so next time you only take three steps, and possibly (or likely) have the same exact problem. It is not the number of steps you take. You could take 15 steps and do great, as long as what you do with the glider during those 15 steps is correct. Or you could do only 2-3 steps and have it be disaster if what you do with the glider during those 2-3 steps is all wrong. What is MOST important to any launch is the proper angle of attack.
Let's take another example of how such literal acceptance of advice is a bad thing. You like aerobatics, right? John and I know an aero pilot who had recently been doing loops. His method at sea level was to dive for a count of four seconds, then pull up. That 4-count was working well for him, so he believed that a count of 4 was the secret to getting enough speed to loop. Then we all went to Telluride for the World Championships. He made terrible loops, stalling them on top. He could not understand why, because he counted to 4 like always, and it just wasn't working. Of course the air at 11,000 feet is much thinner than at sea level. It takes much longer to generate enough airspeed to produce maneuvers at high altitude as it does at low altitude. So this pilot says he will count longer, but how long? 5 seconds? 6 seconds? How many seconds? Here's his problem, similar to yours. It is not the number of seconds you dive to get airspeed for a loop, it is the AIRSPEED that is important, not the time it takes to achieve it. You don't need to be able to count, or need an airspeed indicator to know how fast you need to go to do a loop, you KNOW it because you understand the concept, and recognize the feel and the sound and the texture of the air how much is the right amount for a loop. For a loop, it is not the number one counts to that makes the loop successful. Just as in a launch it is not the number of steps it takes to run. The concept is far different from a number of steps. Your angle of attack has to be correct whether you fall off the cliff or run with more speed off the edge. When the glider gets moving, it needs to be at the correct angle of attack, and when you ultimately leave the ground, it STILL has to be at the correct angle of attack. That is the concept your "3 step max" mantra is missing, and it is the most vital part of the equation of all.