A forced landing (erm...... crash) with the gear down gives additional structure between you & terra firma to absorb & dissipate the energy. Something to consider.
FF, I agree with your thoughts about their navigation technique. I'll stick with using what's available, when it's available - especially in remote/featureless places. And what about all the other nav. techniques? Deliberate track error and funnel, line, boundary & lead-in features, track crawling (yes, it can be appropriate) etc etc? Mandating 1/4, 1/2 & 3/4 ONLY checks forces a navigational error to persist that could have been corrected sooner. It also relies on there being a feature at exactly those points. What if you want to regain track at a particular place? Or have an airspace avoidance issue that requires the deviation to corrected immediately?
Hmmm......How would you recognise that this was the case if you're only allowed to consult your chart 2 mins prior to the 1/4, 1/2 & 3/4 points? Oh, that's what the self drawn mud-map is about. How stupid. There's already a much better drawing available. It's called a 'chart'.
