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Old 3rd Sep 2023, 17:10
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+TSRA
 
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: Wherever I go, there I am
Age: 43
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I did my PPL in 6 weeks back in '99, so it's possible. We were doing 1-2 flights in the morning, ground school in the afternoon and evening, 6 days a week. It is a lot of hard work with very little time for anything but your studies when completed in such a condensed format. Personal time management is key, and you must schedule your day to the minute to be successful. Any commitments with family or friends should be delayed until after the course. I also had the benefit of doing my course without the distractions that social media brings to the fray, so I'd also suggest getting off those as I cannot see how sitting on any of the social platforms would do any good.

You took me down a nice little memory lane here, but this is how our day was structured for a typical two-sortie day, taken from the course handouts that I still have. My course was run through the Royal Canadian Air Cadets, so there is quite a military feel to it, but I'd imagine the same format is used in any civilian course. There were 4 flight slots in the morning and 4 in the afternoon. I was a morning guy, hence the way my schedule below is structured. Simply flip it for a PM-scheduled student.

0600 - Reville
0630 - Breakfast
0700 - Leave for the flight line
0715 - Flight Slot #1
0830 - Flight Slot #2
0945 - Flight Slot #3
1100 - Flight Slot #4
1215 - Leave for the ground school building
1230 - Lunch
1315 - Ground School Slot #1
1445 - Break
1455 - Ground School Slot #2
1625 - Break
1635 - Preparatory Ground Instruction (PGI)
1745 - Dinner
1830 - Study Time
2030 - Free Time
2230 - Lights Out

PGI - This was used to cover any briefings or theory discussions required before the next day's flights. In a traditional setting, this would be your pre-flight briefing. It was great from the standpoint that you showed up and went flying, but woe was the student who did not study through breakfast or lunch on the exercises to be covered that day.

Any downtime between flights was used to review our instructor's comments or prepare for the next flight. Downtime at night was generally used to compare notes with other students, learn from their mistakes, and have a little personal time, which I tended to use to simply study more.
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