"Go On - Let's See How Much Guts You've Got"
........That's what my instructor said to me many years ago in my second-ever flying lesson as we approached CWL's runway at a steady 70kt for a landing which I thought he was going to do in a Glamorgan Flying Club Cessna 172.
In effect he was saying to me that the approach was okay and if, I could remember how to flare, then he was going to leave me to it.
I thought at the time it wasn't a matter of my guts - but his. It seemed to me extraordinary that a middle aged, spectacle-wearing, family man (as he was) had the bravery to sit there, hands-off, and let me attempt a landing. I thought at the time he would be even braver if he'd only known how little I knew.
I take my hat off to flying instructors everywhere. They put their lives on the line every day. Yes, of course they can grab the controls, save a student from himself and retrieve the situation - but just to sit there, in that right hand seat, does -undoubtedly - take guts, and a lot more of them than I will ever have.