Speedbird744
Don't let it get to you - just keep a good look out. I had a VERY close call a couple of years ago, but I figure that statistically it's unlikely to happen again, so I don't let it bother me.
Gliders can travel faster, climb higher and generally run rings around your average 152 / PA28! Coming down from altitude or racing between thermals a decent glider can do well over 100 knots.
Glider pilots generally have better visibility than sepls, with their bubble canopies - they usually spend more time looking outside, too!
Stay clear of launch sites - both cables and tug-glider combinations can be encountered to 2500' + aal.
To give you some feeling of what to look out for, to stay airborne, gliders use:
Thermals - relatively slow circling flight, usually under cumulus clouds that often appear in "streets" or lines downwind from where the heat source on the ground is. If you can see one glider, chances are there'll be more. They should all be circling the same direction if in the same thermal, BTW.
Ridges - local rising air caused by wind striking an escarpment and being deflected upwards. Often very close to (or at) the gliding site - e.g. Camphill, DLGC. Typically gliders are soaring at about 1000' above the ridge and a bit upwind.
Wave - this is ridge lift on a massive scale! Air is deflected upwards by a mountain range, e.g. Welsh mountains, Pennines, Scotland. Characterised by lenticular clouds forming (read your met books
). Fantastic rising laminar flow on the upwind side - violent rotor and downdraft effects downwind. Gliders fly in the rising air perpendicular to the wind and just go up, and up and up! I've had a height gain of 3000' and would have gone higher but for an airway above
It's possible to get very high indeed - I don't know what the record is, but it is over 25000'!
So now you know what to look out for!
Good luck with your QXL - and don't wait till you've qualified to go gliding!
SD