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Old 6th Oct 2016, 07:08
  #2925 (permalink)  
cats_five
 
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There is only a pool of ready-made instructors if they start turning up at their chosen BGA club and ask to instruct. Our experience is they don't.

I agree you can teach the initial stages without a Silver C, but since all BGA instructors except BIs are expected to teach the whole syllabus from ab initio to Bronze & XC endorsement, in practise a Silver C is needed. This might in part be why you have the view that they teach more advanced exercises better - they do much more of it and have more of the background.

Edit - there is an expectation a BI will progress, and most do.

Personally I never found theory hugely necessary thought it is interesting. Want to avoid stalling? Don't fly too slow. Want to avoid spinning? Ditto. Want to maximise XC distance? Fly at the right speed. Want to maximise rate of climb? Fly at the right speed. Want to make a good landing? Approach at the right speed, round out at the right place, choose the right reference point, fly a circuit that lets you do these things.

If you hunt through the old copies of gliding magazines & books online (there is a big archive at https://www.sailplaneandgliding.co.uk/archive), read what Ann Welch has written over the years. Theory in my experience often makes things complicated, she had a wonderful talent for simplifying things. We can only think about so much at a time, if the presentation is too complicated the really important simple things can get crowded out.
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