CEPO-You obviously do not understand aircraft performance. Some of the older duffers around here are forgetting that things advance. The new supersonic airplanes they are designing all have rotate speeds in excess of 350 kts. Think of how afraid a worldwar 1 pilot would feel if you took him for a scare ride in an F18... He would think it was crazy. You must think that aircraft are always going to perform the same way and never look beyond that which you have seen for years???? We wouldn't even have airplanes if nobody reached beyond what they had been taught was impossible. Those people that think of themselves as experts close their eyes to all that MAY be possible. That fatb*tch A380 is going to make one hell of a frieghter, but it will never pass safety tests for passenger evac. Okay, here we go, jump down that 6 story safety slide and we can all break our legs together.
As for the rest of you that are reaching for why the 777 does not have winglets. That is one of the most advanced wing designs ever constructed. It was optimized so much that putting winglets on would realize you undetectable amounts of climb performance and very small benefits in cruise. There would be more in looking at drag reduction elsewhere on the bird.