Task 1 (Open)

How the field flew this task, and which behaviours separated it.

The optimised route. Pilots fly it in the direction of the arrows. The radii, the leg distances and the start times are on the task page.

Analysis computed

Pilots: 45
Airtime: 81h (13:34–17:48 AEDT)
Thermals: 19337 shared by 2+ pilots
Working band: 905–2144 m
Airtime split: 39%climbing
27%gliding
34%searching

2 pilots are in the standings but not in this analysis. Which, and why

What the weather did

From the weather model

Independent of the tracklogs: modelled conditions for the task area.

Fetching the day’s weather — it will appear here in a moment.

From the pilots' tracks

What the field actually flew — wind, climb strength and leg timing measured from every pilot's tracklog.

The day’s wind, hour by hour and leg by leg. What the air did, read from the field itself. We estimate the wind from the circling of every pilot. The first method is the drift of the circle centre, and the second method, used when the first is not available, is the modulation of the ground speed. We then average the vectors two ways. The table by hour of day shows how the wind increased and changed direction through the day. The table by speed-section leg shows the wind on each part of the course. This metric describes the day, so it has no value for each pilot.

How strong the day’s climbs were, hour by hour. When the day started, reached its peak, and ended. We group the thermal climbs of all pilots by the hour in which each climb started, labelled in the time zone of the competition. The median and the 90th-percentile average climb rate for each hour show how the lift developed. This metric describes the day, so it has no value for each pilot.

Share of the flight spent in air that wasn’t sinking. How much of the flight was in air worth being in. The value is the share of the airborne time of a pilot, on the shared grid, with a 30 s-smoothed vario at or above −0.5 m/s. The time they flew, the line they steered and the way the flight ended all feed this value. It is therefore a reading of the day as much as of the pilot. There is no expected direction, and the sign of the correlation is the finding. The timing table compares the window of the day’s best climbs against the time when the field launched.

All charts — measured and modelled alike — share that one time axis, so a vertical scan compares the two at the same moment. Arrows fly WITH the wind — direction figures are degrees the wind blows from; arrow length and opacity track speed and sample count. On the per-leg chart the pale bar is when the field flew that leg and the solid band inside it is the circling its wind was measured from — a leg the field glided is measured in a sliver of the time it was flown. Exact numbers are in the day family’s tables under “The metrics in detail”.

The day's thermals

The 40 most-shared of 96 multi-pilot thermals, reconstructed by pooling every pilot's track through the same climb. Everything shown is measured from the tracks — no fitted lift model.

Start	Pilots	Height band	Mean climb	Strongest side
13:42 AEDT	8	900–1500 m	+1.5 m/s	NW
13:44 AEDT	5	900–1800 m	+2.0 m/s	SW
13:48 AEDT	13	1500–2300 m	+1.7 m/s	S
13:55 AEDT	6	1200–2000 m	+1.4 m/s	E
13:58 AEDT	7	1000–1900 m	+2.2 m/s	SE
14:01 AEDT	7	1400–2300 m	+1.5 m/s	NE
14:05 AEDT	4	500–1400 m	+1.7 m/s	S
14:17 AEDT	5	1000–2200 m	+1.8 m/s	SW
14:18 AEDT	5	800–1200 m	+1.1 m/s	W
14:19 AEDT	8	1100–2300 m	+1.8 m/s	E
14:21 AEDT	7	1500–2500 m	+2.5 m/s	NE
14:25 AEDT	6	1400–2300 m	+1.7 m/s	W
14:26 AEDT	8	1400–2300 m	+1.5 m/s	SW
14:27 AEDT	5	1300–1800 m	+1.8 m/s	S
14:30 AEDT	8	1800–2100 m	+1.3 m/s	NW
14:31 AEDT	9	800–1900 m	+1.6 m/s	NW
14:33 AEDT	8	1700–2200 m	+1.5 m/s	SE
14:36 AEDT	8	1000–2500 m	+2.5 m/s	W
14:37 AEDT	7	1200–2400 m	+1.2 m/s	SW
14:40 AEDT	4	1100–2200 m	+2.0 m/s	E
14:46 AEDT	6	1600–2400 m	+2.0 m/s	SE
14:47 AEDT	5	1000–1800 m	+1.3 m/s	W
14:51 AEDT	7	1000–2000 m	+1.5 m/s	SE
14:54 AEDT	7	1100–2300 m	+1.7 m/s	E
14:55 AEDT	6	1100–2000 m	+1.0 m/s	N
14:58 AEDT	8	1300–2200 m	+1.6 m/s	NW
14:58 AEDT	6	1200–2200 m	+1.6 m/s	W
15:06 AEDT	5	1400–2100 m	+1.4 m/s	NE
15:09 AEDT	5	800–1300 m	+0.8 m/s	N
15:10 AEDT	6	1100–2100 m	+1.8 m/s	N
15:12 AEDT	8	1400–1900 m	+1.5 m/s	SE
15:17 AEDT	6	800–1700 m	+2.0 m/s	E
15:17 AEDT	8	1000–2000 m	+1.4 m/s	W
15:19 AEDT	9	1100–2200 m	+1.6 m/s	S
15:20 AEDT	5	1300–2200 m	+1.7 m/s	SE
15:23 AEDT	5	1400–1900 m	+1.1 m/s	S
15:26 AEDT	5	1800–2200 m	+1.1 m/s	S
15:36 AEDT	5	1100–2100 m	+1.2 m/s	N
15:45 AEDT	4	1200–2000 m	+1.5 m/s	SW
16:01 AEDT	5	1200–2300 m	+1.5 m/s	NW

Thermal at 13:48 AEDT — 13 pilots, 30 climbs

Wind 16.7 km/h from 203° (SSW), measured from 82 circle estimates in the pilots' own tracks.
Model wind cross-check loading…
Leans 11° from vertical toward 61° (ENE), within 37° of downwind.
Strongest on the S side of the core at +2.2 m/s against +1.3 m/s on the N side.
Multiple cores in 2 of 8 bands between 1900 and 2300 m — separate feeders (⬧ in the rose) before they merged.

Watch this thermal in the 3D replay

Pilots in this thermal (climb rates)

Pilot	Min	Median	Max
Olav Opsanger	-8.0 m/s	+2.3 m/s	+15.0 m/s
Steve Blenkinsop	-1.8 m/s	+1.8 m/s	+5.8 m/s
Paul Bissett-Amess	-0.7 m/s	+1.5 m/s	+3.3 m/s
Neale Halsall	-2.0 m/s	+1.5 m/s	+4.8 m/s
Vic Hare	-4.0 m/s	+1.3 m/s	+4.8 m/s
Mitch Butler	-1.5 m/s	+1.3 m/s	+4.3 m/s
Peter Adriaans	-2.5 m/s	+1.0 m/s	+3.5 m/s
Rohan Taylor	-0.5 m/s	+0.8 m/s	+3.3 m/s
Guy Hubbard	—	—	—
Corinna Schwiegershausen	+0.0 m/s	+0.0 m/s	+0.0 m/s
Scott Barrett	—	—	—
Steven Crosby	—	—	—
Steve Docherty	—	—	—

Each pilot's slowest, typical and best climb over their own vario samples in this thermal — a negative minimum means they touched sink inside it.

Band table (exact numbers)

Band	Core offset E/N (m)	Working radius	Extent	Mean climb	Best climb	Samples	Pilots	Cores
2200–2300 m	-55 / 100	209 m	329 m	+1.2 m/s	+7.0 m/s	217	6	2
2100–2200 m	50 / 24	126 m	224 m	+1.9 m/s	+5.8 m/s	141	4	1
2000–2100 m	91 / -4	195 m	317 m	+1.8 m/s	+15.0 m/s	192	4	1
1900–2000 m	77 / -101	203 m	332 m	+1.8 m/s	+9.5 m/s	168	3	2
1800–1900 m	38 / -139	93 m	212 m	+2.1 m/s	+11.6 m/s	129	3	1
1700–1800 m	-31 / -67	141 m	228 m	+1.6 m/s	+9.5 m/s	122	5	1
1600–1700 m	-69 / 51	248 m	579 m	+1.8 m/s	+15.0 m/s	151	4	1
1500–1600 m	-254 / 111	120 m	209 m	+2.0 m/s	+8.3 m/s	65	2	1

How to read this: each thermal pools every pilot's fixes through the same climb into 100 m altitude bands; a band's core is the lift-weighted centre of its fixes, so the rose and the sector readings are already normalised for the thermal's lean and drift. Wedge length is relative climb by side of the core; the dashed ring is the measured working radius and the dotted ring the widest the field ranged. The solid arrow is the wind measured from the pilots' circles; the dashed arrow is the weather model's wind for the same place, time and altitudes — a model run, not an observation.

Which behaviours went with better results

Every row is one behaviour, measured for each pilot and then compared against the published placings (Spearman's rank correlation, ρ). Rank 1 is best, so a behaviour where more is better shows a negative ρ. A bigger bar means the behaviour tracked the placings more closely on this task, and pilots measured is how much of the analysed field the behaviour applied to — a reading drawn from half the field is thinner than one drawn from all of it. Select a row to see that behaviour plotted against rank — the chart stays in view while you work down the table.

Glide speed between climbs

Label every pilot

Each dot is a pilot. ρ = -0.82 (clear pattern, n = 42). More is expected to be better here, and it was: top ranks gather to the right. The curve is a trend fitted through the dots: left to right it runs from about rank 39 to about rank 1. 3 pilots have no value and are not plotted.

Field glide speed: median 57.3 km/h · p90 66.5 km/h (42 pilots)

Behaviour	Strength	What it means	Pilots measured
Glide speed between climbs		clear pattern
Gliding wide of the optimal course line		clear pattern
Time spent flying with a gaggle		clear pattern
How much of the thermal the pilot climbed before leaving it		clear pattern
Share of race time spent hunting for the next climb		clear pattern
How long after the gate opened the pilot started		clear pattern
Climbs joined on another pilot's marker		clear pattern
Distance covered between climbs		clear pattern
Share of the height gain made outside thermals		clear pattern
Share of lift turned in that was kept as a climb		clear pattern
How low the pilot gets between climbs		clear pattern
How often leaving the gaggle paid off		some pattern
Share of the flight spent in air that wasn’t sinking		some pattern
Climbing faster than the pilots sharing the thermal		some pattern
Climb rate at thermal exit		could be chance
How round and consistent the circles were		could be chance
Glide L/D against the field median		could be chance
Low saves dug out from the bottom of the band		could be chance
Time to core thermals		could be chance
Gliding faster when the next climb is stronger		could be chance
Arriving at ESS with height to spare		could be chance

clear pattern is |ρ| ≥ 0.5, some pattern ≥ 0.3 and faint pattern below — each only once the coefficient is bigger than chance alone produces at that many pilots (its noise floor). could be chance (in the statistics: within noise) means shuffling the placings produces a coefficient that size more than 5% of the time, so it cannot be told apart from luck however big it looks. too few pilots is fewer than 8 pilots with a value — not enough to tell either way.

Rank 21 behaviours against one day's results and a few will look strong on luck alone — the ones worth believing are those that repeat across tasks in the competition-level analysis.

Metrics with a clear pattern, plotted against rank

Glide speed between climbs

Measured in kilometres per hour · higher is better

How fast the pilot moves down the course when they are on a glide. The value is the duration-weighted mean ground speed over every glide after the start, which is the glide distance divided by the glide time. A higher value means more ground covered in each minute between climbs.

Field glide speed: median 57.3 km/h · p90 66.5 km/h (42 pilots)

Gliding wide of the optimal course line

Measured in percent · lower is better

How much further the pilot flew on glide than the optimised course line needed. 0% is a flight exactly along the line, and 12% is a glide 12% further than necessary. On each completed speed-section leg, we compare the pilot's route with the optimised distance of the leg, weighted by that optimised distance. Only the glides are measured at their full path length. Circling and searching contribute their entry-to-exit displacement instead. A climb or a search for lift therefore never reads as a wide line, because a pilot chooses a line only on glide. 0% is a real value that a pilot can reach: a pilot who flies the line of the optimiser scores exactly zero.

Each dot is a pilot. ρ = 0.76 (clear pattern, n = 38). Less is expected to be better here, and it was: top ranks gather to the left. The curve is a trend fitted through the dots: left to right it runs from about rank 2 to about rank 38. 7 pilots have no value and are not plotted.

Time spent flying with a gaggle

Measured in percent · no expected direction

Whether the pilot raced with other pilots or alone. The value is the share of their flying time after the start inside a detected gaggle, that is, clustered with one other racing pilot or more on the shared time grid. There is no expected direction. A gaggle increases the power to search for lift, but it also holds a pilot to its own speed. The sign of the correlation says which of the two occurred here.

Each dot is a pilot. ρ = -0.76 (clear pattern, n = 45). No expected direction — the sign is the finding: larger values went with better ranks here. The curve is a trend fitted through the dots: left to right it runs from about rank 40 to about rank 6.

66 gaggle episodes detected (peak size 9 pilots).

How much of the thermal the pilot climbed before leaving it

Measured in percent · no expected direction

Does the pilot climb to the top of every thermal, or leave with lift still above them? We take the altitude where they left each thermal after the start, as a percentage of the day’s working band. 0% is the floor of the field and 100% is its ceiling. The value is the median. There is no expected direction: a climb to the top buys height in reserve, and an early departure buys time.

Each dot is a pilot. ρ = -0.73 (clear pattern, n = 42). No expected direction — the sign is the finding: larger values went with better ranks here. The curve is a trend fitted through the dots: left to right it runs from about rank 45 to about rank 8. 3 pilots have no value and are not plotted.

Share of race time spent hunting for the next climb

Measured in percent · lower is better

Time that goes into neither a climb nor progress down the course. This is the time spent to find lift, to stay up, and to decide what to do next. The value is the share of the speed-section time, from the start to ESS or to the landing, in which the pilot neither climbed in a thermal nor glided with real net speed. A lower value means less time lost between climbs.

Each dot is a pilot. ρ = 0.68 (clear pattern, n = 45). Less is expected to be better here, and it was: top ranks gather to the left. The curve is a trend fitted through the dots: left to right it runs from about rank 3 to about rank 45.

Speed-section phase shares, field p25/median/p75: climb 29/33/36% · glide 27/36/42% · search 23/33/42%

How long after the gate opened the pilot started

Measured in seconds · lower is better

Every second between the opening of the gate and the crossing of the start line is a second lost for nothing. The value is the seconds from the start gate taken to the scored SSS crossing. On an elapsed-time task, the pilot’s own crossing is the reference, so the delay is 0 by definition. The start table adds the crossing altitude, and the distance behind the leading pilot who had already started.

Each dot is a pilot. ρ = 0.66 (clear pattern, n = 45). Less is expected to be better here, and it was: top ranks gather to the left. The curve is a trend fitted through the dots: left to right it runs from about rank 14 to about rank 40.

Climbs joined on another pilot's marker

Measured in percent · no expected direction

How much of the lift of the pilot another pilot found first. The value is the share of their climbs after the start where another pilot was already established in the same thermal when they arrived. Established means 30 s or more into the climb, and still climbing. A high value means they mostly climb on the markers of other pilots. A low value means they find their own air. There is no expected direction. A marker is free information, but it puts a pilot where the last climb was, and not where the next one is.

Each dot is a pilot. ρ = -0.62 (clear pattern, n = 40). No expected direction — the sign is the finding: larger values went with better ranks here. The curve is a trend fitted through the dots: left to right it runs from about rank 34 to about rank 11. 5 pilots have no value and are not plotted.

Distance covered between climbs

Measured in kilometres · higher is better

How far the pilot gets down the course before they must stop and circle again. This is the direct reading of how often they stop. The value is the scored flown distance divided by the number of thermals taken after the start, so 3 km means three kilometres of course for each climb. The pilot must fly 20 km or more. The note of each pilot adds their mean climb percentile inside shared thermals, so you can read the number of stops together with the climb strength. Long legs between weak climbs is a different day from long legs between strong ones.

Each dot is a pilot. ρ = -0.60 (clear pattern, n = 36). More is expected to be better here, and it was: top ranks gather to the right. The curve is a trend fitted through the dots: left to right it runs from about rank 31 to about rank 10. 9 pilots have no value and are not plotted.

Share of the height gain made outside thermals

Measured in percent · no expected direction

Dolphin flying: how much of the height that the pilot gained came outside of circling. The value is the share of the altitude gain after the start, smoothed over 10 s, that the pilot made outside a detected thermal. There is no expected direction. The sign of the correlation shows whether dolphin flying paid on this day.

Each dot is a pilot. ρ = 0.54 (clear pattern, n = 39). No expected direction — the sign is the finding: larger values went with worse ranks here. The curve is a trend fitted through the dots: left to right it runs from about rank 7 to about rank 38. 6 pilots have no value and are not plotted.

Share of lift turned in that was kept as a climb

Measured in percent · no expected direction

How selective the pilot is about the lift they stop for. Each period of circling of 30 s or more after the start counts as lift that the pilot sampled. If the period overlaps a detected thermal, the pilot kept that lift. If it does not, they turned a few circles and left it. The value is the percentage kept. A low value means they are selective. A high value means they keep almost every climb they turn in. There is no expected direction: selection wins on a strong day and wastes time on a weak one.

Each dot is a pilot. ρ = -0.51 (clear pattern, n = 41). No expected direction — the sign is the finding: larger values went with better ranks here. The curve is a trend fitted through the dots: left to right it runs from about rank 42 to about rank 16. 4 pilots have no value and are not plotted.

How low the pilot gets between climbs

Measured in percent · no expected direction

How low the pilot goes before the next climb. A high value is a race with height in reserve, and a low value is a flight that goes down near the ground. We take each pair of climbs that the pilot made after the start, and we find the lowest point between them. We keep only the gaps that go down 100 m or more, because a top-up between two climbs is not a descent. We do not count a sled run or the glide to goal, because the pilot made no climb after them. The value is the median of those low points, as a percentage of the day's working band. 0% is where the lowest tenth of the field's climbs started, and 100% is where the highest tenth stopped. Thus a negative value shows that the pilot went lower than almost all of the field. The pilot must have two or more of these descents. There is no expected direction. The sign of the correlation says whether height in reserve pays.

Each dot is a pilot. ρ = -0.51 (clear pattern, n = 38). No expected direction — the sign is the finding: larger values went with better ranks here. The curve is a trend fitted through the dots: left to right it runs from about rank 40 to about rank 6. 7 pilots have no value and are not plotted.

Outcome checks

These are not behaviours. They measure the result itself, for example the time behind the leader and the race time lost, so they always follow the places. They are here as a check on the analysis. A weak pattern in this table means that something is wrong in the numbers, and not in the flying of any pilot. Their per-pilot tables stay in the Race craft section below.

Outcome	Strength	What it means	Pilots measured
Race time behind the leader at ESS		clear pattern
Race time lost against the fastest pilots, leg by leg		clear pattern

The whole field at a glance

1. Scott Barrett

2. Rohan Holtkamp

3. Rohan Taylor

4. Jon Durand

5. Steven Crosby

6. Peter Burkitt

7. Mitch Butler

8. Steve Docherty

9. Adam Stevens

10. Peter Adriaans

11. Olav Opsanger

12. Paul Bissett-Amess

13. Guy Hubbard

14. Steve Blenkinsop

15. Vic Hare

16. Neale Halsall

17. James Wynd

18. Jay Kubeil

19. Adrian Connor

20. Troy Horton

21. Richard Martin

22. Andrew Sutton

23. Neil Hooke

24. Dustan Hansen

25. Corinna Schwiegershausen

26. Stuart Cathcart

27. Peter Tolhurst

28. James Atkinson

29. Sam Prest

30. Hughbert Alexander

31. Ward Gunn

32. Randall Clotworthy

33. Dean Bayly

34. Andrew Taylor

35. Mark Jeffree

36. Magnus Ronningen

37. Alexander Kot

38. John Harriott

39. David Jackson

40. Jason Lannstrom

41. Ted Sadowski

42. Donny Gardner

43. Peter Garrone

44. Jason Carman

45. Richard Hughes

The pilots in rank order against every behaviour. A darker cell is a better percentile in this field, and an empty cell is a behaviour that does not apply. The columns start with the behaviours whose better end went with better places, continue through the behaviours that separated nobody, and end with the behaviours that ran the other way. A field that one behaviour separated therefore shades dark in the top-left corner, and a field where each pilot won differently does not. The band above rates how much pattern each group of columns holds: a clear, some or faint pattern, noise (could be chance), or too few pilots to tell. The family sections below carry the exact values. † This behaviour has no good or bad direction. The shade is the position in the field, and not the quality.

Pilot style clusters

The groups are flying style, and not score. The spread of ranks in each group shows where that style paid and where it did not. Each group carries the name of its strongest signature. A ★ marks the pilot most typical of their group.

Group A — Gaggle flyers

15 pilots · ranks 1–25 · median 8 · middle half 4.5–14.5

High — Time spent flying with a gaggle group median P82 in this field (62 percent)
Low — Share of the height gain made outside thermals group median P18 in this field (6 percent)
High — How low the pilot gets between climbs group median P81 in this field (61 percent)
High — Glide speed between climbs group median P80 in this field (66.0 kilometres per hour) · usually a strength

1. Scott Barrett
2. Rohan Holtkamp
3. Rohan Taylor
4. Jon Durand
5. Steven Crosby
6. Peter Burkitt
7. Mitch Butler (most typical of this group)
8. Steve Docherty
10. Peter Adriaans
13. Guy Hubbard
14. Steve Blenkinsop
15. Vic Hare
16. Neale Halsall
17. James Wynd
25. Corinna Schwiegershausen

Group B — Stop-often flyers

25 pilots · ranks 9–43 · median 28 · middle half 21–34

Low — Distance covered between climbs group median P29 in this field (1.7 kilometres) · usually costly
High — Gliding wide of the optimal course line group median P70 in this field (32 percent) · usually costly
Low — Climbs joined on another pilot's marker group median P31 in this field (20 percent)
High — Share of the height gain made outside thermals group median P67 in this field (17 percent)

9. Adam Stevens
11. Olav Opsanger
12. Paul Bissett-Amess
18. Jay Kubeil
19. Adrian Connor
20. Troy Horton (most typical of this group)
21. Richard Martin
22. Andrew Sutton
23. Neil Hooke
24. Dustan Hansen
26. Stuart Cathcart
27. Peter Tolhurst
28. James Atkinson
29. Sam Prest
30. Hughbert Alexander
31. Ward Gunn
32. Randall Clotworthy
33. Dean Bayly
34. Andrew Taylor
35. Mark Jeffree
36. Magnus Ronningen
37. Alexander Kot
38. John Harriott
39. David Jackson
43. Peter Garrone

Not clustered: 40. Jason Lannstrom — only 8 of 21 metrics available (needs ≥ 60%); 41. Ted Sadowski — only 9 of 21 metrics available (needs ≥ 60%); 42. Donny Gardner — only 10 of 21 metrics available (needs ≥ 60%); 44. Jason Carman — only 8 of 21 metrics available (needs ≥ 60%); 45. Richard Hughes — only 11 of 21 metrics available (needs ≥ 60%).

GlideComp groups the pilots by flying style, and not by score. It transforms the rank of every behavioural metric to a percentile inside the field. It then compares two pilots by the mean percentile gap over the metrics that both pilots have, and never fills in a missing value. Ward-linkage agglomeration forms the groups, and the best mean silhouette selects the number of groups. Each group carries the spread of the GAP ranks of its members, which shows where a style paid and where it did not. On this task, 40 pilots on 21 behavioural metrics formed 2 groups, with k searched from 2 to 6. The mean silhouette is 0.26. A value near 0 means soft group boundaries, and a value near 1 means tight, well-separated groups.

The metrics in detail

best: some pattern (0.47)

#	Pilot	NonSink%
1	Scott Barrett	51
2	Rohan Holtkamp	53
3	Rohan Taylor	54
4	Jon Durand	56
5	Steven Crosby	49
6	Peter Burkitt	56
7	Mitch Butler	55
8	Steve Docherty	55
9	Adam Stevens	60
10	Peter Adriaans	51
11	Olav Opsanger	56
12	Paul Bissett-Amess	51
13	Guy Hubbard	57
14	Steve Blenkinsop	57
15	Vic Hare	57
16	Neale Halsall	57
17	James Wynd	61
18	Jay Kubeil	55
19	Adrian Connor	61
20	Troy Horton	59
21	Richard Martin	58
22	Andrew Sutton	58
23	Neil Hooke	60
24	Dustan Hansen	54
25	Corinna Schwiegershausen	57
26	Stuart Cathcart	57
27	Peter Tolhurst	59
28	James Atkinson	54
29	Sam Prest	63
30	Hughbert Alexander	62
31	Ward Gunn	60
32	Randall Clotworthy	55
33	Dean Bayly	59
34	Andrew Taylor	60
35	Mark Jeffree	63
36	Magnus Ronningen	61
37	Alexander Kot	64
38	John Harriott	56
39	David Jackson	57
40	Jason Lannstrom	57
41	Ted Sadowski	52
42	Donny Gardner	50
43	Peter Garrone	59
44	Jason Carman	63
45	Richard Hughes	71

The day’s wind, hour by hour and leg by leg

Measured in kilometres per hour · no expected direction

What the air did, read from the field itself. We estimate the wind from the circling of every pilot. The first method is the drift of the circle centre, and the second method, used when the first is not available, is the modulation of the ground speed. We then average the vectors two ways. The table by hour of day shows how the wind increased and changed direction through the day. The table by speed-section leg shows the wind on each part of the course. This metric describes the day, so it has no value for each pilot.

Wind by hour

Period	Speed (km/h)	Dir (°)	n
Whole task	4.6	245	4443
13:00 AEDT	6.5	244	242
14:00 AEDT	4.3	240	1559
15:00 AEDT	3.8	246	1857
16:00 AEDT	7.2	251	721
17:00 AEDT	4.2	251	64

The vector mean of the wind estimate of each circle. GlideComp uses centre drift where it can, and ground-speed modulation where it cannot. The direction is the degrees the wind blows FROM (0° = north).

Hours are shown in the competition’s time zone.

Wind by leg

Leg	Flown	Pilots	Circling	Speed (km/h)	Dir (°)	n	From pilots
ELLIOT (SSS)→TINTAL	14:16–16:30 AEDT	38	14:21–16:26 AEDT	3.2	188	696	32
TINTAL→CUDG	14:28–17:05 AEDT	30	14:31–17:03 AEDT	2.7	237	808	30
CUDG→TOWONG	14:51–17:09 AEDT	28	14:57–17:00 AEDT	6.0	257	799	26
TOWONG→CORRY (ESS)	15:22–17:08 AEDT	22	16:13–16:58 AEDT	10.3	254	107	4
CORRY (ESS)→CORRY (GOAL)	15:27–17:08 AEDT	22	—	—	—	0	0

“Flown” is when the field was ON the leg — the first pilot entering to the last leaving — over the “Pilots” who started and flew the whole leg.

“Circling” is the narrower window the wind was actually measured in: first to last circle estimate any pilot logged while on the leg, from “From pilots” pilots. Glides produce no estimate, so a leg the field mostly glided shows a sliver of its flown window (or “—” where no one circled at all) — and a late leg the leaders glided can be measured EARLIER than the leg before it without either being wrong.

How strong the day’s climbs were, hour by hour

Measured in metres per second · no expected direction

When the day started, reached its peak, and ended. We group the thermal climbs of all pilots by the hour in which each climb started, labelled in the time zone of the competition. The median and the 90th-percentile average climb rate for each hour show how the lift developed. This metric describes the day, so it has no value for each pilot.

Climb by hour

Hour	Median (m/s)	p90 (m/s)	n
13:00 AEDT	1.1	2.2	51
14:00 AEDT	1.2	2.2	432
15:00 AEDT	1.1	1.9	506
16:00 AEDT	1.0	1.7	226
17:00 AEDT	1.0	1.6	31

The average climb rate of every thermal use across the field, grouped by the start of the climb. The hours are in the time zone of the competition.

Share of the flight spent in air that wasn’t sinking

Measured in percent · no expected direction

How much of the flight was in air worth being in. The value is the share of the airborne time of a pilot, on the shared grid, with a 30 s-smoothed vario at or above −0.5 m/s. The time they flew, the line they steered and the way the flight ended all feed this value. It is therefore a reading of the day as much as of the pilot. There is no expected direction, and the sign of the correlation is the finding. The timing table compares the window of the day’s best climbs against the time when the field launched.

Day timing

	Time
Best conditions	14:00–15:00 AEDT
Earliest takeoff	13:34 AEDT
Median takeoff	14:22 AEDT
Latest takeoff	17:08 AEDT

Best conditions is the one-hour window with the strongest median climb (1.2 m/s), among hours with enough climbs to be representative (≥20% of the busiest hour).

best: clear pattern (0.73)

One lane per behaviour, one dot per pilot, placed by percentile within the pilots that behaviour could be measured on — so a dot's position says where a pilot sat, never how spread the field was. Hover a pilot to light them up in every lane at once. Lanes run strongest separator first, the ones that separated nobody last; the table below keeps its usual order. Right is the end the behaviour is expected to be better at — whether it paid on this task is the ranking's question, not this chart's. † No good or bad direction: right is simply the larger value. A lane's count is the pilots it applied to; the rest have no value for it, which is not a score of zero.

#	Pilot	Out-climb	Core s	LeaveRate	Kept%	TopOut%	Round
1	Scott Barrett	65 (13 shared climbs)	56 (13 climbs ≥ 60 s)	0.2 (12 climbs ≥ 90 s)	78 (7/9 circling bouts led to climbs)	81 (mean on-course altitude 42% of band)	— (6 circles, 67% left)
2	Rohan Holtkamp	78 (19 shared climbs)	31 (9 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.2 (8 climbs ≥ 90 s)	88 (7/8 circling bouts led to climbs)	76 (mean on-course altitude 58% of band)	0.17 (95 circles, 81% left)
3	Rohan Taylor	74 (29 shared climbs)	55 (11 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.5 (8 climbs ≥ 90 s)	82 (9/11 circling bouts led to climbs)	85 (mean on-course altitude 58% of band)	0.16 (112 circles, 81% left)
4	Jon Durand	76 (19 shared climbs)	34 (14 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.3 (13 climbs ≥ 90 s)	90 (9/10 circling bouts led to climbs)	68 (mean on-course altitude 50% of band)	0.15 (125 circles, 86% left)
5	Steven Crosby	41 (9 shared climbs)	91 (9 climbs ≥ 60 s)	-0.4 (9 climbs ≥ 90 s)	63 (5/8 circling bouts led to climbs)	101 (mean on-course altitude 40% of band)	0.37 (12 circles, 75% left)
6	Peter Burkitt	73 (34 shared climbs)	36 (10 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.3 (8 climbs ≥ 90 s)	65 (13/20 circling bouts led to climbs)	80 (mean on-course altitude 55% of band)	0.17 (130 circles, 97% left)
7	Mitch Butler	70 (26 shared climbs)	59 (13 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.2 (12 climbs ≥ 90 s)	82 (9/11 circling bouts led to climbs)	81 (mean on-course altitude 66% of band)	0.16 (150 circles, 67% left)
8	Steve Docherty	53 (13 shared climbs)	61 (13 climbs ≥ 60 s)	0.1 (10 climbs ≥ 90 s)	65 (13/20 circling bouts led to climbs)	72 (mean on-course altitude 55% of band)	— (4 circles, 100% left)
9	Adam Stevens	65 (28 shared climbs)	36 (17 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.0 (12 climbs ≥ 90 s)	75 (9/12 circling bouts led to climbs)	72 (mean on-course altitude 57% of band)	0.15 (201 circles, 81% left)
10	Peter Adriaans	76 (30 shared climbs)	51 (9 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.3 (8 climbs ≥ 90 s)	78 (7/9 circling bouts led to climbs)	78 (mean on-course altitude 66% of band)	0.15 (111 circles, 54% left)
11	Olav Opsanger	61 (13 shared climbs)	11 (6 climbs ≥ 60 s)	2.4 (4 climbs ≥ 90 s)	71 (10/14 circling bouts led to climbs)	19 (mean on-course altitude 21% of band)	0.17 (137 circles, 27% left)
12	Paul Bissett-Amess	73 (20 shared climbs)	62 (13 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.1 (11 climbs ≥ 90 s)	75 (6/8 circling bouts led to climbs)	87 (mean on-course altitude 53% of band)	0.19 (98 circles, 97% left)
13	Guy Hubbard	58 (17 shared climbs)	70 (14 climbs ≥ 60 s)	0.6 (12 climbs ≥ 90 s)	73 (8/11 circling bouts led to climbs)	99 (mean on-course altitude 60% of band)	0.22 (35 circles, 89% left)
14	Steve Blenkinsop	62 (19 shared climbs)	90 (12 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.2 (9 climbs ≥ 90 s)	69 (9/13 circling bouts led to climbs)	80 (mean on-course altitude 61% of band)	0.15 (150 circles, 58% left)
15	Vic Hare	68 (39 shared climbs)	36 (16 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.2 (11 climbs ≥ 90 s)	71 (10/14 circling bouts led to climbs)	71 (mean on-course altitude 68% of band)	0.13 (206 circles, 78% left)
16	Neale Halsall	73 (29 shared climbs)	47 (15 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.4 (10 climbs ≥ 90 s)	77 (10/13 circling bouts led to climbs)	71 (mean on-course altitude 53% of band)	0.17 (132 circles, 54% left)
17	James Wynd	48 (15 shared climbs)	63 (16 climbs ≥ 60 s)	0.4 (14 climbs ≥ 90 s)	75 (12/16 circling bouts led to climbs)	68 (mean on-course altitude 48% of band)	— (7 circles, 29% left)
18	Jay Kubeil	76 (33 shared climbs)	41 (14 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.1 (7 climbs ≥ 90 s)	69 (9/13 circling bouts led to climbs)	77 (mean on-course altitude 54% of band)	0.16 (87 circles, 69% left)
19	Adrian Connor	68 (45 shared climbs)	11 (19 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.4 (12 climbs ≥ 90 s)	74 (14/19 circling bouts led to climbs)	39 (mean on-course altitude 43% of band)	0.16 (186 circles, 23% left)
20	Troy Horton	69 (43 shared climbs)	51 (16 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.1 (13 climbs ≥ 90 s)	68 (13/19 circling bouts led to climbs)	50 (mean on-course altitude 46% of band)	0.18 (216 circles, 99% left)
21	Richard Martin	78 (21 shared climbs)	42 (13 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.0 (9 climbs ≥ 90 s)	61 (11/18 circling bouts led to climbs)	56 (mean on-course altitude 57% of band)	0.17 (214 circles, 45% left)
22	Andrew Sutton	69 (29 shared climbs)	36 (14 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.2 (10 climbs ≥ 90 s)	79 (11/14 circling bouts led to climbs)	71 (mean on-course altitude 57% of band)	0.14 (170 circles, 99% left)
23	Neil Hooke	58 (29 shared climbs)	41 (17 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.2 (9 climbs ≥ 90 s)	69 (11/16 circling bouts led to climbs)	66 (mean on-course altitude 57% of band)	0.14 (161 circles, 80% left)
24	Dustan Hansen	85 (14 shared climbs)	66 (9 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.4 (6 climbs ≥ 90 s)	56 (9/16 circling bouts led to climbs)	60 (mean on-course altitude 53% of band)	0.14 (118 circles, 72% left)
25	Corinna Schwiegershausen	49 (11 shared climbs)	100 (12 climbs ≥ 60 s)	-0.2 (12 climbs ≥ 90 s)	60 (9/15 circling bouts led to climbs)	80 (mean on-course altitude 55% of band)	0.27 (13 circles, 77% left)
26	Stuart Cathcart	57 (17 shared climbs)	57 (15 climbs ≥ 60 s)	0.6 (13 climbs ≥ 90 s)	56 (10/18 circling bouts led to climbs)	86 (mean on-course altitude 67% of band)	0.20 (86 circles, 97% left)
27	Peter Tolhurst	59 (26 shared climbs)	29 (18 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.3 (12 climbs ≥ 90 s)	45 (9/20 circling bouts led to climbs)	61 (mean on-course altitude 58% of band)	0.18 (133 circles, 99% left)
28	James Atkinson	79 (23 shared climbs)	44 (13 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.2 (11 climbs ≥ 90 s)	67 (8/12 circling bouts led to climbs)	68 (mean on-course altitude 54% of band)	0.13 (159 circles, 76% left)
29	Sam Prest	61 (35 shared climbs)	34 (17 climbs ≥ 60 s)	0.9 (9 climbs ≥ 90 s)	83 (15/18 circling bouts led to climbs)	52 (mean on-course altitude 49% of band)	0.17 (138 circles, 89% left)
30	Hughbert Alexander	72 (26 shared climbs)	37 (11 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.6 (7 climbs ≥ 90 s)	92 (12/13 circling bouts led to climbs)	37 (mean on-course altitude 42% of band)	0.17 (131 circles, 48% left)
31	Ward Gunn	74 (30 shared climbs)	36 (13 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.5 (9 climbs ≥ 90 s)	79 (19/24 circling bouts led to climbs)	64 (mean on-course altitude 45% of band)	0.18 (117 circles, 47% left)
32	Randall Clotworthy	78 (5 shared climbs)	25 (7 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.1 (6 climbs ≥ 90 s)	78 (7/9 circling bouts led to climbs)	46 (mean on-course altitude 36% of band)	0.15 (57 circles, 46% left)
33	Dean Bayly	65 (12 shared climbs)	34 (9 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.3 (6 climbs ≥ 90 s)	83 (10/12 circling bouts led to climbs)	20 (mean on-course altitude 28% of band)	0.13 (133 circles, 85% left)
34	Andrew Taylor	37 (5 shared climbs)	90 (7 climbs ≥ 60 s)	0.1 (6 climbs ≥ 90 s)	33 (3/9 circling bouts led to climbs)	57 (mean on-course altitude 44% of band)	— (3 circles, 67% left)
35	Mark Jeffree	66 (13 shared climbs)	37 (14 climbs ≥ 60 s)	0.7 (11 climbs ≥ 90 s)	61 (11/18 circling bouts led to climbs)	69 (mean on-course altitude 53% of band)	0.16 (98 circles, 99% left)
36	Magnus Ronningen	88 (6 shared climbs)	2 (7 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.3 (4 climbs ≥ 90 s)	43 (3/7 circling bouts led to climbs)	33 (mean on-course altitude 37% of band)	0.21 (164 circles, 99% left)
37	Alexander Kot	61 (32 shared climbs)	32 (10 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.4 (4 climbs ≥ 90 s)	50 (10/20 circling bouts led to climbs)	56 (mean on-course altitude 46% of band)	0.15 (97 circles, 62% left)
38	John Harriott	60 (18 shared climbs)	35 (5 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.0 (4 climbs ≥ 90 s)	20 (1/5 circling bouts led to climbs)	38 (mean on-course altitude 32% of band)	0.20 (59 circles, 46% left)
39	David Jackson	41 (6 shared climbs)	100 (11 climbs ≥ 60 s)	0.2 (11 climbs ≥ 90 s)	54 (7/13 circling bouts led to climbs)	17 (mean on-course altitude 4% of band)	0.36 (16 circles, 75% left)
40	Jason Lannstrom	—	7 (3 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.1 (1 climb ≥ 90 s)	—	—	0.16 (27 circles, 93% left)
41	Ted Sadowski	53 (3 shared climbs)	80 (3 climbs ≥ 60 s)	-0.0 (3 climbs ≥ 90 s)	0 (0/3 circling bouts led to climbs)	—	— (5 circles, 100% left)
42	Donny Gardner	54 (3 shared climbs)	78 (4 climbs ≥ 60 s)	0.3 (4 climbs ≥ 90 s)	—	19 (mean on-course altitude 9% of band)	— (5 circles, 100% left)
43	Peter Garrone	52 (2 shared climbs)	22 (4 climbs ≥ 60 s)	0.8 (2 climbs ≥ 90 s)	60 (3/5 circling bouts led to climbs)	-8 (mean on-course altitude -14% of band)	0.23 (37 circles, 22% left)
44	Jason Carman	26 (5 shared climbs)	76 (6 climbs ≥ 60 s)	0.1 (6 climbs ≥ 90 s)	—	—	— (4 circles, 100% left)
45	Richard Hughes	54 (3 shared climbs)	45 (4 climbs ≥ 60 s)	1.1 (2 climbs ≥ 90 s)	—	-15 (mean on-course altitude -17% of band)	0.18 (99 circles, 98% left)

Share of lift turned in that was kept as a climb

Measured in percent · no expected direction

Acceptance by hour

Hour	Median accepted (%)	pilots
14:00 AEDT	100	25
15:00 AEDT	63	42
16:00 AEDT	54	24
17:00 AEDT	0	7

Median per-pilot acceptance %, bucketed by the hour (competition time zone).

How round and consistent the circles were

Measured in ratio · lower is better

Whether the pilot flies clean, repeatable circles, or moves around the thermal. We fit each detected circle by least squares. The RMS fit error divided by the fitted radius measures how round the turn was. The value is the median over all of the circles of the pilot. A lower value means smoother and more consistent turns.

Turn direction across the field: 73% left (4444 circles).

best: clear pattern (0.82)

#	Pilot	GlideSpd	GlideL/D	SpeedToFly	Wide%	Dolphin%
1	Scott Barrett	74.0 (6 glides, 26 min gliding)	1.12 (4 legs compared)	-2.8 (5 glide→climb pairs)	7 (4 legs completed)	2 (56 of 2734 m gained outside thermals)
2	Rohan Holtkamp	72.7 (10 glides, 32 min gliding)	1.15 (4 legs compared)	-8.3 (9 glide→climb pairs)	6 (4 legs completed)	6 (150 of 2512 m gained outside thermals)
3	Rohan Taylor	66.1 (13 glides, 40 min gliding)	1.12 (4 legs compared)	-1.6 (12 glide→climb pairs)	8 (4 legs completed)	15 (393 of 2696 m gained outside thermals)
4	Jon Durand	61.1 (14 glides, 44 min gliding)	1.10 (4 legs compared)	3.5 (13 glide→climb pairs)	6 (4 legs completed)	8 (239 of 2910 m gained outside thermals)
5	Steven Crosby	66.5 (6 glides, 35 min gliding)	1.03 (4 legs compared)	-9.6 (5 glide→climb pairs)	8 (4 legs completed)	2 (76 of 3319 m gained outside thermals)
6	Peter Burkitt	63.1 (13 glides, 42 min gliding)	1.18 (4 legs compared)	-2.3 (12 glide→climb pairs)	11 (4 legs completed)	18 (481 of 2635 m gained outside thermals)
7	Mitch Butler	66.4 (8 glides, 45 min gliding)	1.09 (4 legs compared)	-0.2 (7 glide→climb pairs)	10 (4 legs completed)	5 (156 of 3022 m gained outside thermals)
8	Steve Docherty	64.6 (10 glides, 43 min gliding)	1.07 (4 legs compared)	1.7 (9 glide→climb pairs)	14 (4 legs completed)	4 (115 of 3172 m gained outside thermals)
9	Adam Stevens	64.2 (12 glides, 45 min gliding)	1.14 (4 legs compared)	1.5 (11 glide→climb pairs)	8 (4 legs completed)	17 (479 of 2742 m gained outside thermals)
10	Peter Adriaans	59.6 (9 glides, 48 min gliding)	0.97 (4 legs compared)	1.8 (8 glide→climb pairs)	11 (4 legs completed)	8 (287 of 3444 m gained outside thermals)
11	Olav Opsanger	67.0 (20 glides, 51 min gliding)	0.95 (4 legs compared)	-5.0 (20 glide→climb pairs)	20 (4 legs completed)	29 (1637 of 5606 m gained outside thermals)
12	Paul Bissett-Amess	54.0 (8 glides, 53 min gliding)	1.40 (4 legs compared)	0.3 (7 glide→climb pairs)	16 (4 legs completed)	6 (162 of 2694 m gained outside thermals)
13	Guy Hubbard	66.3 (6 glides, 43 min gliding)	0.95 (4 legs compared)	-1.7 (5 glide→climb pairs)	14 (4 legs completed)	4 (132 of 3631 m gained outside thermals)
14	Steve Blenkinsop	66.0 (12 glides, 49 min gliding)	0.98 (4 legs compared)	0.3 (11 glide→climb pairs)	14 (4 legs completed)	5 (175 of 3462 m gained outside thermals)
15	Vic Hare	66.9 (13 glides, 51 min gliding)	1.03 (4 legs compared)	-2.0 (12 glide→climb pairs)	19 (4 legs completed)	9 (292 of 3356 m gained outside thermals)
16	Neale Halsall	63.3 (12 glides, 46 min gliding)	0.88 (4 legs compared)	4.7 (11 glide→climb pairs)	14 (4 legs completed)	9 (354 of 3924 m gained outside thermals)
17	James Wynd	62.0 (8 glides, 44 min gliding)	1.02 (4 legs compared)	-6.3 (7 glide→climb pairs)	17 (4 legs completed)	3 (99 of 3880 m gained outside thermals)
18	Jay Kubeil	58.3 (14 glides, 52 min gliding)	1.19 (4 legs compared)	-2.3 (13 glide→climb pairs)	25 (4 legs completed)	12 (381 of 3314 m gained outside thermals)
19	Adrian Connor	49.1 (24 glides, 80 min gliding)	0.87 (4 legs compared)	3.6 (23 glide→climb pairs)	39 (4 legs completed)	19 (944 of 5097 m gained outside thermals)
20	Troy Horton	49.3 (21 glides, 81 min gliding)	0.93 (4 legs compared)	-0.1 (20 glide→climb pairs)	32 (4 legs completed)	18 (822 of 4657 m gained outside thermals)
21	Richard Martin	59.3 (14 glides, 68 min gliding)	1.02 (4 legs compared)	2.7 (13 glide→climb pairs)	28 (4 legs completed)	14 (574 of 3984 m gained outside thermals)
22	Andrew Sutton	52.2 (15 glides, 67 min gliding)	0.89 (4 legs compared)	-0.5 (14 glide→climb pairs)	34 (4 legs completed)	12 (597 of 5121 m gained outside thermals)
23	Neil Hooke	54.2 (15 glides, 64 min gliding)	0.88 (3 legs compared)	0.8 (14 glide→climb pairs)	17 (3 legs completed)	19 (686 of 3574 m gained outside thermals)
24	Dustan Hansen	60.4 (15 glides, 62 min gliding)	1.08 (3 legs compared)	-0.4 (14 glide→climb pairs)	34 (3 legs completed)	13 (522 of 3951 m gained outside thermals)
25	Corinna Schwiegershausen	56.1 (5 glides, 38 min gliding)	1.15 (3 legs compared)	-12.8 (4 glide→climb pairs)	15 (3 legs completed)	8 (245 of 3026 m gained outside thermals)
26	Stuart Cathcart	50.1 (17 glides, 63 min gliding)	0.97 (3 legs compared)	-0.4 (16 glide→climb pairs)	22 (3 legs completed)	10 (321 of 3222 m gained outside thermals)
27	Peter Tolhurst	50.3 (18 glides, 72 min gliding)	0.74 (3 legs compared)	-1.2 (17 glide→climb pairs)	30 (3 legs completed)	15 (643 of 4246 m gained outside thermals)
28	James Atkinson	56.8 (12 glides, 54 min gliding)	0.92 (3 legs compared)	0.6 (11 glide→climb pairs)	19 (3 legs completed)	13 (521 of 3939 m gained outside thermals)
29	Sam Prest	63.8 (23 glides, 55 min gliding)	1.01 (2 legs compared)	1.5 (22 glide→climb pairs)	35 (2 legs completed)	17 (690 of 4156 m gained outside thermals)
30	Hughbert Alexander	53.4 (26 glides, 63 min gliding)	0.89 (2 legs compared)	-0.4 (25 glide→climb pairs)	58 (2 legs completed)	32 (1357 of 4246 m gained outside thermals)
31	Ward Gunn	54.9 (28 glides, 84 min gliding)	1.18 (1 leg compared)	0.6 (27 glide→climb pairs)	55 (1 leg completed)	19 (954 of 5080 m gained outside thermals)
32	Randall Clotworthy	57.9 (7 glides, 30 min gliding)	1.12 (1 leg compared)	-1.5 (6 glide→climb pairs)	13 (1 leg completed)	20 (346 of 1714 m gained outside thermals)
33	Dean Bayly	43.8 (16 glides, 55 min gliding)	1.00 (1 leg compared)	0.2 (15 glide→climb pairs)	33 (1 leg completed)	17 (463 of 2703 m gained outside thermals)
34	Andrew Taylor	43.8 (5 glides, 46 min gliding)	1.15 (1 leg compared)	-6.3 (4 glide→climb pairs)	70 (1 leg completed)	14 (257 of 1862 m gained outside thermals)
35	Mark Jeffree	47.3 (13 glides, 52 min gliding)	0.81 (1 leg compared)	0.4 (12 glide→climb pairs)	93 (1 leg completed)	14 (394 of 2721 m gained outside thermals)
36	Magnus Ronningen	45.1 (11 glides, 40 min gliding)	1.17 (1 leg compared)	-3.7 (10 glide→climb pairs)	10 (1 leg completed)	27 (379 of 1420 m gained outside thermals)
37	Alexander Kot	54.5 (16 glides, 45 min gliding)	1.20 (1 leg compared)	2.4 (15 glide→climb pairs)	126 (1 leg completed)	29 (535 of 1839 m gained outside thermals)
38	John Harriott	51.1 (2 glides, 29 min gliding)	1.00 (1 leg compared)	—	47 (1 leg completed)	52 (200 of 388 m gained outside thermals)
39	David Jackson	45.7 (6 glides, 36 min gliding)	—	-5.0 (5 glide→climb pairs)	—	6 (174 of 2783 m gained outside thermals)
40	Jason Lannstrom	—	—	—	—	—
41	Ted Sadowski	—	—	—	—	—
42	Donny Gardner	42.5 (1 glides, 8 min gliding)	—	—	—	—
43	Peter Garrone	47.1 (3 glides, 9 min gliding)	—	—	—	—
44	Jason Carman	—	—	—	—	—
45	Richard Hughes	48.7 (1 glides, 3 min gliding)	—	—	—	—

Glide speed between climbs

Measured in kilometres per hour · higher is better

Field glide speed: median 57.3 km/h · p90 66.5 km/h (42 pilots)

best: clear pattern (0.68)

#	Pilot	Floor%	LowSaves	km/climb	Search%
1	Scott Barrett	69 (5 descents, lowest 28% of band)	0.0	6.5 (mean shared-climb pctile 48%)	10
2	Rohan Holtkamp	34 (8 descents, lowest -9% of band)	0.0	3.5 (mean shared-climb pctile 65%)	15
3	Rohan Taylor	41 (7 descents, lowest 13% of band)	0.0	2.9 (mean shared-climb pctile 57%)	27
4	Jon Durand	57 (9 descents, lowest -36% of band)	0.0	2.7 (mean shared-climb pctile 63%)	18
5	Steven Crosby	68 (5 descents, lowest -29% of band)	0.0	7.4 (mean shared-climb pctile 29%)	7
6	Peter Burkitt	65 (7 descents, lowest 27% of band)	0.0	2.4 (mean shared-climb pctile 50%)	35
7	Mitch Butler	63 (6 descents, lowest 36% of band)	0.0	4.0 (mean shared-climb pctile 50%)	21
8	Steve Docherty	57 (7 descents, lowest 15% of band)	0.0	4.7 (mean shared-climb pctile 36%)	22
9	Adam Stevens	54 (5 descents, lowest 19% of band)	0.0	2.1 (mean shared-climb pctile 52%)	33
10	Peter Adriaans	69 (6 descents, lowest 32% of band)	0.0	3.5 (mean shared-climb pctile 51%)	25
11	Olav Opsanger	9 (17 descents, lowest -46% of band)	0.0	1.4 (mean shared-climb pctile 72%)	41
12	Paul Bissett-Amess	21 (6 descents, lowest -33% of band)	0.0	4.0 (mean shared-climb pctile 59%)	18
13	Guy Hubbard	70 (5 descents, lowest 5% of band)	1.0 (deepest save from 12% of band)	5.8 (mean shared-climb pctile 35%)	18
14	Steve Blenkinsop	46 (7 descents, lowest 18% of band)	0.0	3.5 (mean shared-climb pctile 46%)	23
15	Vic Hare	67 (7 descents, lowest 40% of band)	0.0	2.7 (mean shared-climb pctile 51%)	30
16	Neale Halsall	61 (8 descents, lowest -6% of band)	1.0 (deepest save from -9% of band)	2.4 (mean shared-climb pctile 55%)	25
17	James Wynd	29 (6 descents, lowest -4% of band)	1.0 (deepest save from -4% of band)	4.0 (mean shared-climb pctile 38%)	17
18	Jay Kubeil	27 (5 descents, lowest 12% of band)	1.0 (deepest save from 12% of band)	2.1 (mean shared-climb pctile 57%)	24
19	Adrian Connor	24 (9 descents, lowest -20% of band)	0.0	1.0 (mean shared-climb pctile 53%)	34
20	Troy Horton	31 (7 descents, lowest -33% of band)	2.0 (deepest save from -32% of band)	1.4 (mean shared-climb pctile 46%)	38
21	Richard Martin	38 (8 descents, lowest 0% of band)	1.0 (deepest save from 4% of band)	2.1 (mean shared-climb pctile 49%)	42
22	Andrew Sutton	58 (9 descents, lowest -16% of band)	1.0 (deepest save from -16% of band)	1.7 (mean shared-climb pctile 55%)	29
23	Neil Hooke	36 (6 descents, lowest -15% of band)	0.0	2.0 (mean shared-climb pctile 43%)	33
24	Dustan Hansen	37 (7 descents, lowest -3% of band)	1.0 (deepest save from 6% of band)	2.3 (mean shared-climb pctile 57%)	33
25	Corinna Schwiegershausen	39 (4 descents, lowest 30% of band)	0.0	5.6 (mean shared-climb pctile 32%)	16
26	Stuart Cathcart	55 (10 descents, lowest -40% of band)	0.0	2.5 (mean shared-climb pctile 34%)	33
27	Peter Tolhurst	51 (7 descents, lowest 2% of band)	0.0	1.4 (mean shared-climb pctile 39%)	43
28	James Atkinson	38 (6 descents, lowest 20% of band)	0.0	2.2 (mean shared-climb pctile 64%)	29
29	Sam Prest	50 (9 descents, lowest 9% of band)	0.0	0.9 (mean shared-climb pctile 42%)	28
30	Hughbert Alexander	8 (12 descents, lowest -50% of band)	0.0	0.9 (mean shared-climb pctile 56%)	43
31	Ward Gunn	41 (11 descents, lowest -24% of band)	1.0 (deepest save from 14% of band)	0.7 (mean shared-climb pctile 53%)	40
32	Randall Clotworthy	12 (5 descents, lowest 2% of band)	1.0 (deepest save from 14% of band)	1.8 (mean shared-climb pctile 67%)	34
33	Dean Bayly	2 (7 descents, lowest -27% of band)	1.0 (deepest save from -3% of band)	1.2 (mean shared-climb pctile 40%)	43
34	Andrew Taylor	43 (2 descents, lowest 13% of band)	1.0 (deepest save from 5% of band)	6.0 (mean shared-climb pctile 18%)	25
35	Mark Jeffree	38 (7 descents, lowest -19% of band)	1.0 (deepest save from 11% of band)	1.2 (mean shared-climb pctile 54%)	45
36	Magnus Ronningen	-7 (2 descents, lowest -8% of band)	0.0	1.3 (mean shared-climb pctile 86%)	55
37	Alexander Kot	43 (6 descents, lowest -30% of band)	0.0	—	58
38	John Harriott	—	0.0	—	64
39	David Jackson	-18 (5 descents, lowest -34% of band)	4.0 (deepest save from -34% of band)	—	38
40	Jason Lannstrom	—	0.0	—	21
41	Ted Sadowski	—	0.0	—	44
42	Donny Gardner	—	0.0	—	28
43	Peter Garrone	—	0.0	—	72
44	Jason Carman	—	0.0	—	100
45	Richard Hughes	—	0.0	—	94

Share of race time spent hunting for the next climb

Measured in percent · lower is better

Speed-section phase shares, field p25/median/p75: climb 29/33/36% · glide 27/36/42% · search 23/33/42%

best: clear pattern (0.76)

#	Pilot	InGaggle%	Marked%	LeaveWin%
1	Scott Barrett	67	50 (4/8 climbs marked)	100 (3W–0L (3 departures))
2	Rohan Holtkamp	81	53 (8/15 climbs marked)	100 (1W–0L (1 departure))
3	Rohan Taylor	62	56 (10/18 climbs marked)	100 (1W–0L (1 departure))
4	Jon Durand	70	53 (10/19 climbs marked)	100 (1W–0L (1 departure))
5	Steven Crosby	47	29 (2/7 climbs marked)	100 (3W–0L (3 departures))
6	Peter Burkitt	45	73 (16/22 climbs marked)	50 (1W–1L (2 departures))
7	Mitch Butler	70	85 (11/13 climbs marked)	100 (1W–0L (1 departure))
8	Steve Docherty	77	45 (5/11 climbs marked)	33 (1W–2L (3 departures))
9	Adam Stevens	45	28 (7/25 climbs marked)	100 (1W–0L (1 departure))
10	Peter Adriaans	44	80 (12/15 climbs marked)	100 (1W–0L (1 departure))
11	Olav Opsanger	14	6 (2/36 climbs marked)	100 (2W–0L (2 departures))
12	Paul Bissett-Amess	20	46 (6/13 climbs marked)	—
13	Guy Hubbard	37	22 (2/9 climbs marked)	67 (2W–1L (3 departures))
14	Steve Blenkinsop	84	87 (13/15 climbs marked)	0 (0W–2L (2 departures))
15	Vic Hare	75	53 (10/19 climbs marked)	50 (1W–1L (2 departures))
16	Neale Halsall	62	55 (12/22 climbs marked)	—
17	James Wynd	39	54 (7/13 climbs marked)	0 (0W–1L (1 departure))
18	Jay Kubeil	25	32 (8/25 climbs marked)	—
19	Adrian Connor	24	30 (16/53 climbs marked)	0 (0W–1L (1 departure))
20	Troy Horton	37	42 (15/36 climbs marked)	—
21	Richard Martin	18	16 (4/25 climbs marked)	—
22	Andrew Sutton	28	29 (9/31 climbs marked)	—
23	Neil Hooke	39	65 (17/26 climbs marked)	0 (0W–1L (1 departure))
24	Dustan Hansen	11	5 (1/22 climbs marked)	—
25	Corinna Schwiegershausen	36	67 (6/9 climbs marked)	0 (0W–2L (2 departures))
26	Stuart Cathcart	26	20 (4/20 climbs marked)	—
27	Peter Tolhurst	22	24 (8/34 climbs marked)	—
28	James Atkinson	27	38 (8/21 climbs marked)	100 (1W–0L (1 departure))
29	Sam Prest	33	42 (18/43 climbs marked)	—
30	Hughbert Alexander	10	0 (0/42 climbs marked)	—
31	Ward Gunn	16	38 (15/40 climbs marked)	—
32	Randall Clotworthy	0	7 (1/15 climbs marked)	—
33	Dean Bayly	1	0 (0/22 climbs marked)	100 (1W–0L (1 departure))
34	Andrew Taylor	16	0 (0/4 climbs marked)	—
35	Mark Jeffree	3	10 (2/20 climbs marked)	—
36	Magnus Ronningen	9	0 (0/17 climbs marked)	—
37	Alexander Kot	9	19 (5/27 climbs marked)	—
38	John Harriott	65	40 (2/5 climbs marked)	—
39	David Jackson	0	17 (1/6 climbs marked)	—
40	Jason Lannstrom	0	—	—
41	Ted Sadowski	11	—	—
42	Donny Gardner	44	—	—
43	Peter Garrone	0	0 (0/4 climbs marked)	—
44	Jason Carman	0	—	—
45	Richard Hughes	0	—	—

Time spent flying with a gaggle

Measured in percent · no expected direction

66 gaggle episodes detected (peak size 9 pilots).

best: clear pattern (0.66)

One lane per behaviour, one dot per pilot, placed by percentile within the pilots that behaviour could be measured on — so a dot's position says where a pilot sat, never how spread the field was. Hover a pilot to light them up in every lane at once. Lanes run strongest separator first, the ones that separated nobody last; the table below keeps its usual order. Right is the end the behaviour is expected to be better at — whether it paid on this task is the ranking's question, not this chart's. A lane's count is the pilots it applied to; the rest have no value for it, which is not a score of zero.

#	Pilot	StartDly	TimeLost	Behind	Spare m
1	Scott Barrett	97	13	0.0	-53
2	Rohan Holtkamp	142	0	0.2	-132
3	Rohan Taylor	41	0	5.2	-37
4	Jon Durand	154	236	11.4	-2
5	Steven Crosby	130	103	11.7	61
6	Peter Burkitt	104	314	13.4	-40
7	Mitch Butler	131	489	17.5	35
8	Steve Docherty	117	542	20.6	-102
9	Adam Stevens	98	596	21.4	-104
10	Peter Adriaans	162	506	21.5	-205
11	Olav Opsanger	128	1028	23.1	-128
12	Paul Bissett-Amess	172	618	23.5	200
13	Guy Hubbard	111	716	24.1	-80
14	Steve Blenkinsop	127	836	25.4	56
15	Vic Hare	108	881	25.5	-67
16	Neale Halsall	149	987	26.7	-30
17	James Wynd	167	1837	43.8	-8
18	Jay Kubeil	891	1189	44.3	82
19	Adrian Connor	709	4504	97.2	-109
20	Troy Horton	198	3737	75.9	-154
21	Richard Martin	868	2463	65.9	127
22	Andrew Sutton	518	3151	71.5	-177
23	Neil Hooke	241	1682	—	—
24	Dustan Hansen	2008	1925	—	—
25	Corinna Schwiegershausen	127	527	—	—
26	Stuart Cathcart	12	2294	—	—
27	Peter Tolhurst	97	2997	—	—
28	James Atkinson	413	1354	—	—
29	Sam Prest	75	1044	—	—
30	Hughbert Alexander	2609	2460	—	—
31	Ward Gunn	402	1215	—	—
32	Randall Clotworthy	4486	198	—	—
33	Dean Bayly	1634	1168	—	—
34	Andrew Taylor	2131	1748	—	—
35	Mark Jeffree	950	2713	—	—
36	Magnus Ronningen	7	613	—	—
37	Alexander Kot	1013	2621	—	—
38	John Harriott	2174	1068	—	—
39	David Jackson	2124	—	—	—
40	Jason Lannstrom	9068	—	—	—
41	Ted Sadowski	1021	—	—	—
42	Donny Gardner	2034	—	—	—
43	Peter Garrone	802	—	—	—
44	Jason Carman	2837	—	—	—
45	Richard Hughes	3658	—	—	—

How long after the gate opened the pilot started

Measured in seconds · lower is better

Start execution

Pilot	Delay	Alt m	Band %	Behind km
Scott Barrett	1:37	2105	97	9.4
Rohan Holtkamp	2:22	1991	88	9.9
Rohan Taylor	0:41	2036	91	9.9
Jon Durand	2:34	2052	93	9.9
Steven Crosby	2:10	2042	92	0.4
Peter Burkitt	1:44	2016	90	9.6
Mitch Butler	2:11	2070	94	0.4
Steve Docherty	1:57	2072	94	0.2
Adam Stevens	1:38	1925	82	9.0
Peter Adriaans	2:42	2002	89	1.0
Olav Opsanger	2:08	2060	93	0.4
Paul Bissett-Amess	2:52	1902	80	9.5
Guy Hubbard	1:51	2083	95	0.1
Steve Blenkinsop	2:07	2129	99	0.4
Vic Hare	1:48	2086	95	0.0
Neale Halsall	2:29	1926	82	0.8
James Wynd	2:47	1661	61	9.9
Jay Kubeil	14:51	1689	63	10.6
Adrian Connor	11:49	1618	58	9.7
Troy Horton	3:18	2031	91	9.0
Richard Martin	14:28	2217	106	9.7
Andrew Sutton	8:38	1788	71	9.2
Neil Hooke	4:01	1850	76	9.4
Dustan Hansen	33:28	1903	81	9.9
Corinna Schwiegersha	2:07	2030	91	9.8
Stuart Cathcart	0:12	2246	108	9.3
Peter Tolhurst	1:37	2106	97	7.9
James Atkinson	6:53	1656	61	9.7
Sam Prest	1:15	1692	64	9.1
Hughbert Alexander	43:29	1681	63	8.9
Ward Gunn	6:42	1596	56	9.9
Randall Clotworthy	74:46	1824	74	9.9
Dean Bayly	27:14	1496	48	10.4
Andrew Taylor	35:31	1907	81	10.0
Mark Jeffree	15:50	2010	89	10.6
Magnus Ronningen	0:07	2125	99	9.2
Alexander Kot	16:53	1882	79	10.9
John Harriott	36:14	1943	84	10.2
David Jackson	35:24	1109	16	9.8
Jason Lannstrom	151:08	1542	51	0.0
Ted Sadowski	17:01	1873	78	10.8
Donny Gardner	33:54	1664	61	9.8
Peter Garrone	13:22	987	7	9.1
Jason Carman	47:17	654	-20	8.5
Richard Hughes	60:58	981	6	9.3

Delay = gate taken → SSS crossing. Behind km = extra distance to the next turnpoint vs the furthest-along already-started pilot at the moment of this start (time grid).

Race time lost against the fastest pilots, leg by leg

Measured in seconds · lower is better

For each completed speed-section leg, we compare the leg time of the pilot with the mean of the top 10 pilots by rank who completed that leg. Only the losses count, and we add them together. The sum of the leg times is the race time, and the rank defines the reference, so this metric follows the result by construction. Read the waterfall table, which shows every leg against the task winner, for the diagnosis. Do not read the correlation as a finding.

Rohan Holtkamp against the winner, leg by leg: bars hanging below the line are time lost, bars above are time gained; over the 4 compared legs, -0:31 overall. — marks a leg the pilot or the winner did not complete; the table below has every pilot.

Leg waterfall — leg time vs the task winner

Pilot	SSS→TINTAL	TINTAL→CUDG	CUDG→TOWONG	TOWONG→ESS	Total
Scott Barrett	+0:00	+0:00	+0:00	+0:00	+0:00
Rohan Holtkamp	+0:10	-0:54	+1:14	-1:01	-0:31
Rohan Taylor	+1:29	+2:00	+3:29	-0:47	+6:10
Jon Durand	+3:13	-1:28	+9:07	-0:24	+10:27
Steven Crosby	+4:41	+4:02	+4:21	-1:53	+11:11
Peter Burkitt	+7:02	-0:54	+7:30	-0:18	+13:20
Mitch Butler	+4:48	+10:21	+2:18	-0:33	+16:54
Steve Docherty	+4:23	+9:51	+6:59	-0:54	+20:18
Adam Stevens	+9:41	+2:21	+9:02	+0:18	+21:22
Peter Adriaans	+5:45	+3:31	+7:46	+3:21	+20:23
Olav Opsanger	+2:34	-2:08	+22:16	-0:10	+22:32
Paul Bissett-Amess	+10:11	+3:42	+7:38	+0:45	+22:15
Guy Hubbard	+4:24	+9:27	+10:08	-0:06	+23:54
Steve Blenkinsop	+4:13	+9:14	+12:40	-1:11	+24:55
Vic Hare	+4:23	+17:19	+4:57	-1:19	+25:20
Neale Halsall	+4:55	+1:26	+20:49	-1:20	+25:51
James Wynd	+21:36	+6:29	+13:41	+0:48	+42:35
Jay Kubeil	+17:09	+2:10	+10:06	+1:38	+31:03
Adrian Connor	+32:16	+12:04	+23:19	+19:22	+87:01
Troy Horton	+9:41	+11:08	+24:08	+29:17	+74:14
Richard Martin	+11:12	+22:23	+19:17	+0:08	+53:00
Andrew Sutton	+11:56	+15:12	+17:44	+19:38	+64:28
Neil Hooke	+15:00	+9:41	+15:31	—	+40:12
Dustan Hansen	+22:48	+16:17	+5:11	—	+44:16
Corinna Schwiegersha	+8:31	+1:04	+9:34	—	+19:09
Stuart Cathcart	+18:48	+18:04	+13:33	—	+50:25
Peter Tolhurst	+22:37	+12:22	+27:09	—	+62:08
James Atkinson	+12:19	+8:31	+13:55	—	+34:45
Sam Prest	+10:53	+13:32	—	—	+24:24
Hughbert Alexander	+31:09	+16:51	—	—	+48:00
Ward Gunn	+24:23	—	—	—	+24:23
Randall Clotworthy	+7:25	—	—	—	+7:25
Dean Bayly	+23:35	—	—	—	+23:35
Andrew Taylor	+33:15	—	—	—	+33:15
Mark Jeffree	+49:20	—	—	—	+49:20
Magnus Ronningen	+14:20	—	—	—	+14:20
Alexander Kot	+47:48	—	—	—	+47:48
John Harriott	+21:55	—	—	—	+21:55

Each cell is the leg time of this pilot minus the leg time of the winner. A + value is slower than the winner, and a − value is faster. A — means that the pilot or the winner did not complete the leg.

The scalar metric instead adds the losses against the mean of the top 10 pilots who completed each leg. A leg flown faster than that reference contributes 0.

Race time behind the leader at ESS

Measured in minutes · lower is better

At each speed-section turnpoint, we compare the elapsed race time of the pilot, which is the reaching time minus their own start, with the fastest pilot to that turnpoint. The value is the minutes behind at ESS. It follows the final rank almost exactly, because this metric is the sanity check of the evaluation.

Minutes behind the fastest pilot at each turnpoint — the leader runs along the top at zero, and a line that stops early is a pilot who landed. The top 5 are coloured; every pilot's exact numbers are in the table below.

Horserace — minutes behind the leader at each turnpoint

Pilot	ELLIOT	TINTAL	CUDG	TOWONG	CORRY	CORRY
Scott Barrett	1.5	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Rohan Holtkamp	2.2	0.9	0.0	1.2	0.2	0.2
Rohan Taylor	0.6	0.6	2.5	6.0	5.2	5.2
Jon Durand	2.5	4.2	2.7	11.8	11.4	11.4
Steven Crosby	2.1	5.2	9.3	13.6	11.7	11.7
Peter Burkitt	1.6	7.1	6.2	13.7	13.4	13.4
Mitch Butler	2.1	5.4	15.7	18.0	17.5	17.5
Steve Docherty	1.8	4.7	14.6	21.5	20.6	20.6
Adam Stevens	1.5	9.7	12.0	21.1	21.4	21.4
Peter Adriaans	2.6	6.8	10.3	18.1	21.5	21.5
Olav Opsanger	2.0	3.1	1.0	23.2	23.1	23.1
Paul Bissett-Amess	2.8	11.4	15.1	22.8	23.5	23.5
Guy Hubbard	1.7	4.6	14.1	24.2	24.1	24.1
Steve Blenkinsop	2.0	4.7	13.9	26.6	25.4	25.4
Vic Hare	1.7	4.6	21.9	26.8	25.5	25.5
Neale Halsall	2.4	5.8	7.2	28.0	26.7	26.7
James Wynd	2.7	22.8	29.3	42.9	43.8	43.8
Jay Kubeil	14.7	30.4	32.6	42.7	44.3	44.3
Adrian Connor	11.7	42.5	54.5	77.9	97.2	97.2
Troy Horton	3.2	11.4	22.5	46.6	75.9	75.9
Richard Martin	14.4	24.1	46.5	65.7	65.9	65.9
Andrew Sutton	8.5	18.9	34.1	51.9	71.5	71.5
Neil Hooke	3.9	17.4	27.1	42.6	—	—
Dustan Hansen	33.3	54.7	70.9	76.1	—	—
Corinna Schwiegersha	2.0	9.0	10.1	19.7	—	—
Stuart Cathcart	0.1	17.4	35.5	49.0	—	—
Peter Tolhurst	1.5	22.6	35.0	62.1	—	—
James Atkinson	6.8	17.6	26.1	40.0	—	—
Sam Prest	1.1	10.5	24.0	—	—	—
Hughbert Alexander	43.4	73.0	89.9	—	—	—
Ward Gunn	6.6	29.5	—	—	—	—
Randall Clotworthy	74.6	80.6	—	—	—	—
Dean Bayly	27.1	49.2	—	—	—	—
Andrew Taylor	35.4	67.2	—	—	—	—
Mark Jeffree	15.7	63.6	—	—	—	—
Magnus Ronningen	0.0	12.8	—	—	—	—
Alexander Kot	16.8	63.1	—	—	—	—
John Harriott	36.1	56.5	—	—	—	—
David Jackson	35.3	—	—	—	—	—
Jason Lannstrom	151.0	—	—	—	—	—
Ted Sadowski	16.9	—	—	—	—	—
Donny Gardner	33.8	—	—	—	—	—
Peter Garrone	13.2	—	—	—	—	—
Jason Carman	47.2	—	—	—	—	—
Richard Hughes	60.9	—	—	—	—	—

The elapsed race time, from the pilot’s own start, minus the fastest elapsed time to that turnpoint. A — means that the pilot did not reach the turnpoint.

Arriving at ESS with height to spare

Measured in metres · lower is better

Height still available at ESS that the pilot no longer needed. That altitude was available for more speed, and the pilot did not use it. The value is the altitude at ESS minus the altitude needed to glide to goal at the standard glide ratio of the sport, which is 5.0 for HG and 4.0 for PG (S7F §12.3.6). A large positive margin means the pilot arrived too high. A margin near zero means they flew the final glide with little height to spare.

ESS altitude margin over final glide: top-10 median -47 m (n=10) vs rest median -48 m (n=12).

Footnotes

2 pilots in the standings but not in this analysis

Kerry Bradley — scored from a manual flight report — no tracklog to analyse
Wayne Johnston — scored from a manual flight report — no tracklog to analyse

The correlations are measured against the published ranks, and those ranks include these pilots. Their behaviour cannot be measured without a tracklog.

How the field is compared

Everything that compares pilots to each other uses one shared clock. That includes gaggles, shared thermals, and the position of each pilot at the same moment. GlideComp resamples every track onto a common 10-second grid. Two pilots are therefore always compared at the same instant, whatever rate their instruments logged at.

Metric glossary

How GlideComp measures every metric on this page. On screen, the ⓘ beside a metric opens the same description in place. On paper, this section is the reference for all of them.

Day profile & wind

The day’s wind, hour by hour and leg by leg(“Wind” in tables): Measured in kilometres per hour · no expected direction
What the air did, read from the field itself. We estimate the wind from the circling of every pilot. The first method is the drift of the circle centre, and the second method, used when the first is not available, is the modulation of the ground speed. We then average the vectors two ways. The table by hour of day shows how the wind increased and changed direction through the day. The table by speed-section leg shows the wind on each part of the course. This metric describes the day, so it has no value for each pilot.
How strong the day’s climbs were, hour by hour(“Climb/hr” in tables): Measured in metres per second · no expected direction
When the day started, reached its peak, and ended. We group the thermal climbs of all pilots by the hour in which each climb started, labelled in the time zone of the competition. The median and the 90th-percentile average climb rate for each hour show how the lift developed. This metric describes the day, so it has no value for each pilot.
Share of the flight spent in air that wasn’t sinking(“NonSink%” in tables): Measured in percent · no expected direction
How much of the flight was in air worth being in. The value is the share of the airborne time of a pilot, on the shared grid, with a 30 s-smoothed vario at or above −0.5 m/s. The time they flew, the line they steered and the way the flight ended all feed this value. It is therefore a reading of the day as much as of the pilot. There is no expected direction, and the sign of the correlation is the finding. The timing table compares the window of the day’s best climbs against the time when the field launched.

Climbing

Climbing faster than the pilots sharing the thermal(“Out-climb” in tables): Measured in percent · higher is better
When this pilot and other pilots were in the SAME thermal, who climbed faster? In every thermal that two pilots or more used, we rank each use by its average climb rate. The percentile of a use is the share of uses that were strictly slower. The value is the duration-weighted mean percentile over the shared climbs of the pilot. 50% is exactly average. 80% means they climbed faster than four in five of the pilots they shared lift with. The shared thermal is what separates centring skill from thermal selection: a pilot who only found better air gets no higher value here.
Time to core thermals(“Core s” in tables): Measured in seconds · lower is better
How long the pilot takes to get into the best lift after they arrive in a thermal. For each thermal of 60 s or more, we measure the seconds from the entry until the 30 s rolling climb rate first reaches 90% of its peak in that thermal. The value is the median across the thermals of the pilot. Every second here is a second spent climbing slower than the thermal can carry them.
Climb rate at thermal exit(“LeaveRate” in tables): Measured in metres per second · no expected direction
The median climb rate that the pilot left thermals at. For each thermal of 90 s or more, we take the climb rate over its final 30 s. A high value means they leave lift that still works. A low value means they stay in a climb until nothing is left. This is an absolute rate, so read it against the day: compare it with the median climb in "How strong the day’s climbs were". A pilot who leaves at 1.5 m/s leaves a good climb on a 1 m/s day, and takes the worst lift available on a 4 m/s day. There is no expected direction. The sign of the correlation says which behaviour paid on this task.
Share of lift turned in that was kept as a climb(“Kept%” in tables): Measured in percent · no expected direction
How selective the pilot is about the lift they stop for. Each period of circling of 30 s or more after the start counts as lift that the pilot sampled. If the period overlaps a detected thermal, the pilot kept that lift. If it does not, they turned a few circles and left it. The value is the percentage kept. A low value means they are selective. A high value means they keep almost every climb they turn in. There is no expected direction: selection wins on a strong day and wastes time on a weak one.
How much of the thermal the pilot climbed before leaving it(“TopOut%” in tables): Measured in percent · no expected direction
Does the pilot climb to the top of every thermal, or leave with lift still above them? We take the altitude where they left each thermal after the start, as a percentage of the day’s working band. 0% is the floor of the field and 100% is its ceiling. The value is the median. There is no expected direction: a climb to the top buys height in reserve, and an early departure buys time.
How round and consistent the circles were(“Round” in tables): Measured in ratio · lower is better
Whether the pilot flies clean, repeatable circles, or moves around the thermal. We fit each detected circle by least squares. The RMS fit error divided by the fitted radius measures how round the turn was. The value is the median over all of the circles of the pilot. A lower value means smoother and more consistent turns.

Gliding

Glide speed between climbs(“GlideSpd” in tables): Measured in kilometres per hour · higher is better
How fast the pilot moves down the course when they are on a glide. The value is the duration-weighted mean ground speed over every glide after the start, which is the glide distance divided by the glide time. A higher value means more ground covered in each minute between climbs.
Glide L/D against the field median(“GlideL/D” in tables): Measured in ratio · higher is better
Whether the pilot found better air on glide than the other pilots on the same leg. For each completed speed-section leg, we take the pilot's glide-phase L/D. That is the path distance divided by the net altitude lost during the glides, and we skip a leg that loses less than 100 m. We divide it by the median L/D of the field on that same leg, and then average over the legs. 1.10 means the pilot glided 10% further for each metre lost than the usual pilot on those legs.
Gliding faster when the next climb is stronger(“SpeedToFly” in tables): Measured in kilometres per hour · higher is better
Speed to fly: the pilot flies faster when a good climb is in front of them, and slower when it is not. We pair each glide after the start with the climb rate of the next thermal that starts within 5 minutes. The value is the mean glide speed before climbs stronger than the median, minus the mean glide speed before weaker climbs. +8 km/h means the pilot flew 8 km/h faster into the good climbs. This is a PROXY, and not true speed to fly, because there is no glider polar data.
Gliding wide of the optimal course line(“Wide%” in tables): Measured in percent · lower is better
How much further the pilot flew on glide than the optimised course line needed. 0% is a flight exactly along the line, and 12% is a glide 12% further than necessary. On each completed speed-section leg, we compare the pilot's route with the optimised distance of the leg, weighted by that optimised distance. Only the glides are measured at their full path length. Circling and searching contribute their entry-to-exit displacement instead. A climb or a search for lift therefore never reads as a wide line, because a pilot chooses a line only on glide. 0% is a real value that a pilot can reach: a pilot who flies the line of the optimiser scores exactly zero.
Share of the height gain made outside thermals(“Dolphin%” in tables): Measured in percent · no expected direction
Dolphin flying: how much of the height that the pilot gained came outside of circling. The value is the share of the altitude gain after the start, smoothed over 10 s, that the pilot made outside a detected thermal. There is no expected direction. The sign of the correlation shows whether dolphin flying paid on this day.

Decision-making

How low the pilot gets between climbs(“Floor%” in tables): Measured in percent · no expected direction
How low the pilot goes before the next climb. A high value is a race with height in reserve, and a low value is a flight that goes down near the ground. We take each pair of climbs that the pilot made after the start, and we find the lowest point between them. We keep only the gaps that go down 100 m or more, because a top-up between two climbs is not a descent. We do not count a sled run or the glide to goal, because the pilot made no climb after them. The value is the median of those low points, as a percentage of the day's working band. 0% is where the lowest tenth of the field's climbs started, and 100% is where the highest tenth stopped. Thus a negative value shows that the pilot went lower than almost all of the field. The pilot must have two or more of these descents. There is no expected direction. The sign of the correlation says whether height in reserve pays.
Low saves dug out from the bottom of the band(“LowSaves” in tables): Measured in count · no expected direction
How many times the pilot got low and climbed out again. We count the climbs after the start that the pilot entered below 15% of the working band, and that then gained 300 m or more. Those are true low saves. Zero is a real value, and not a missing one: it means the pilot never got that low. There is no expected direction. The sign of the correlation says whether a climb-out or a flight that stays high pays.
Distance covered between climbs(“km/climb” in tables): Measured in kilometres · higher is better
How far the pilot gets down the course before they must stop and circle again. This is the direct reading of how often they stop. The value is the scored flown distance divided by the number of thermals taken after the start, so 3 km means three kilometres of course for each climb. The pilot must fly 20 km or more. The note of each pilot adds their mean climb percentile inside shared thermals, so you can read the number of stops together with the climb strength. Long legs between weak climbs is a different day from long legs between strong ones.
Share of race time spent hunting for the next climb(“Search%” in tables): Measured in percent · lower is better
Time that goes into neither a climb nor progress down the course. This is the time spent to find lift, to stay up, and to decide what to do next. The value is the share of the speed-section time, from the start to ESS or to the landing, in which the pilot neither climbed in a thermal nor glided with real net speed. A lower value means less time lost between climbs.

Gaggle

Time spent flying with a gaggle(“InGaggle%” in tables): Measured in percent · no expected direction
Whether the pilot raced with other pilots or alone. The value is the share of their flying time after the start inside a detected gaggle, that is, clustered with one other racing pilot or more on the shared time grid. There is no expected direction. A gaggle increases the power to search for lift, but it also holds a pilot to its own speed. The sign of the correlation says which of the two occurred here.
Climbs joined on another pilot's marker(“Marked%” in tables): Measured in percent · no expected direction
How much of the lift of the pilot another pilot found first. The value is the share of their climbs after the start where another pilot was already established in the same thermal when they arrived. Established means 30 s or more into the climb, and still climbing. A high value means they mostly climb on the markers of other pilots. A low value means they find their own air. There is no expected direction. A marker is free information, but it puts a pilot where the last climb was, and not where the next one is.
How often leaving the gaggle paid off(“LeaveWin%” in tables): Measured in percent · no expected direction
When a pilot leaves a gaggle that continues to fly, did the departure pay off? We compare the arrival of the pilot who left at the next turnpoint against the median arrival of the pilots who stayed. A win rate of more than 50% means their departures beat the gaggle. A pilot counts as a pilot who stayed only if they were still in the gaggle after the split, and reached that turnpoint after it.

Race craft

How long after the gate opened the pilot started(“StartDly” in tables): Measured in seconds · lower is better
Every second between the opening of the gate and the crossing of the start line is a second lost for nothing. The value is the seconds from the start gate taken to the scored SSS crossing. On an elapsed-time task, the pilot’s own crossing is the reference, so the delay is 0 by definition. The start table adds the crossing altitude, and the distance behind the leading pilot who had already started.
Race time lost against the fastest pilots, leg by leg(“TimeLost” in tables): Measured in seconds · lower is better
For each completed speed-section leg, we compare the leg time of the pilot with the mean of the top 10 pilots by rank who completed that leg. Only the losses count, and we add them together. The sum of the leg times is the race time, and the rank defines the reference, so this metric follows the result by construction. Read the waterfall table, which shows every leg against the task winner, for the diagnosis. Do not read the correlation as a finding.
Race time behind the leader at ESS(“Behind” in tables): Measured in minutes · lower is better
At each speed-section turnpoint, we compare the elapsed race time of the pilot, which is the reaching time minus their own start, with the fastest pilot to that turnpoint. The value is the minutes behind at ESS. It follows the final rank almost exactly, because this metric is the sanity check of the evaluation.
Arriving at ESS with height to spare(“Spare m” in tables): Measured in metres · lower is better
Height still available at ESS that the pilot no longer needed. That altitude was available for more speed, and the pilot did not use it. The value is the altitude at ESS minus the altitude needed to glide to goal at the standard glide ratio of the sport, which is 5.0 for HG and 4.0 for PG (S7F §12.3.6). A large positive margin means the pilot arrived too high. A margin near zero means they flew the final glide with little height to spare.
Final glide committed to when leaving the last climb(“FinalGl” in tables): Measured in ratio · no expected direction
How optimistic the pilot was about their final glide. A pilot wins or loses a task by the height at which they leave the last climb. At the last climb of the pilot before ESS, or before the landing, we divide the distance to goal by their height above goal. That is the glide ratio they committed to. 8 means they left and needed 8:1 to make goal. The value counts only when that climb ended within 1.5 times the distance of the final leg from goal. There is no expected direction: a marginal glide wins if it connects, and loses if it does not.

Task 1 (Open)

What the weather did

From the weather model

From the pilots' tracks

The day's thermals

Thermal at 13:48 AEDT — 13 pilots, 30 climbs

Which behaviours went with better results

Glide speed between climbs

Metrics with a clear pattern, plotted against rank

Glide speed between climbs

Gliding wide of the optimal course line

Time spent flying with a gaggle

How much of the thermal the pilot climbed before leaving it

Share of race time spent hunting for the next climb

How long after the gate opened the pilot started

Climbs joined on another pilot's marker

Distance covered between climbs

Share of the height gain made outside thermals

Share of lift turned in that was kept as a climb

How low the pilot gets between climbs

Outcome checks

The whole field at a glance

Pilot style clusters

The metrics in detail

Day profile & windbest: some pattern (0.47)

Climbingbest: clear pattern (0.73)

Glidingbest: clear pattern (0.82)

Glide speed between climbs

Decision-makingbest: clear pattern (0.68)

Gagglebest: clear pattern (0.76)

Time spent flying with a gaggle

Race craftbest: clear pattern (0.66)

Footnotes

2 pilots in the standings but not in this analysis

How the field is compared

Metric glossary

Day profile & wind

Climbing

Gliding

Decision-making

Gaggle

Race craft

best: some pattern (0.47)

best: clear pattern (0.73)

best: clear pattern (0.82)

best: clear pattern (0.68)

best: clear pattern (0.76)

best: clear pattern (0.66)