Who is AEAJR
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Revised January 2012
I started flying in March of 2003 with a small electric RTF airplane called an Aerobird. Since then I have become more of a thermal soaring glider pilot than an electric airplane pilot. I fly pure gliders for thermal duration, DLG, slope and aerotow. These days the electrics that I fly tend to be e-gliders. I have about 26 gliders and planes with about 10 flyable at any given time.
Most of my flying is at our club field. I am former President and current member of the Long Island Silent Flyers. www.lisf.org. We have a great club focused on thermal duration soaring and small electric airplanes.
I try to get to the field one day each weekend all year round. That is when I am not flying glider competition with the Eastern Soaring League. www.flyesl.com I am former President of the League and current Newsletter Editor. I travel along the East coast of the USA for the ESL contests.
My longest TD glider flight is just under 90 minutes. My longest slope flight was about 2 hours. After that the flights become boring and I land. With slope, it can be the cold that gets me as slope soaring where I live on Long Island, NY, is mostly a winter time activity. At 20 degrees and 15 mph winds, it can be chilly.
I stared competing in thermal duration glider contests in our club in 2004 with Spirt 2M RES plane, then a Sagitta 600 then a 3 meter Airtronics Legend. They got me into a great sport and now I am totally hooked.
In 2005 When I started flying with the Eastern Soaring League. First with a Sagitta 600, then an Airtronics Legend. In 2007 I upgraded to a Polecat Thermal Dancer. With that plane and a year of flying I managed to move up the ranks within the Eastern Soaring League, www.flyesl.com , to finish 2007 at 6th in the sportsman class. I was so hooked.
Today I fly Expert Class in the ESL. My main TD competition gliders are a Kennedy Composites Supra Pro Competition which I added in December 2011. My original Supra is my back-up. Also I have a Graphite D-Box 3.4M, an AVA. The Thermal Dancer and Legend have moved on to other members of our club to help them get into the soaring.
I think it was in 2006 when I purchased a Mountain Models Boomer as my first hand launched glider. This foam flying wing was a lot of fun but I was not very good with it. In 2007 I added a Polecat XP-5 DLG and started flying club and ESL DLG contests. In 2010 I added a Kennedy Composites Blaster 2.
While I have flown a number of club and Eastern Soaring League DLG contests the rapid fire launching bothers my left leg. So my DLGs are just for sport flying today. They are a ton of fun. Hand launched glider is a very different, very personal experience compared to my larger winch launched or my electric launched or slope gliders. I love 'em all.
In e-gliders I have a Radian, 2 Easy Glider Electrics (brushless) and a World Models Sky