Counting down

I flew a ton of patterns today. They were totally fine in regards to a checkride, but I will always have things to work on. Everyone always wants to really grease their landings. Mine were on speed, where I wanted to touchdown and definitely safe, but just not great passenger landings. My procedures were pretty solid, but my area work could still use polish. I feel good about the upcoming check though.

My IP was the same one I had regularly way back at the beginning, so it was good to talk with him again and get his perspective on some things. One more prep ride before Thursday.

High Area

Formation is a little more difficult in the high areas. I found that out by experience today. The prop just doesn't have as much bite in the thinner air. The hot weather doesn't help anything either. This translates to bigger power corrections and more frustration. On the plus side, the recovery was pretty smooth. Double turning formation rides again tomorrow.

Banana orange smoothie, smoked bratwurst, and cheesecake for dinner. Yeah, I'm not going to win any awards for my great dinner combinations.

Aerobatics Refresher

After my low-level today I went to the area and got some aerobatics practice before flying back to Sheppard for a straight-in. It was fun to pull some G's again, if only for 15 minutes.

The low-level was largely uneventful, but I still have things to work on. I get to use the GPS next time, which should make things a whole lot easier. A ground speed readout and exact track over the ground will hopefully make it impossible to miss my turn points. Now, if I could just get a radar altimeter...

Flying is Hard Work, but Flying is Fun

I'm pretty tired after a full day. We're only flying once a day, but it's definitely tiring. I love it. I have so much to work on. The area work went well. Power on stalls, the stability demonstration, and ELP stalls were pretty straightforward. Might have been better to have stuck my foot in my mouth today in the pattern before I talked on the radio for all the IRTs I had, but I was able to read back all the vectors approach gave me on my recovery from the MOA. I forgot some confirmations in the pattern as well. Gotta quit that. Tomorrow after the Instruments 1 test and Instruments 102 I go to the aux field, Hacker for some more pattern work.