About us

We share XC skills and have fun by flying somewhat realistically on Condor 2 in widely varying conditions and terrain.

In our group are beginners and advanced pilots. Our goal on Condor is usually not racing, but to fly cooperatively at least weekly so that we can share ideas and skills and get to know each other, have fun, and talk about soaring and what worked and didn't. We talk through a Discord server. We often fly with OLC-like scoring and upload to SkyLinesCondor. We encourage realistic safety margins (see How we fly). If you want to use a phone or tablet as a flight computer (e.g. XCSoar or SeeYou) in real life flight or just to fly XC on Condor expertly, we encourage you to take the time to link that to Condor so that it's very familiar to you before you fly in real life. We can help you set things up.

You can find our flights at Virtual Soaring (the best list) Condor Server List, CondorClub server list, or Alternate Condor Serverlist

Condor realism: Some of us fly with safety habits on the realistic side to train for real flight. Below 1500 ft AGL, look for landing sites. Below 1000 AGL choose a landing site. Unless you have an escape route to lower terrain, no thermalling below 500 ft AGL; time to land. Keep safe height margins to cross ridges or escape mountain canyons.

It's a great idea to keep an airport within glide distance. Because Condor PDA doesn't show all the airports and it's very limited when you need to explore options, it's good to fly with your own device to show your height above glide to nearby real airports. You need to load a map, waypoints and a glider polar. Go to www.teamxc.us/files-XCSoar. Then tweak your device safety margins: (polar degradation 50% is conservative, arrival height 800 ft typical, terrain height 500 ft typical). You can fly with your own style.

We would be happy to have other groups or individuals join us, in any language.

Email teamxc.us@gmail.com with questions.