Description - What to expect

During this advanced thermal paragliding course, you always fly side by side with a professional and experienced pilot. This is not a case of dropping you off on the launch site with a brief and saying "off you go". Your guides will actually fly with you whilst reassuring and coaching you by radio as well as providing thorough pre and post-flight briefs. The aim of this course is to make you a better and more confident pilot whilst helping you to get the most out of your valuable flying time in the mountains.

Amongst other skills and techniques, you can expect to learn about some of the following aspects of thermal paragliding:

◾ Making good decisions in the mountains. Mountain flying requires a whole new set of skills
◾ Basic turns, combining turns, and weight shifts. (Sounds obvious but this is actually the fundamental thing that many pilots are doing wrong when trying to thermal)
◾ What to look for whilst flying. When to read the sky and when to read the ground
◾ Mapping a thermal
◾ Using a multiple cores thermal
◾ What to do at a cloud base. (We hear so many pilots say "I can get to cloud base but then I don’t know what to do")
◾ Active flying and how to fly in rough air
◾ Introduction to XC flying
◾ Safety issues with Thermal flying
◾ Descent techniques. (And this doesn’t just mean big ears! Too many pilots want to learn how to go up before they know how to come down.)
◾ Tasks and airtime for BHPA Pilot rating