Podz-Glidz, the Lu-Glidz podcast. Stories from the cosmos of paragliding.
Today with Stefan Lauth and Lucian Haas at the mic.
When you think of tandem flying, you usually think of paid flights for tourists who want to be chauffeured through the air by a professional pilot for 20 or 30 minutes. But it can be different too. Just like with the solo glider, long-distance cross-country flights over great distances are possible with a tandem. However, that does require a completely different approach to flying with a two-seater.
One who has already experienced many great long-distance adventures with a tandem is Stefan Lauth.
In 2018, he won the DHV -XC Championship in the tandem category. And he's on track to do it again this year. In early June 2019, he flew a tandem from the border in South Tyrol, completing an FAI triangle over almost 233 kilometers. The flight, which was nearly nine hours long, was even world-record-threatening.
In this tenth episode of Podz-Glidz, Stefan talks about, among other things, how he planned his record flight, in what ways cross-country flying with the tandem differs from flying under a solo glider, and why he developed a special leg bag for the two-seater.
He also explains what role his wife Ulli plays for him as a passenger and co-pilot, and how important it is to be a well-coordinated team, especially when cross-country flying with a two-seater.
Stefan, on June 2nd, you flew an FAI triangle from the border in South Tyrol over almost 233 kilometers. Is that actually a world record?
So, according to my research, yes, and it's also registered as a world record with the FAI. However, the processing takes a while. Dieter Münchmeier from the DRV said it can take about half a year until it's finalized. I think it will be announced at the finale. We'll see.
But the German record is definitely that.
Exactly, I set the German record last year with 137. And that's actually what we wanted—we wanted to improve it. And yeah, then some kind of potential world record came out of it. To be honest, I didn't even know where it stood beforehand. We only researched it after the landing. And yeah, that's obviously nice and was a surprise. Great stuff.
Where is the current world record that you researched?
222 by a French tandem pilot. But that one has been under review by the FAI for a year. So it's not recognized yet. And I don't even know what the previous one was. The
The French pilot's name is, I think, Julien Irelie. Could that be it?
Yes, exactly, exactly. If I'm not completely wrong, he also won the world ranking last year. The XC ranking. He pulled off some good, long flights. And it's such a great area where they fly. I mean, I was there last year. And it's, well, the French Alps. It totally blew me away. It's a really fine place. Anyone who hasn't been there yet should definitely go.
So, you flew your record from Grenthe now. Did you actually plan this flight as a record in terms of its size?
No, not at all. I mean, last year we always flew from Speikboden. And that's very convenient because you can get up there with the mountain railway. And it's also a triangle, which I absolutely love and is beautiful. And the intention for paragliding... Tandem was for my wife, who flies herself, just to show her a bit of what she can't get to on her own. When I tell stories about glaciers and birds in the evening, it's just nicer if you can share that. That was, just to get that out of the way right away, the intention behind why we started with tandem flying.
And last year we said we really should try Grenthe sometime. Because Grenthe always goes about an hour earlier. And that's why we made a plan. We decided to try Grenthe three times this year. And now we were there for the first time on Grenthe. And it turned out right away. I personally didn't believe the day would hold. I mean, we did drive there. And a friend was with us. We said we'd hike up there. But I absolutely didn't believe the day would last. And in the end, it was also the case that they closed the Dolos. Otherwise, probably even more would have come out of one or the other.
Well, you said your girlfriend was there. Your wife flies with you. Does it work well, flying tandem as a married couple?
I can only answer for us. I don't know how it is for others. But for us, it works well. We're like two old boots, totally in sync. We've been together for over 30 years and have done all sorts of things together. Including living together in very small spaces. Very intensely. And yeah, for us, it works. It actually even pushed us forward as a couple quite a bit.
Your wife also flies paragliders herself. How do you manage to get her to fly with you in a tandem instead of her just taking off on her own?
Well, that's made sense, I'd say, to some extent. She had an accident five years ago. And from my point of view, she did everything right. She had a total destruction during an off-field landing. Ten meters. And I would have personally chosen that landing field too. It looks great. But she had a one-meter or even 1.50-meter drop across the valley wind. Which you obviously can't see from above. And sure, there were turbulence that just weren't manageable at that moment. And since then, logically, she's approached things differently. And she was never really into cross-country flying to begin with. And since then, she's logically been even more cautious. And yes, luckily, she has the trust and flies with me.
And it's actually always very, very relaxed. I mean, of course, there are always [issues] again and again, and that's part of the learning process. We've only been doing tandem for two years now. What we had was this learning curve—what do you have to do differently? So, communication is extremely important. And above all, avoiding wrong communication. Sending the wrong signals. If I send signals that unsettle her, that's obviously not okay. And just as much the other way around: if she sends me something that I perceive as her maybe not being completely okay with the situation, then I can't concentrate on the flying at all anymore. So then I try to get out of the situation and take more care of her than the flying itself.
In that sense, we really had to learn a lot, or rather, we're allowed to. And that really did us some good. It moved me forward quite a bit. What's developed there is a really great thing.
Now you said you send out signals somehow. What kind of signals were those that you say really bother you? And what did you basically agree on? Or what kind of rules did you set up, saying that's how we have to communicate with each other in the air, so that it actually works harmoniously over hours of flying?
So, for example, I used to swear when I was out in the air, flying solo. And I don't do that at all anymore; I've actually broken the habit. But two or three years ago, it was like, if I was on a cross-country flight and something didn't work, like there was a construction site, I'd swear under my breath. I'd definitely say things like "shit" or "damn" and stuff like that. And of course, that unsettles her because she can't assess it. What exactly is it now? And it's completely understandable that some safety aspect isn't good anymore, or that the weather conditions aren't good, or something like that.
And the other way around, if she sends me signals that she doesn't feel comfortable, that she's scared, or that she might not want to keep flying because she perceives the situation differently for herself, then logically, on my side, I have to ask: can I do this now? Because one thing about tandem flying that I hadn't really considered before is what it does to me mentally. This responsibility I have for the passenger—for me, except for two other people who have flown with me, one a flight instructor and one a good friend, I've never had responsibility for anyone else. It's always been my wife. But this is just a responsibility, and it affects me.
And I absolutely could not have imagined that. So, when I started my tandem training, I completely underestimated that aspect.
In what way does that change your flying? You're saying you're probably a bit more cautious and so on. And how does it change your flying in terms of how you approach your passenger—in this case, your wife?
So that actually changed my flying style. That's pretty interesting, because before, I was solo-wise,
Yeah, "radical" doesn't sound quite right, I think. But maybe you could say more consistent along the way. So, I'd just fly through the obstacles and knew there was a rotor there and I had to make it. And I don't want to say "head through the wall." That's really wrong. That's not how I flew. But I wasn't particularly focused on what happens if I hit some stronger turbulent air there. I always said, I can handle that. And I was allowed to prove that I can. But that's something I obviously don't want to experience with the tandem.
And in that sense, flying high is absolutely important. Reading the clouds and finding the right line has improved significantly with the tandem. And that's also reflected in my solo flying. Simply because I don't want to get low. I want to avoid situations where I have to fly close to a rock face or something like that. So, in the past—I can remember triangles—I would fly quite close to the terrain. Also at times when it's already a bit more thermally active. And I don't do that with the tandem. It's not necessary at all. There are other ways to do it. And that's a great learning experience.
To what extent does it help to have someone as a passenger on a cross-country flight who is also a pilot themselves?
So
I think that's pretty important. Especially if you want to fly for a long time. So, I have a comparison to a good friend who flew with me recently. And she's actually a pilot herself. But it made me realize again how my wife and I function as a team. Because she didn't do anything wrong. That dear friend did everything right. But still, there are certain movements, especially in the weight shift, where I notice that when my wife hangs on, it just works differently. And weight shift is one of the most crucial things, because we communicate about what we need right now.
So if we have narrow, rough bars, then the full weight has to go over, and I can't manage that with the one I fly—an Advanced Bipro, it doesn't have a seat board, but I tried one with a seat board once before—you just can't do it as a pilot. You just can't get the weight shift right. And of course, she can take the tandem spread with both arms and hang herself onto it completely. So there's almost 50 kilos on there when there are really critical situations. And that's important because if it keeps pushing you out of the bad, that's of course totally unpleasant, inefficient, and I wouldn't say dangerous, but you then always have to keep correcting the glider, and all of that just falls away when there's proper weight on it.
Did I understand that correctly just now? Weight shift in this case doesn't mean as a technique, like you or your wife pushing your butt to one side, but that she actually does, like, a pull-up on the riser.
Yes, exactly. Not me, of course. But her, yes. She reaches into the spreaders with both hands and, depending on what I ask for—of course, I know it can't be for too long because it's like a pull-up—but she really gives it her all, exactly. And it makes a huge difference. You wouldn't believe it.
But for her as a passenger and co-pilot in that case, it's then really physically demanding as well.
Yes, it is. It's no walk in the park.
And there are other things too, where she—I mean, she's just as interested in navigation and the weather. I'm quite, how should I put it, interested in the information I can get from the internet about weather stations and I want to know all of it. So I don't want to do a Stärzchen crossing if I don't know what the surrounding weather stations are saying. Especially what's going on down in Sterzing. It's just something I want. I wanted that five years ago too, but now it's obviously much easier with tandem flying. And even when I'm solo, I do it; I have internet in the cockpit and then I check it out.
In that case, your wife is sitting in the front and she basically has the tablet on her lap, and you say, "Could you please check what's going on in Sterzing or something?" Exactly.
So we both have a mobile phone in front of us, like a smartphone—I don't want to mention any brands here.
and they also saved the same apps and websites and so on. And then she just looks at it, and I just think it's important to keep checking how things are changing. So, for example, what the Wilde Feiger has, if I go into the Riedenhauen, I want to know that. And I'd prefer to know that an hour in advance, so I know how it's developing. Because if I get there and, in the triangle I mentioned, it was like Ladons—which is basically the north side of the Riedenhautal, opposite the Brenner—then I already knew there were 10 to 15 km/h North.
So, down in Sterzing, there was nothing. And I already knew that if we fly into it, there's going to be some north component in there, and it was indeed quite borderline, you could almost say. I saw two pilots spiraling down. I don't know if that was because of the north, but the air was calm, there was widespread lift and all that. So I decided that it makes no sense to abort here. On the contrary, landing down there is worse than continuing to fly. Gain altitude, that's safety, and keep flying. And it was also clear that it's only in that area. The other wind stations, including the Wilde Feiger back in the Riedenhauen,
completely without any problems.
And that's something I personally like. I can honestly recommend it to everyone because it just allows you to assess the situation on a larger scale.
Then your wife is basically the navigator, like on those big planes back in the day, who'd say, "The weather is like this, I've checked everything." And then you can actually always give your wife tasks and say, "Check that, check that, check that." And she does that for you in the meantime.
Exactly, she has a vested interest in it too. It's not like I'm the only one who wants this. She also wants to know where the thunderstorms are, if there's a labile air mass, or if it's already raining somewhere. Nowadays, there are also some really great features, like thunderstorm and rain alerts. I can only recommend them to everyone. It's a great thing. Yeah, it's just good to be a bit more planned and in control while traveling. I wouldn't have believed it myself if I hadn't experienced it firsthand. You see a rain shower 20 kilometers away behind the main ridge. I didn't see it. But the radar shows it very clearly, of course.
And then you can make your own decision on what to do about it.
It's also always important to see where these rain showers and things like that are actually moving. Does that mean you actually check the rain radar regularly during the flights themselves or what?
Exactly. So, I have a thunderstorm alert—lightning and rain—in the cockpit. And if one of them goes off, I check what's going on. And then there's the forecast, for example, you can look at WetterOnline to see what the forecast is, how it's moving. But you have to say, that should be taken with caution. Those are simply forecasts extrapolated based on the past.
Especially when there's a labile air mass and a cold front outflow is already there, a thunderstorm or a rain cloud just develops in all directions. So you can't just rely solely on how they predict it, because all they know is that the wind is blowing this way or that way. They see that it's moved this way or that way for the last 30 minutes and they project that forward. But how it grows, or if the wind is slightly different, you have to be careful. You can't take it at face value. But if it's clearly moving away from you, then it's clear, you can trust that, and you're always checking it yourself again and again.
You said that you fly a bit more defensively with the tandem. Is it also the case in these rainy situations that you'd fly closer to such clouds with the solo than with the tandem?
Basically, I'd say yes, yeah, I would.
With solo, it's just that I have a plan B that I already execute. One I always had to use in Fiesch many years ago, where I just say, okay, if there's really a clean cold air outlet, okay, then I'll land at the top perfectly and that's that. And I'm much less confident with the tandem than with the solo. With the solo, it's already not always that easy at times. But with the tandem, the coordination—that's the difficult thing about tandem flying, I think, the landing.
It has to be coordinated. And that's somehow not as easy as when you do it with a solo.
That's maybe a bit of the handicap of tandem flying, that you just have to be more cautious with some things or say, I can't just land super easily or whatever. How high do you estimate this tandem handicap compared to a solo glider, when you translate that into the possible routes you can do with it?
That's a difficult question to answer.
Because basically, in terms of glide ratio, there isn't really a difference. The tandem actually has a slight advantage due to the higher Reynolds number. When you consider the tandem I'm flying now, it doesn't have a sharknose or mini-rips, and there are so many other great features out there.
And it still keeps up well. And that was back then, too—before we started the training, or before I started the training and we decided to do it—I took a Bion from NOVA once and we just went to Bassano, I'm actually not supposed to say that now, I didn't even have a tandem license yet, but anyway, we just tried it out to see what it was like. I just didn't want to do it blindly. And there I was, at some point, flying next to an Ozone Delta, or something, during the Brenner crossing, and I thought, that's impossible. It's not pulling away from me at all, I'm at the same altitude, it's insane.
And the only thing that's really a real disadvantage with tandem is accelerating. That starts with operating the trim, and of course, it stops with the dropping glide ratio and the significantly lower top speed. That's when I notice it. But if I have a day where I,
if the solos didn't accelerate, then I'd say I have hardly any disadvantage. When there's no wind, as I said. And the solos don't accelerate. But that's the only thing, clearly, those are the disadvantages. You're just a bit more like a jumbo and a tad less in top speed. And above all, you don't dare to have the trimmers open the whole time. I have that now, because the problem is that the trimmers and the control lines have to be operated together. I don't let the control lines out during a flight like that. That's what I don't do. I might do that on a cross-country over analyses.
But otherwise, if I'm expecting some thermal turbulence somewhere, I don't let go of the control line. So I have to close the trimmers while keeping the control line in my hand. And of course, I don't do that at the last moment. So you use the trimmers significantly less than you do when accelerating with the solo. And I've built something for myself now to decouple that, so I can pull the trimmers with my feet. So I've done a sort of line redirection and can then close the trimmers with my toes. It doesn't work over the full trimmer travel, but from about 60, 70 percent I can get them closed to the best-performance position.
And that's already enough, it's sufficient to just fly a bit more relaxed with the trimmers open. Because I can make corrective movements with the brake when I need to and at the same time take the trim out. And that's obviously a huge advantage.
So, I have to imagine it like this: if you're doing a valley crossing, for example, you open the trim to move faster, and then you get to the other side where there are thermals, and you fly into them, so to speak, slightly accelerated or with the faster trim. But when flying into the thermals, you say, okay, now I want to fly thermals. And then you basically step through with your legs and pull the trim closed with them.
No, I do that beforehand. So, as soon as I notice the air starting to move, I actually pull it closed with my feet. The system is still set up so that I pull it closed with my feet. That's not old. Unfortunately, that also broke during the Kränteflug. I still had a thin rope in there and it got jammed in the deflection pulley. In that sense, it only worked for an hour. But now there's a thicker rope in there and it works reliably.
No, but it's especially when you're flying for a degree, for example, then I can just go to, say, 50% open trim, or... 30, 40, depending. And I can just adjust it more finely. And then I just pull it in a bit already. And it's different. If you do that with your hands, then you don't use it that much, at least from my experience. And so that's already an advantage now. But flying into thermals with open trim, yeah, you can certainly do that. But that, no, I don't do that.
Even if you imagine this handicap—you're a bit slower with your tandem and therefore have slightly lower average speeds, etc.—at the same time, you're also paying a bit more attention to safety, partly because your wife is with you as a passenger and all that. What does that change about the route planning when you're preparing for such flights? What should you as a tandem pilot pay special attention to in order to still be able to cover such long distances?
Basically, I don't really do anything different than with solo flying. For example, last year there was a goal we didn't even manage to reach. I said to him, "Look, Wilder Feiger, the glacier, I have to show you that. Same with the Grossglockner, the glacier, you just have to see it. It's so gigantic."
And it's not really... I'm flying the triangle now. So especially last year, it was still pretty laid-back somehow. This year we said we want to fly from the border. But even then... I mean, I didn't fully believe in that day anyway. And that was good too, because on the way up we saw two tandem pilots. And one, I didn't know him personally, but I know who he is. Kilian Insam. And then I briefly introduced myself, talked to him and all that. And then he said, yeah, he has Martin with him too and he absolutely wants to break the world record. And they just want to see what's possible.
And yeah, then we basically took off at the same time. I mean, everyone starts out immediately anyway if there's lift.
And yeah, then I kept seeing Kilian in the Defreckental. Sometimes he was in front, sometimes I was in front. It was kind of going side-by-side like that. And for me, it was clear: Defreckental, end, I'm turning around. I'm not flying all the way to Karlsruhe now, I'm not crazy. But then it went so well. And we were so fast. And then I turn back up with Kilian. He was already at the base by then. And suddenly the other guy starts cutting across towards Karls. And I think to myself, no way. What are they doing?
Karls is heading towards Großglocknern. Just so I can visualize the spatial layout.
Exactly, exactly. And then I flew behind them and said to Uli, my wife, oh come on, if they're flying over there, then we'll do it too. Then I told her, well, over there, the thermal, I know it as being pretty stubborn. It really wrecked me with the solo right next to the Kurt Eder. I got twisted three times. That was a pretty unpleasant situation. I gave her some courage right away.
Did you tell her that too? Yes,
Exactly. That's how I actually told her. And then I told her, we're doing it completely differently now with the tandem. I'm flying much more from the south now. And I'm turning in like a banana so that I can already catch the thermals that are further out. And I'm also taking the ones that aren't quite that strong yet. So if we get 2 meters of thermal, we take that first to get some decent height and then we can let ourselves move further back toward the terrain. And that's exactly how we did it. And it was completely relaxed. And by the time we were turned up, Kilian was already back at base. And then I see him taking off toward the Großglockner. And I said, no, I'm really getting out now. I'm not following him anymore.
Because it just doesn't work out. The day doesn't hold. And it won't work. And that was my luck. Because Kilian and Martin, they arrived half an hour or even 35 minutes later. Because they flew that bit out to Sterzing back there. And I had already come back. And I had full base height. And I didn't care about the north or the massive shading anymore because I was under the cloud. But the two of them grounded it there. So they had to go for a long time.
Like many others. It wasn't because of the tandem at all. It was just bad luck. Being half an hour later was simply too late.
During that record flight, you were up there for nine hours. Because long distances automatically mean long flight times. How do you actually deal with your bodily needs? Do you also use a condom catheter while on the tandem? Yes,
Of course. I'm not some bladder-training monk. Obviously, I have to use a catheter balloon. And it works great. I got one last year from Volbiflin that you can reuse multiple times. I'm actually quite impressed with it. I never would have thought it would work so well. So, I'd rather wear it one too many times than one too few.
And what does your wife do?
She obviously has to do what the girls do. A diaper. However, she has the gift of being able to last for nine hours. So I don't understand how that works biologically. But it works.
When you fly solo, you probably also use a lying harness on long cross-country flights. Just by yourself, because it's significantly warmer up there and all that. What do you do? How did you solve this problem for tandem flying?
Yeah, that was actually one of the hardest things. Because we both get extremely cold. We just can't handle the cold well at all. Unless we're moving like when we're skiing. But when flying, I get cold very quickly. So in that sense, we thought about how we could solve that. And then we built a tandem leg bag where we're both in it. So you have to imagine it like this: the leg bag is attached to my tandem harness. And it's also permanently mounted. And we start normally and the leg bag is in the back. And then we gain some altitude first. And then I have two leg loops for my feet, where I can then close the trimmers over these little loops that are on there, at least lately.
And then, once we have a bit of altitude and feel comfortable, I can move the leg bag forward. Or, usually, my wife even takes it out from behind. So if she reaches back, she can open the buckles there and pull it forward. Then it has to go into her carabiner. And then it's just a completely normal leg bag. It goes forward and then we're both like in a cocoon. And it's cozy and warm. That's good.
That means you basically slide it, or your wife does, from back to front so that it reaches around both harnesses, like that. Exactly. Right. And did you sew this leg bag completely yourself? Or did you take an existing one and say, I'll basically knit something onto it? Or did you add a bit of fabric to the back so that it has a corresponding extension? Or how did that work?
No, that's a completely custom construction. And for that, yeah, I just thought about how it could work. There were different phases, like thinking phases.
I think that was even before I did my tandem training, I was already thinking about how that could work. And in the end, that's what got approved.
There was also this idea that it would be on the passenger and that I would, so to speak, slip into it. But I'm absolutely convinced of the concept we have now. It works really well. And even if you have to solve it very quickly, because of an emergency landing for example, it's really done in a flash. So we've also done it where, without the leg bag—so if it's unclipped from the front on the passenger—then, to make it look nice, you can clip it back onto the tandem, onto the pilot's harness, how should I put it, again. Those are buckles that you close. But you can also let all of that swing in the wind and still land. That works just as well. And ultimately, those are four buckles, one, two, exactly, four buckles that have to be released.
It's done in a flash and then you're free.
Tandem flying for hours at high altitude isn't just potentially unpleasant because of the cold—which you've solved with the leg bag—but it's also physically grueling, especially for the pilot. How do you deal with that? Do you train specifically to last for nine hours, to be able to continuously pilot a tandem with its higher control pressures and all that?
No, not at all. I mean, I do a bit of training, but it has nothing to do with tandem flying. I've been doing that for a long time. And I'm not really built big or muscular. But I think it's a misconception that you have to train a lot for it, because you only need strength when circling in thermals and during landing. Other than that, not really, because using the brake isn't good anyway since it damages the performance. So I hardly ever use the brake. Only where I have to. Like when circling in thermals, and even then, as little as possible. But of course, the internal brake is already,
has more power than solo flying, clearly. But it's not really problematic. I mean, you can easily hold out for nine hours. This year, we flew tandem for three days in a row from Hoch Velln.
And I don't know, the first day was five or six hours. And then each time it was about eight to nine hours. And that was completely fine.
So, not even a bit of muscle soreness or anything?
Maybe a little. So not critical, no.
Do you guys ever take turns during the flight, where you just tell your wife, "Hey Uli, you take the brake for a bit. I want to stretch out my arms." Or "You fly for ten minutes now. I'm going to look at the scenery." Or "I want to check the weather for myself right now," or something like that?
No, never. We never do. We tried it once just for safety, just from a safety aspect, to see if she could reach it, if she could take over in an emergency? And yeah, she can.
But otherwise, no, I'm not letting go of the brakes.
And Uli never had the desire to get a tandem license herself, to basically flip the dynamic. She sits in the back, you sit in the front.
No, she doesn't. She doesn't have any ambitions; she's happy just doing her 30-minute flights, maybe even an hour sometimes.
And then she goes to have a cappuccino and is totally happy. And I'm out there for five or six hours in the Barsano because I enjoy it. And that's perfectly fine too. I'm glad she flies solo herself, that she hasn't completely given it up. But even if she wants to give it up completely at some point, that's also fine. Yeah. Everyone has to know that for themselves. Is this still fun for me? Does it still suit me? And I just think that once you've had an accident, it really changes your perspective quite a bit.
So you're saying you mainly fly with Uli, your wife. Every now and then you fly with others too. Is it kind of weird then, when you say we're no longer that well-coordinated team and suddenly I have to fly completely differently in the back because the other person isn't leaning into the turns the same way and so on?
Yes, as I said, that has only happened very rarely so far. It was just that one friend and the flight instructor. And with the friend, it's only happened twice in two years. So, basically, you could say I only fly with my wife.
That's why, you asked at the beginning of the conversation, or rather in our pre-talk, how you motivate a passenger to go along for eight or nine hours? I actually don't know. I can only answer that for my wife. And we've done many things together,
what we wanted, where we said, we're interested in that and we want to achieve it together. And so tandem flying is part of that. Now, not necessarily about breaking a record. Sure, it's nice if you win the German championship or fly a record, definitely. But it's more about the shared experience that you can share.
Given that background, does this shared aspect of it actually make tandem flying more fun for you now than solo flying?
Cross-country flying, yes.
So, cross-country flying with the tandem? Is that more fun?
So it's hard to compare. They're just two different worlds, somehow. For the last two years, well, what does cross-country flying mean? I mean, of course I also fly cross-country solo. So the question is what you understand by cross-country flying. If you take the pure word, then I obviously fly cross-country solo. Last weekend I flew from—what was it? We were in Kössen and then we said we wanted to go to Pinzgau, so I flew there and Uli drove behind in the motorhome. And because Hollersbach, where we wanted to go, wasn't enough for me, I flew back and forth a bit more in Pinzgau.
But by cross-country flying, I mean more towards competition flying. I don't know if competition is the right word, but so often that I'm thinking, I want to score points for the German Championship. And I'm not doing that solo at the moment. At the very beginning of the first season, I thought maybe you could combine them. Like maybe you could see if you can score points for the German Championship both solo and tandem. And that didn't work.
And that was very clear: no, that's tandem. It's just more fun with two people.
That means in terms of planning, if you see, hey, this weekend or whenever, the weather for a really good cross-country flight is looking up, a "hammer-day-alert" or whatever, then it's immediately, "Uli, keep Saturday free. We have to go flying again." And she always says yes right away. Or what kind of coordination happens between you two?
Well, that's, as I said, two old boots. So we always spend our weekends together, every single time.
We have the same hobbies, we have the same interests, and we're out with our paragliders every weekend. It's just a question of solo or tandem. And if it's a promising day, where if a new good day comes up where we both have time and the opportunity, then it's clear, we're going there and we want to try it out. Because we said we want to take off from the Krente three times this year. So far, we've only managed once. So it would be nice if we could manage those other two times now as well.
Are there things you learned while cross-country paragliding in a tandem that also help you when you're flying solo?
Yeah, so the line, flying under clouds, and a bit of patience, I'd say.
I'd think so, yeah. And like, I don't have to scrub the terrain. I don't have to fly deep into anywhere. That usually goes up somewhere beforehand. So, this is a bit of a correlation to the line. So that has already changed a bit.
Has anything changed for Ulli as a passenger with you, but also when she flies solo? Has she said that just from flying with you and maybe the exchange and watching how you do things and all that, she feels like she's flying much better now?
So she's definitely learned things and recognizes what's still possible and what you can do with altitude. Like, she just says, I'm flying to the next mountain now and I'll approach it like this. But she's not at the point where she says, that's something I want to work on intensively to improve there. She's happy with her half-hour or one-hour flight and enjoys it. And she's, for example, totally happy if she's had a great takeoff and a great landing. She writes me "Princess" every time after the landing and is totally thrilled, with a smiley face behind it, when she just manages a really elegant landing on the landing field.
But of course, she can see what's possible now. And above all, that if she feels like it, she doesn't necessarily have to fly away. Instead, she can just stay completely calm. So I do think something has improved and changed for her, simply from the wealth of experience.
Based on this experience, do you think that tandem flying should perhaps be used much more in training and further education as such, and maybe even could be? That it would make sense if more customers were just offered the option to fly along with a good tandem pilot and could really learn something from it?
I'd even be down to do that, because I'm absolutely convinced that it would be very beneficial.
I just don't know if that would work with our "cheap is cool" mentality, because you can't really offer that for free. And commercial tandem pilots would very likely be able to generate significantly more revenue if they just cycle through several people a day with 15 or 20 minutes of flight time. But if I'm not mistaken, Kriel offers it. I'd love to go up with him sometime.
I think everyone would love to go along for the ride. From your perspective, what's the most important piece of advice you'd give to an aspiring tandem paraglider? Something you'd say is a tip you might have liked to get yourself two or two and a half years ago when you first started, maybe to avoid some mistakes?
Now, I'm assuming you do this with a partner too. I don't think you can do that kind of thing. Maybe we're already at the tip there. I don't think you can do that with a pedestrian. There might be some where it works, but I just think it goes better with a pilot. Or maybe put another way, the person flying along has to be 100 percent behind it. Otherwise, it won't work. And I think that's also the reason why there aren't that many. We know a few by now where the couples fly together.
I don't know the name of the people who make the Lippipipp brand right now. They also fly tandem together. Quite nice French people.
We also spoke with them at the Thermik trade fair in Stuttgart. They reported something similar to us. They also built their own leg bag, by the way. Also quite interesting.
I think a lot of coordination is necessary between the two people who are sharing such an intense experience together. I believe that's probably where the biggest potential for conflict lies if it doesn't work.
Now, let's imagine a different situation at the end. A fellow pilot comes up to you and says, "Look, my wife flies too, but she wants to do tandem flights with me and she'd also like to do cross-country flights. I just don't know if I'd enjoy that." What would you tell them about why it's actually so much fun to do cross-country in a tandem?
Because you share the experiences directly with each other. Because you share the experiences directly with each other. Because you share the experiences directly with each other. Because you have double the joy. These are emotional moments, they're just great. One of the most beautiful tandem flights was at Liag, one of the most beautiful tandem flights was at Liag, wedding anniversary, I don't know, took off at five or six. Wedding anniversary, I don't know, took off at five or six. Maybe even half past six, I don't know anymore, half past six, I don't know anymore, in the height of summer.
We soar into the sunset. Yeah, how romantic is that? How great is that? And you can't do that alone. You can go to the bar afterwards and tell people how great it was. And of course, you're happy yourself, sure, when you're out there alone. But you don't have that shared experience.
Do you ever have those moments where, if you're flying solo now, you think, oh, I would have much rather had Uli along?
Yeah, I can't recall a specific situation right now, but in principle, yes, of course. Especially last year, I was doing some Volbiv stuff. I had several situations that I would have loved to share with Uli. And one of the possible goals is for us to fly Volbiv together with the tandem sometime. I didn't know that myself. I only discovered it last year, and I was completely surprised by how intense it is and what it does to me.
And doing it with a tandem would be really great.
But isn't the tandem actually an even bigger handicap when it comes to the Volbiv?
Yes, definitely. I mean, landing it perfectly requires training. I don't think it's going to be that easy. And in terms of equipment, you'd have to set things up completely differently.
Sure, that's a bit more demanding, yeah.
But that would already be a goal for you now, where you say you could maybe imagine doing that next year and then getting the corresponding equipment for it?
Yes, indeed, certainly. I don't know if it'll happen like that, but it's definitely appealing.
Alright, Stefan. Then I hope that this Volbiv topic—or the dream of maybe going to Volbiv with the tandem—maybe actually comes true next year. Otherwise, I hope that those two remaining cross-country flights this year also actually work out weather-wise, and that you might even be able to beat the record again. Thanks anyway. That
I don't think so. That was already a very, very good, fast day.
Who knows, the weather is going crazy in so many places right now that maybe some good, crazy days will come back again... But who knows. In any case, I wish you lots of fun with your flights regardless of how it turns out, and thanks for all the great footage of the tandem flying. It looks like a lot of fun. I actually have a tandem license myself, and now I really feel like going on a route with my wife sometime.
You absolutely have to try it. I can only recommend it.
That was Stefan Lauth in conversation with Lucian Haas. If you want to know more about Stefan's big tandem cross-country flights or also Julien Iring's... you can find the relevant links in the show notes for this podcast. They are on the Lu-Glidz blog. There, as well as on Soundcloud, you can also find more episodes of Podz-Glidz. If you don't want to miss any of the stories from the cosmos of paragliding, then just subscribe to Podz-Glidz. You can do that via RSS feed or through well-known podcast catalogs like iTunes, Spotify, TuneIn, or Podcast.de. If you enjoy Podz-Glidz and Lu-Glidz and find my work worth supporting, I invite you to send me a voluntary donation via PayPal or bank transfer. You can find the links and details for that on the website www.Lu-Glidz.blogspot.com.
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