SAFA Skysailor Magazine

18 SKY SAILOR September-October-November | SPRING 2026 Although counterintuitive, when you step on the bar, your sink rate increases. You are going down faster and this should put you on the ground closer. In still air, this is exactly what would happen. However, the increased sink from the bar is small compared to the sinking airmass around you, and the time component offsets the penalty. The sinking airmass is eating your height per second so each second matters. The speedbar decreases your glide, but increases your speed, shortening your stay in the sinking airmass. The higher the sink you are in, the larger the time benefit over reason for me to step on the bar just yet. The bar increases the risk of collapses, and on the ridge, we are close to the ground, so I’m a conservative user of it. However, in this desperate situation if I had applied it at 100m AGL, it could have given me an extra 30m. Likely not enough to save me, but a possibility of landing on some rocks is still worth consideration. When I ran some calculations, I was sur- prised to realise that even in this light sink, the bar would have made a difference. Failing badly: The katabatic trap