Dana,

The simple answer to your question is that in the pre-turn around era, you made one manuever per pass. In essence, set your pass up, perform the manuever, execute some kind of non judged turnaround to perform the next pass and manuever. Not having to worry about the box I believe makes it a little easier since you have more time to set-up the plane for each maneuver.

Personally, I am not sure why having the turn around manuevers in Sportsman is such an issue. I flew my first competition with maybe 20 practice flights without any coaching and it went O.K. I actually got quite a bit of help regarding manuever shapes and placement from my callers and judges. I know that I probably exited the box a few times unintentionally but I guess that it was overlooked ("soft judging?"). I believe the judging was more focused on the shape of the manuevers themselves. In intermediate, I believe the judging is a little more strict regarding the box.

Teo