It is sort of funny how just about every competition area I am involved with goes through this exercise every now and then. IMAC, soaring, you name it. The question always comes up about how do we attract new pilots. The plain fact is that only about 6% or so of AMA members ever enter any kind of sanctioned event in any given year, and that includes club fun flies!!

The take away from that for me is that the vast majority of guys simply have no interest in competition. Look at IMAA and IMAC. IMAA has 6 to 8 times the number of members that IMAC has. Compare the attendance at IRCHA to the helicopter NATS just a couple of weeks before at the same venue. 1,000+ heli pilots at IRCHA and maybe 30 or so at the NATS.

I think one of the best ways to get new interest is to do one day clinics. Give people a chance to see the sport and ask questions and gain information in a positive and non-threatening environment. Sadly most areas of competition look to the outsider like they need to spend big bucks on airframes and equipment and then run the chance of being embarrassed at a contest or labeled as the "newbie".

Making changes to the core of the event is not the way in my mind to attract new blood. Once the guy is hooked he wants to know that he is a full part of the event. Having sort of a "bunny slope" class is not going to be very attractive to too many people in my experience.

As a community we need to think about doing more outreach to the general group of pilots to get them exposed to what we do and to make them feel comfortable and welcome.