That's excellent food for thought . I've done it both in full scale and r/c and it is indeed a blast . I own a tow plane and a scale d.g. 505 that I can drag out to the field but coordinating all the moving parts has been the problem . So the winch becomes the default .
The roots of full scale soaring are actually in catapulting a glider off a cliff , like Harris Hill in Elmira N.Y. When last I was there , the catapult rails were still in place as a museum piece .
Thanks for the picture .