If you are first starting out and the plane is a trainer, then the "you just throttle back and glide it in" works but you still need to know what you are doing. A problem new flyers have is to be able to keep the plane lined up with the runway without making constant back and forth corrections. If the engine is at at idle, then every time you do a turn, the plane loses speed and altitude. Make too many corrections to stay lined up with the runway and you may not be able to make the runway with out throttling up again. I have 3 warbirds that I just throttle down to idle and land but I turn to final much closer to the runway than a trainer (they don't glide much) and I keep the speed up by careful use of the elevator. My suggestion, join a club, and get some proper training. [8D]