Flight computer

18Final glide, ESS and goal

Arrival height, required glide, speed to fly and McCready, plus the banner that appears when you are on final glide.

Limited offline

The four numbers that matter#

Final glide is one question asked continuously: will I get there, and with how much to spare. The app answers it with four numbers.

Arrival

How much height you will have left when you arrive, on current performance. Positive is above, negative is short.

Required L/D

The glide ratio you need from here to arrive exactly at the target. Compare it with what you are actually achieving.

Distance

How far it is, along the route you must fly rather than in a straight line.

Time to goal

How long it will take at your current performance.

Caution

All of these start from the glide ratio and speeds you entered for your wing. If you have not set up your glider, they are guesses. See Gliders.

ESS and goal#

In a race task the clock stops at the end of speed section, but you still have to reach goal. The app tracks both, and switches its final glide target from ESS to goal once you have crossed ESS.

Tile	Shows
Arrival ESS	Height you will have on arrival at ESS.
L/D to ESS	Glide ratio required to reach ESS.
Arrival	Height you will have on arrival at the current final glide target.
Task L/D	Glide ratio required for the task target.
Time to goal	Time to the current target at your present performance.

Tip

On the last leg, watch arrival at ESS to decide how hard to push, and arrival at goal to decide whether you can afford it. They can disagree, and the difference is exactly the decision you are making.

Elevated goal#

Some tasks finish at a height above the ground rather than on it. When a task defines an elevated goal, the app takes that height into account, so arrival is calculated to the finish height and not to the terrain.

Caution

An elevated goal makes the glide harder, not easier. Arriving at ground level at an elevated goal means you did not make it.

The final glide banner#

Once the final glide target is active, a banner appears with the arrival status. It can be expanded for detail or minimized to stay out of the way.

Status	Meaning	What to do
Good	You are comfortably above the glide.	You can push the speed, which is what McCready is telling you.
Warn	You are marginal.	Slow toward best glide and stop giving away height.
Bad	You are below the glide.	You need another climb. Decide early, while you still have options underneath you.

Caution

Before the final leg there is no persistent banner, because the target is not active yet. That is normal, not a fault.

Speed to fly and McCready#

Speed to fly answers a different question from final glide: not whether you will arrive, but how fast you should be flying right now to get the best average speed for the day.

Speed to fly

The recommended airspeed, given your wing, the air you are in and your McCready setting.

STF (+-)

How far you are from that recommendation. Positive means speed up.

Linear STF

The same as a bar along the edge of the screen, readable without looking directly at it.

McCready is set in Gliders. Left on automatic, it follows your rolling last thermal average, so the recommendation gets more aggressive as the day improves and backs off as it dies.

Tip

The recommendation is bounded by your wing's max speed, so it will never ask for something you cannot fly. If it always reads full bar, your McCready is probably too high for the conditions.

Terrain and connectivity#

Arrival height needs to know the height of the ground at the target. The app looks for that in three places, in order: a downloaded offline region, online terrain tiles, then a direct server lookup.

Situation	Result
Inside a downloaded offline region	Full terrain heights with no connection.
Outside a region, with a connection	Terrain heights fetched as needed.
Outside a region, no connection	Terrain heights unavailable. Arrival, AGL and the side view degrade or stop.

Caution

This is a concrete reason to download an offline region for a task area even if you expect coverage. Without terrain heights, the final glide numbers you most want are the ones that stop working.

Note

When a task is loaded, turnpoints whose ground height could not be resolved are flagged as warnings rather than failing silently.

The ESS and goal simulator#

You can see the real banner and the real tiles without flying, which is the fastest way to learn what each state looks like before it matters.

Where Settings › Other › Open ESS / Goal simulator

The simulator is introduced in the app as Preview the real final glide banner and cockpit tiles without starting a flight.

Scenario	Shows
Before final leg	The blank state, before the final glide target activates.
Classic ESS	A normal race task on the final leg to the literal ESS.
Classic Goal	A normal race task after ESS, already switched to goal.
Elevated Goal	An elevated finish.

Open the simulator and pick a scenario.
Use the quick presets Too low, Just and Good to jump between the three arrival states.
Or set altitude, distance, arrival glide ratio and ground speed by hand.
Read the Resolved state block to see exactly what target the app picked and why.

Note

This page is only visible with Debug mode on. See Appearance, power and diagnostics.