Debrief: Michael Goudeau

Trading wings for wings…
I was already a hang glider and paraglider pilot, and I’d had a fairly serious accident. So I thought—you know, I should get a motor. I started taking lessons in a Cessna 152 and was lucky to get great flight instructors.

Juggling the controls…
I knew how to learn skills from having done so much juggling. I know how to structure practice so I can learn things quickly, and I have a lot of confidence in my ability to do that. Juggling also gave me a sense of fun, and since I’m flying for fun, I’m really going to enjoy it too.

Seeing the nuances…
In juggling you need everything to be repeatable. When I practice juggling I try to do a trick exactly the same way every time. At first I didn’t think of flying that way, but once I learned to fly the pattern reliably it became much easier to see and solve variations. Like juggling, it’s practice that makes flying easy and safe.

Advice for students…
There’s a moment where you quit reacting to the airplane and the airplane starts reacting to you. That’s being ahead of the airplane. Look for when that switch flips and you are actually in charge of the airplane.