Oriel is full of high-flyers, but usually not quite like this.
Students from Oxford and Cambridge took to the skies earlier this month to compete in the 2023 Varsity Match for Gliding. Oxford’s team won, with recent Orielensis Azmi Rahman having the highest-scoring flight on the team.
Dr. Rahman began his gliding career upon beginning his DPhil in Musculoskeletal Sciences & Data Science at Oriel College. Soon after he earned his flying licence, and today he is the only member of Oxford University Gliding Club (OUGC) with an instructor qualification.
“Gliding,” Dr. Rahman explains, “is a dance with the invisible but very dynamic airmass over the UK,” adding that it is “a great respite from the stresses of work and studies.”
At the Varsity Match, which this year was held at the Gransden Lodge Airfield in Cambridgeshire, flights were scored on how long they stayed airborne and how much height was gained. Both Oxford and Cambridge entered five pilots.
Dr. Rahman scored 229 points, over one third of Cambridge’s total score of 611 points.
On 21 July, OUGC will host a contingent of Oriel SCR members for experience flights, with Dr. Rahman on-hand as an instructor.