Ian Strachan gained his pilot’s licence while still at school. There was no grounding him after that – in the years that followed he flew in every continent except Antarctica and eventually piloted 172 different types of aircraft. As a test pilot he commanded a squadron at the Boscombe Down test base and was Chief Test Pilot at the research base at Farnborough. His test activity including night low flying using images on a TV screen, testing a 4-engine Nimrod on one engine and taking a Canberra to ‘coffin corner’ at 65,000 feet. He became an expert in flight simulation, first with the UK Ministry of Defence and later as a writer for several publications. As a glider pilot since his cadet days he won two UK gliding championships and was placed "above first" in another. This is his story.