For any prospective PPL students, I just got my PPL yesterday. Below are the specifics on my training as a whole:



1. I did my training at a Part 141 school.

2. My first flight was May 15th, 2019. So about 6 months from start to finish.

3. For most of the training I flew about 3-4 days per week.

4. Part 141 requires progress checks at several points throughout the training. There was a total of 3 if I remember correctly. I accrued more flight time because of the wait time to get the prog checks scheduled with the chief flight instructor. Additionally, I was not ready for the written test by the time I finished the required hours. Between both of these issues I probably tacked on about 4-5 additional weeks on the total time from start to finish and at least 10-15 hours.

5. I had 69 hours prior to taking checkride.

6. I have not calculated my expenses yet, but on instructor/prog checks/plane rental/checkride I probably spend around $14k-$15k.

7. I fly in the Houston, Texas area. So we did not have too many delays from weather. However, now with winter approaching the weather will not be as good. Thankful I was able to finish PPL prior to winter really starting.

8. I worked full time (typically 45-55 hours) during my training. I would fly in the evening at 5:00 p.m. -7:00 p.m.

9. Training to get my PPL was substantially harder than what I was expecting. Growing up racing motorcycles, cars, etc. I have felt I have a good understanding of machines and controlling them. The reality is there is just so much information to learn for flying and there are a lot of things that are not intuitive. I feel that training for my PPL was more difficult than obtaining my college degree. (Business Management.... not exactly a difficult degree) but the amount of studying I had to do seemed more. Perhaps this is because I am married now and have much less time and much more stress for pursuing this endeavor.


For all the prospective students out there working on their PPL my advice would be as follows:

1. Have adequate funding so there are no gaps in your training.

2. Keep on top of your studying. Make sure you are prepared for each lesson. (i.e. if you are going to work on steep turns, make sure you have read about them, understand them, etc. prior to showing up to fly them)

3. Get a written test prep. I used the Dauntless Aviation Written test prep. I think it was around $40 or so... was VERY helpful for getting the written done. I made a 92% on my first try. Scoring well on the written will help in your checkride. You may not get grilled as much as someone who scores in the 70s.

4. Be VERY organized. Have all your books, tab them out for relevant sections. Tab our your FAR/AIM, etc. Have a binder with the ACS printed out. Being organized in general will benefit you in life/career.

5. Don't get down on yourself if you are struggling to learn certain maneuvers or knowledge. Just keep practicing.

6. I wanted to finish in like 50 hours. Don't get hung up on finishing by XX hours. Just make you have quality training and are a competent pilot. You do not want to have any holes in your knowledge/skills.

7. Watch 8MA youtube channel and also Cyndy Hollman on youtube. Both have great material that is very helpful. There are other aviation youtube videos that are good to watch too. Just search.