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The weather was great! Maybe the best fly conditions we had at any of our events this season. The only thing to complain about was the temperature; it did get a little hot. The wind kicked up and it stormed a bit Saturday night but this was after the flying was done for the day. Parts, parts and more parts make up a pattern airplane. Forget one part and bad things can happen! Steve Sterling found this out on Saturday during a practice flight with his Focus. He had done a little maintenance work on the elevator bell-crank and forgot to put in the retaining bolt. The bell-crank came apart in flight and his Focus went in, he had the power off and the wings level. It hit in a pretty soft field but it did do major damage. I think it's repairable. Steve did not fly Saturday but he did stay to help us judge because we were pretty short handed in this area. Steve came back Sunday with his backup Tipo and flew two rounds.
Rex Lesher and I flew our new aircraft in their first competition. Rex has a Hydeaway with YS 140DZ and I have a Hydeout with a Webra 1.45. I had a lot of engine trouble and got everything worked out on Friday before the contest. Friday was the first time I flew it through the pattern; this was true for Rex as well, and he was still trimming his Hydeaway on Friday. Rex and I were the only Advanced competitors, we have been exchanging contests all season and this was no exception. Rex won by 23 points. This makes 3 contests that Rex has won and I have taken second and 3 contests I have won and Rex has taken second. We are now heading to the last contest of the season tied for district points! Creswell will be the Advanced shootout! Rex will be tough to beat with his new plane so I plan on doing a lot of practice in the next couple of weeks.
We had a lot of fun at this contest! I always loved the color scheme on Gary Pugh's and Dave Villwock's Hydeaway so when I finished my Hydeout I copied Gary and Dave's design. The primary color is orange. Saturday Gary was wearing bright orange shorts that matched his airplane; I was giving him a bad time all day Saturday. Sunday when I arrived at the field Gary and Dave were both wearing bright orange shorts and they presented me with a pair, we are now team orange! We all got a kick out of being color matched to our airplanes. We may see more color coordination in Creswell!
Bill Bowen couldn't join us this weekend because he had shoulder surgery last week and is home recovering. I guess he is doing recovering comfortably. Meri, my wife, picked up a card for Bill and we all signed it and sent it home with Brett. It sure was strange seeing Brett fly without his dad. Bill supports about every contest in D8, a real pattern animal!
Many thanks to Michael Lance for organizing and CD'ing this event, its not a small task to run a pattern contest. A big thank you to Meri for running the scoring program and taking care of all the paperwork details. Meri has done this in several contests this year and she is becoming a pro! We have been using this new scoring program this season that I developed. It is a series of macros and VBA in Excel. The program has several nice features, statistics and plots, which are easy implement due to the power of Excel. I'll post this program on our web site when the season ends. We have done a lot of refinements all season long, plus of course bug fixes! Only one more contest left in D8 before the season ends, the final contest will be held in Creswell on Labor Day weekend hope to see you all there. See you in the pits….
More pictures in the photo archives at: |
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