NSW State Championships 21–22 August 2010

This years State Championship was hosted by the Illawarra MAC, the second two day contest held at the Berkeley field this year.  The field was set up on Friday and was, as we have come to expect, meticulously groomed by the IMAC members and all was set for another good contest.  Entries were for various reasons, mainly health and family related, a little down on what we would normally expect but we finished up with 18. Considering this included only one Sportsman, wasn’t too bad for the middle of winter.

The week leading up to the event was dominated by strong westerlies and the forecast, at least for the Saturday, wasn’t looking to good with a large high pressure over the centre of the country compressing the isobars against a deep low over Tassie.  Unfortunately the weathermen got it right and we were greeted by a very brisk and gusty south westerly.  A few keen pilots got their models out and Richard Knox even had a practice flight but as we were deciding on whether or not to start the contest the wind increased and models were getting damaged by being blown around in the pits in the lee of the clubhouse!  As usual with these things we waited around to “see if things would improve” but it was not to be and day 1 was called off soon after lunch with peak gusts at 40knots.  The time was not wasted with much useful discussion taking place as conditions for talking were quite good if you were sheltered by the wind and the R & C (or is that C & R) canteen was producing its usual fine selection of food and beverages.

The forecast for Sunday was for perfect weather with a light south westerly backing around to the north east and continuing clear skies under the high pressure.  Amazingly the Met people got that right as well and Sunday would have qualified as perfect day.

With the entries only allowing one line and the contest reduced to a single day we had to push to get the flying in and the first flight was in the air a few minutes after 9am.  In the 7 hours of flying we managed 7 rounds, 3 for F3A/Sportsman and 4 for the Expert/Advanced group.  A really good effort by all participants as the contest and line directors had very little directing to do.

Sportsman

As mentioned above only local Josh Clifton competed in the Sportsman class using his recently purchased ex-Bill Garrod Trebuchet/ YS 170 CDI.  After only test flying the model on Monday he put together three excellent flights to gain a promotion point.  Now he just needs to fly more than two contests a year.

Advanced

Advanced is possibly the most competitive class in NSW at the moment.  Unfortunately one of the main contenders, Joe Costa, wasn’t competing due to some aircraft availability issues but the others had a great contest with some good consistent flights.  Daryl O’Brien has been flying really well recently and is starting to get the most out of the Pinnacle EP and took three of the four rounds to take a good victory and a promotion point.  Richard Knox gave the Wind S Pro its second contest outing and posted some excellent scores taking one round and just falling short of promotion point on this occasion.  A little more time on the aeroplane and points and wins will surely come.  Daniel Beresford flew to his normal high standard but not having flown much recently showed in a slight lack of consistency which cost him in the final results.  A visitor form very slightly south of the border (Wodonga) Warren Leach is enjoying the EPower experience with his Black Magic and put in some good flights.  He says he has a new one in the works that will be LIGHT.  Look out world when he gets that going.  The tenacity award for the weekend goes to Felix who finished the first round with one landing gear at an odd angle.  I seem to recall a similar repair being conducted at IMAC’s first contest of the year so I guess experience really does count for something!

Expert

The field of four experts was reduced to three when Doug Tebbit, who is recovering from a recent operation, decided on Saturday that he wasn’t quite up to it.  It was good to see him up and about and hopefully a few more weeks should see him back on the scene.

For the results of close contest check out the scores of the three who did fly!  All three took a round and the final result was decided by one dodgy reverse knife edge and a slight oversight in the refuelling department.  Jason Arnold hung on to win and gained a point, he now has two I believe.  Peter Amadio took second but was robbed of a point by the normalising and for Tom Collinge it was a case of what might have been.  All good stuff and an excellent standard.

F3A

In F3A there was some good flying, taking advantage of the near perfect conditions, with all but one achieving a promotion point.

With the new Ballista Evo fully sorted and on his home field, Dave Macca had it all under control to take a well deserved win. In second place Chris Swain did his usual fine job but couldn’t quite get in touch with Dave.  Chris has been taking it easy on the practice the last few months but is intending to ramp it up in coming weeks prior to heading to the Philippines as part of the Australian team at the Continental Championships. Richard Hirst has over a hundred flights on his Tempest now, but got off to an uncharacteristically slow start and gave John Payne a sniff of third place.  Brian Dooley barely held off the newly promoted Shane Austin who proved his recent form (including a win in Expert at the Masters) was no illusion, by getting a promotion point at his first attempt in the top class.  Bill Garrod was handicapped by the technology as he has only handful of flights on his new Electric Tempest. Nothing a couple of hundred battery charges won’t fix!

The Wrap

Although reduced to a one day one line comp it was enjoyable and the decision not to try and fly on Saturday proved the right one.  Overall a pretty high standard considering the weather of recent times has not enabled much practice.

A big thank you to the Illawarra club for the use of their excellent facility.  Special thanks to IMAC members Ray and Cynthia Woods for the sterling effort in the canteen, Bill Garrod for setting up the field and the club members on the field mowing crew who had the surface in such good condition.  Thanks also to Joe Costa for his work on the trophies.

Next contest is Gunnedah 18 – 19 September.  We are still hearing rumours about a flood of Queenslanders coming south for this event so start planning now it is always a fun weekend.