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I got a motel room close to the field and when I woke up, the sun was shinning and the weather warm. I could hear birds outside chirping and I knew it was going to be a really spectacular contest day!
But I had no idea just how spectacular!
When I got to the field there were nearly a hundred pilots waiting to get signed it, but everything when smooth. It was Man on Man, and the battle was on, with 9 rounds of 10 with almost everyone hitting 95 plus in the first few rounds.
I think the biggest surprise was that Jerry Slates of RCSD publishing fame showed up from CA with one of his old Viking Models 3m Ravens. If you aren't familiar with the plane it has poly ANhedral wings (like a gull).
The top spots were being dominated by me (and my buddy Mr Volz Powered Pike Superior), Jerry Slates (Raven), Dale King (his own design Buteao), Jack Womack(Houston Hawk), Dale Nutter (Stratos, Randy Mcleave (Icon), Rense Lange (Sharon), Paul Perret (LAsoar), Rich Burnowski (Pike Superior), Brian Smith (Molded CompPsyko), George Joy (Escape Xtail) and Dr Dan (Icon). Needless to say, things had to really move along but Henry Bostick is a harsh mistress when it comes to CDing a contest and didn't put up with any of my bullshi_!
Dale Nutters plane developed a weird anomoly and he had to fy the entire contest inverted! I never saw anyone launch inverted but he said that he wasn't about to not fly after driving the 500 miles from Tulsa to Dallas!
I flew the best contest I had ever flown, ending only a few points out off perfect but....
In the end it took a triple fly off between Rense Lange, Jack Womack and Jerry Slates! These guys really brought their best thumbs today! It took three flights to determine the winner! The first two rounds were perfect flights between all three and that was with ALL of use timing and checking the landings. The last flight ended the same but the landing was changed to a Double Spot landing! Two paper plates were set on the 50 and 100 marks. The object was to poke/snag the first plane and end up with that plate poked snagged into the second plate with all the edges aligned.
Rense came in first and it seemed he had it with just a little of one plate edge showning! But the clock was short one second! Jack came in hooking both plates and on the zero, but his plane stood on its nose in the wind for what seemed like 10 seconds then dropped and left about 1/16" plate edge showing.
That left room for Jerry to take Dallas wood, all eyes were on him and his unique plane...you could hear a pin drop and his timer was counting him in. He hooked the first plane and his nose popped up in to a stall (turns out there was a rock under the ground right where his first target was :-( He was early by 5 seconds and there was a themal coming thru holding his plane dead over the target.
His timer now counting those last few seconds out loud and Jerry working frantically to hold his plane in the wind over the spot...then just as the timer got the first part of the word Zero out, his plane's nose dropped dead on to the plate for a perfect landing and time score.
It doesn't ever get as good at this!
Gordy |
