[RCSE] "Visalia...Pikes and Sharons, and well...Pikes and Sharons"

[GordySoar]

......And AVA's..and their clones.   I started the day with a max time and landing! Usually its a flip over due to the down wind that happens but I had calm air since I drew first flight.   From there I missed the next two landings, but got my times...well till the last round..where I dropped 2 mins from a 6 with a 15 landing....landings are 25 max, 15 and 10 runway that's about 20" wide and 6' wide...okay I didn't measure it but  close enough.   One round I was coming in dead on the spot and the downwind kicked up and I had to stuff it for a no landing points or kill about 30 competitors....its was a tough decision but thank gosh time slows during that kind of thing so I had time to weigh the benefits or drawbacks to a bunch of dead guys at the event on the first day :-)   Who's hot? Mike Lee is on top with a Hobby Club moldie.  Craig Greening is doing well, but JW, Mike Smith and DP are up there with a few other really good sticks.   Edgar was kicking butt again but took a similar hit to me on his 6.   John HKM (Sharon) Luetke is here for his first time and now knows how brutal it can be at times...a weird sort of non logical way, that drives weaker men totally crazy. Sunny warm and calm and sink that can break the back of a motor home..and there are no shortage of them here.    290 ish pilots on Unlimited and many flying 2m and RES too....JW for one.  DP is flying his most recent Insanity and its always awesome and FUN to watch him.  He timed for Mike Smith (great guy, Nats Champ, world class thumb) in the first round, where Mike managed to get caught by the downwind flare up for a tip over....DP is a total gentleman, who honors the code of "timer takes the flop when his pilot does a tip over"..which means he dropped on his back when Mike nailed the 25 and his plane ended up planting its rudder tip as a skeg!  Very funny stuff.  So a bunch of us were prepared to do a group flop if DP ended up upside down...(a pretty normal Visalia position)...however he made a sweet flight and landing with that giant.  How big is the Insanity?  Well I saw a Sailaire trying to hump it in the pits :-)   Where am I at the end of 4 rounds with only a loss of 2mins? 70th!  but I am wearing a tag that says, "I beat Sal !"  (course he's not here but he's on the score sheet  :-)   Tradition dictates an all up last down DHLG contest (something I have been officially banned from since I seldom get enough time per toss to register on a stop watch and the rest of the pilots get embarrassed!).  In the end it was JW and one other.  I would say that 90% of the DLGs were Kennedy Composite Blasters, including JWs.    The final launch put the other guy's plane slightly higher than JWs.  But this year they threw in a hook....on a cue of an air horn, a loop had to be made...the last flight had 4 in a row after a couple of two's I think...both planes were together, but JW was slightly lower.  JW is the king of energy and after the 4 loop he had about 20' more than the other, which sealed the fate...and left JW with plenty of time and altitude to do a style behind the back catch. There was a 'nickel glider' all up last down in which competitors bought and built balsa free flights for an all up last down comp, must have been 50 competitors...a fun thing.   Tonite it was BBQ's, homemade beers, Marguritas and night flying...and a lot of swishing the day around in our mouths.   I've said it before, and I'll say it again, there is no event in the world like Visalia's Fall Festival, in prestige or fun....wish you all could have been here!   Gordy