2008 Tucson Shoot-out

Well the shootout has come and gone!! There are so many stories to tell, funny ones, technical ones I really just couldn’t write them all down!

I try and sum it up in a few words and in different sections!
(more…)

Day Three. Well this was the windy day, 20mph for us mere mortals 30mph or so for the invitationals in the afternoon!

My unknown was a flown ok bar two zeros! Again silly mistakes, the high wind caught me out on my crossbox spin, nose dropped just after the wing so that’s a zero! And I did a 1 1/2 roll on an up line instead of a 1 1/4 so when I corrected back that added another element in so therefore a zero! So that was my dropped unknown!!
(more…)

Day two and the one word would be stuffup! LOL

I got a zero in each round unknown and known! The unknown I flew a bit far out and under rotated on a spin, which threw downline the wrong way, exit upright when I should have been inverted!! Also I wrote the a schedule to wind correct out, probably should have come in, would have presented better! My scores weren’t terrible but when you get a zero it screws things up!
(more…)

Day one of the comp!

It started early with a pilots brief! We had the brief at 7.30am, it was all the usual PB stuff and was conducted by Michael Marcellin the CD.

I was flying 8th in the 1st round! I have to admit to being more nervous than usual for an Unlimited known! My first flight was ok and few under rotations of my snaps, but I was gettin used to the plane and the slight wind. I finished 11th in the first round with a normisled score of 860 or so! The standard in unlimited was very high and everyone flew well!
(more…)

The eve of the shootout is almost over! The big day has almost arrived! Last night at the BBQ round at Dave place, I got chatting to Frazer. I asked him was be going to the judges meeting? He said no “I’m going to the moon!” I Said I had planned on going to the breif, he said come to the moon with me!

So to cut a long story short we did! I flew a few knowns, some unknowns and a spot of freestyle! I have made the decision not to compete in the freestyle. The model is not setup at all for 3d, we can’t change the geometry without effecting the resolution and sequence rates etc.,
(more…)

Today was my final day of preparation for the contest! We headed to Catalina about 10am. There already was QQ, Seth, Brendan and Mark. Everyone was flying well and you could sense that it was getting serious!

Mark was in the zone, he put a flight on his Dalton 300 MEL and for his 1st shootout practise flight it was damn good! On landing he lost a wheel and axle, luckily it didn’t do any damage, just scuff the spat. He then prepared his backup sequence plane, his godfrey 300 with a DA200 4cyclinder! He had to change out some servos and re set it up, but after a few minutes he had it flying just like his Dalten. He got his wheel fixed and put a few flights on it in the afternoon! His style is unique I really enjoy watching him fly sequences!
(more…)

We had an early start down at the Catalina RC, we arrived down at the field about 7am and it was packed! As we got out of the car, we noticed that a few other bigger planes were on the flightline, Seth Arnold, Brendan Jones and the Godfather Quique Somenzini! We were also greeted by the ever friendly bunch of club members! My dad and I started to introduce ourselves to Seth etc., as I was chatting to Tom Arnold, Seth’s dad who is a really nice guy, Quique comes up and says hello Matthew, I’m Quique how are you? (more…)

Four days to go till the Contest!! We are on wind down mode, just keeping the hands in so to speak, a few flights a day just to make sure the plane is good and I don’t totally lose the feel. Talking to Leseberg yesterday he said that with the amount I’ve been doing I should back off, he said peak on Friday/Saturday of the contest, don’t burn out!! Good advice!

We headed to Catalina RC club this morning which is no more than 5 mins from our hotel. We were greeted by maybe 20 or so very friendly members. The all made us feel very welcome and seemed interested in the aeroplane and our trip to Arizona.
(more…)

Today we had our meeting at the new field close by our hotel, that was a formality, no issues with us flying there, so hopefully we can get some flying in closer to our base!

We headed to TRCC for a bit and got 5 good flights in, with a strong crosswind, which is all good training! Out at the field was Bill Hempel & myself for a good two hours, we just flew time after time! We had to pack up early and head off to DA to fit our smoke injectors! My big Carden is going to be my freestyle plane, so I got to fit our smoke pump so I can smoke the desert out!! As we left the TRCC field Gernot Bruckmann and his dad turned up to fly, he flew a few knowns, his Krill Yak55sp was going well!
(more…)

Thursday was a fairly uneventful day to be honest, 2.5 gallons gone again, some good practise in a crosswind and a quiet TRCC field.

Chris Brislin was practising his freestyle, it was outstanding to watch with and without music! His invitational knowns were pretty good too!!

Frazer was out with his new PBG Extra 260, it was going well and the 200cc DA was hauling it around great. Frazer’s knowns looked pretty bloody good (that’s what PBG stands for!)
(more…)