This has been a good discussion and maybe it is time to summarize what I have learned here. Of course, the big thing is that we are all older and less able or interested in serious travel to compete in contests. And for so many, the fun of flying in a contest with friends greatly outweighs the fun of competing at a national championship. I, too, enjoy some contests a lot (such as the Phoenix contest going on right now,) even more than the Nationals. But a national championship is the highest achievement in these events and for a serious competitor, it is worth working hard for. I do understand that a lot of people just don't want to put in the effort needed to compete on a national level, and that's just fine. They can and should enjoy the local and regional contests and keep those contests strong.
The idea that there are too many events at the Nationals is a difficult one. It starts with three official classes and these are the ones with the greatest emphasis in terms of operations and they are the most important.Then you get to the provisional and unofficial events and, when you start asking around, people say, "No, don't drop that event, it's really fun and I love to go there and fly it." So the events stay. The good thing is the only cost is the time and effort of those working to support the events, and there are people willing to help others have the events they enjoy. That's how we get others to help with the events we enjoy.
The 2013 Nats was missing some regulars, people who were not able to come this year but have in most past years and who plan to come next year. I can think of David and Michael Smith, Dale Gleason, Dick Perry and Ted Kraver and expect most of these people to be back in 2014. So we may not really be hurting quite so badly for active participants as 2013 indicated. I have participated in the Nats Planning Meeting for several years and the question of the minimum participation over the years required to keep the events going at the Nats does come up. We are nowhere near that minimum, so we are not in any danger that AMA will drop Carrier from the Nats.
I believe that all of us would prefer the Nats rotate around the country as in the past before settling in Muncie. This certainly has a bad effect on participation. When we first moved to Muncie, we were told that we would still occasionally rotate to other venues. Well, that never happened, and many of us are disappointed. Some of us still bring it up with AMA, but so far that seems to be like talking to a brick wall.
The idea of having the Carrier Nats move around without the rest of the events is appealing in many ways but also has problems. First, as was mentioned, separating Carrier from the other events would mess up those who also participate in both at the Nats. Of this year's Carrier entrants, five entered other events at the Nats and at least two more, Ted and Dale, intend to come in 2014 and also enter other events. So more than half the contestants enter other events. That's a problem. The next problem is that the NCS doesn't get to choose where the Carrier Nats is held: that is reserved for the AMA Executive Committee to decide, not NCS or even the AMA Nats management people. So getting the Nats moving around the country occasionally, perhaps the entire CL Nats if we could, is something we have to convince the Executive Committee to do. I suggest individuals talk to their AMA Vice Presidents about this and see if they would be supportive. Doing the groundwork first with individual contacts with the VPs is much more likely to give us an idea of what they might support than by having the NCS go to the entire Executive Council first with such a proposal. We would need a core of supportive VPs receptive to any such proposals before we would have a chance. Individuals could use their existing relationships with their VPs to seek support, or to find out if there will be none.
Another idea might be to have an annual NCS Championships contest. NMPRA has done this for decades for pylon racing and it has worked. Would this work for NCS? I'm not convinced. First, would it cannibalize the Nats, so people would go the the NCS Championships in their neighborhood and skip the Nats? Second, would it really be a championship contest, or would it just be the same regional contest with a new name? People can see through that sort of thing pretty easily. Maybe we should consider designating a "Contest of the Year" where we encourage everybody to make the trip to one of these contests, not as a championship but as a special year to make the regional contest have a special turnout. Each of these regional contests might expect a larger turnout but it would still be a regional contest. Who knows, perhaps a bunch of the guys who do not want to compete at the national championship level would enjoy traveling to and competing in a regional contest instead. Think of it as a rotating, Brodak-type contest where the emphasis is on fun and camaraderie rather than determining a national champion. Perhaps it could have more than the official events by including some of the unofficial or provisional events as well and spread the events over more than one day so people weren't completely exhausted trying to fly everything all on one day.
Pete