Fellow Modelers ,
Thank you to all the contestants, spectators and administrative support people who helped make our Huntersville NC fall Contest a great success. I heard from many people who expressed thanks for their experiences at our event. This was again expressed on the various boards, Stuka & Stunthanger, and from many people who expressed having a lot of fun at the contest .We had people from ten (10) states attend the event .
As the Contest Director my biggest concern is that we have everything prepared so that all the contestants need to do is show up and fly. One of the things that made this function possible is the support of the registration and score sheet tabulation efforts of James Duckworth and Sonny Williams. William Davis goes to great effort in securing judges for all the stunt events. Many others in the club who help by setting up the various pits areas scoreboard and generally doing whatever was needed. The Mecklenburg County Park & Recreation people who maintain the field provided extra porta-johns, trashcans and mowed the grass areas days before the contest. This makes my job a lot easier and I appreciate it.
We had eight (
new contestants fly at this event and all seemed to have fun and also learned a lot from the free exchange of information of how they could improve their building and flying abilities. This attitude of help and support is what makes our sport a positive experience for all. THANK YOU AGAIN
We started out with early in the morning Saturday with heavy rains and high winds to the point that I was concerned that we would not be able to start any flying. Then about 10:00 the rain quit and we started all the events and continued throughout the rest of the weekend.
Our first Navy Carrier event went off well, under the direction of David Smith, with flyers competing in 3 events. David Smith had built and set up the carrier deck at the end of the RC runway and the four flyers took off and attempted landings most of the day. Jo Just (Ukey 35 Designer) had awarded our club a free Navy Carrier trainer kit, which was given to David to build so that we could have a trainer for anyone wanting to learn this challenging event. Joe had met Jo & Everett Shoemaker at Brodak’s, which was instrumental in our being awarded this kit.
The stunt events, as expected, had the most entries with very good representation in all eight (
events. We were able to use the upper grass circle extensively for Old Time, Beginner and Intermediate events due to the efforts of Larry Fulwider. Larry has spent many hours working on the circle trimming the underbrush back, mowing the grass and putting a concrete center marker in place. There did not appear to be any problems in takeoff or landings so it looks like we have a great area now available. Thank you Larry. Several of the stunt events were very hotly contested. Old Time stunt had 5 people within 15 points of first place and Nostalgia ‘79 had 4 people within the same 15 points of first with Tom Hampshire winning based on his higher first round score. Jim Welch flew his Brodack T-Rex ARF for its first competition flight and was very pleased with how it performed. Bob Zambelli flew the prototype of the Brodack Cardinatte ARF. Bob said he was very happy with the performance and can’t wait for the manufactured kits arrive.
Speed Limit Combat was also well attended with 10 people flying and another 2 who decided not to fly. There were at least 3 more people who normally attend which would have brought us up to 15 flyers. Alex Givan flew his first matches and was pumped up and ready to go some more. Best matches were between the OLD guard of Phil, Mack, Wayne and Bill. Lots of experience there and tough to beat on any day. For the first time we had plenty of help with judging and a center marshal so that none of the flyers had to help.