Ted noticed this in the other thread, and its something I noticed, too, in 14-15-16. The "energy", for lack of a better description does seem to be going out of it, and it looks more and more like a medium-sized local contest than the unique event it used to be. This is long, even for me, but I have been trying to put my finger on it myself for a few years now.
I don’t think lack of local promotion has much to do with it. There are a number of element that I think go into it:
• Permanently located in Muncie. The AMA site is about as good as I ever saw at a NATs, so it’s not the facilities. But it is still 2400 miles away from home for a big contingent of fliers. I counted the entries from the 2012 Golden State meet, and I got 76 entries (not distinct individuals, that included people who entered OTS and Classic in addition to PAMPA classes). And that it pretty typical. We have had more Expert entries than there were Open entries at the NATs this year (and Lubbock in 94, as Paul pointed out). That’s not intended to brag, but it shows that there are an awful lot of people who would probably love to go to a NATs. Three of those people showed up at this year’s NATs.
That has dropped off drastically from the travelling NATs and the first 10-ish years in Muncie. People just got burned out on the travel. You drive for 3 fairly hard days at 80 mph – and your reward is a week in Muncie, Indiana AGAIN. How many times can you eat at Fazoli’s and Texas Roadhouse? Aside from the airplane contest part, there is (and no offense is intended) not a lot else to recommend it. I can drive 4 hours and go to Yosemite (when it is not on fire), I can drive 4 hours and go poke around Mt. Lassen and Mt. Shasta (when that is not on fire), I can drive an hour and hang around Big Basin Redwoods state park, places that people come from all around the world to visit. Or I can spend 3 days hot-footing it across the country, not stopping because I have to go at least 800 miles a day, and hope I don’t run out of gas before I get to Buford, Wyoming (population: 3). And with all that, I found that I liked the travel part of it, and the driving, more than when I got to the destination.
People used to show up with their families in tow, and it was the family vacation for the year. That has dropped off drastically, because trying to do the same old thing, year after year, no new sites, always the same trip along essentially the same route, has to have lost its appeal. That's why it looks like a local contest, and the banquet, for example, has fallen off to nothing or is cancelled - only people directly involved, i.e. the competitors, judges, and administrators, go, the family in most cases stays home.
• It has gotten very predictable – As much as I hate to even superficially argue like the gadflies, the contest has become pretty predictable and the same people tend to be competitive year after year – the corollary to that being that the same people are NOT competitive year after year. I think there are a lot of reasons for it, mostly things you think would be and objectively are good things. The judging is very consistent, doesn’t really “bracket” scores and has a reasonable scoring range, which is particularly noticeable in the Top 20 and Top 5 and wildly different from top 5s in the early-mid-2000s. My first two rounds in 2008 would have given a nearly insurmountable lead in earlier years, but that was the first year that we weren’t trying to restrict the scoring range, and Orestes (with a better flight) was able to catch me right at the end.
But it’s not just the judging that has gotten better. Everybody’s engine/motor runs well, and gives plenty of power to get through any reasonable conditions. You never win a contest due to a flameout or undiagnosed engine issue where it just, one day, decided to crap out on you. In past decades, this was sometimes the decisive factor. If someone good happened to get a couple of perfect runs at the right time, it gave them a huge advantage. The airplanes almost always fly well, and the trim is usually decent if not ideal, certainly good enough to get through flights in any reasonable air. Taking the equipment out of the equation also make things very predictable – the best pilots generally win and there aren’t too many anomalies that you can take advantage of. Again the corollary is that if you aren’t necessarily the best pilot, the chances of a surprise qualification or Top 5 appearance seems pretty remote, you aren’t going to luck into it.
• Related to everybody having access to competitive equipment, the standards for every aspect of the event have gotten ridiculously high. In past years, it was possible, for example, to distinguish yourself at appearance judging or with extraordinary workmanship. Great plan – take a look at the Hellcat construction article by Chris Cox in Stunt News, does anyone here think they can do better? The engineering and workmanship is as high as it has ever been, And he also made the fly-off . There aren’t many/any better airplanes, but there sure are a lot of really good ones. Combine the exceptionally high quality flying, powerful and effective engines that are dead-nuts reliable, incredible workmanship through the field, and unerring judging, and that is a standard of overall quality that would have been inconceivable even 15 years go. So, practice more? What kind of practice are you going to do that will put you ahead of a 12-time NATs and World Champion, and also a 17-time NATS and world Champion who has won in all three age ranges over a period of 40+years. The (for my money, and on the objective record) two most successful competitors in the history of the event? It’s possible (I have done it on occasion) but as I told Derek about 15 years ago, you might beat one or the other, but both – that’s pretty hard. I managed it a few times in some special circumstances, and David isn’t even my #1 nemesis, historically – that would be Mr. Terry G. “Ted” Fancher.
You have to look at this from the outside and find it almost inconceivable to ever meet any of these levels of accomplishment, much less all of them at once (which is necessary to win). If all you see is a trophy, you are going to have a tough time of it, and you either go and are resigned to getting your 4 flights and heading home, or figure there’s gotta be some better way to spend your week of vacation.
This is missing the point, of course. The point is to challenge yourself, far more than it is to win. Winning is a lot better, but it’s the logical result of overcoming your own limitations and preconceptions, and maintain physical and psychological control over yourself for long periods under stress. The trophy is nice, it’s pretty cool to have your name on the same Trophy as George Aldrich, but the accomplishment is overcoming and mastering your own actions and thoughts, and being recognized as champion by others doing the same. But only the real die-hards ever even get to looking at it like that, for others, it's a long ordeal with little chance of a payoff.
Brett
Topic: Nat's participation, then and now. (Read 5369 times)