SEN 2819
- The 2021 FAI Southwest Regionals Model Airplane Championships
- Flyoffs.
- Back in the good old days
- Fab Feb FollowUp
- Heads up for SoCal locals
- San Valeers Annual
The 2021 FAI Southwest Regionals Model Airplane Championships
The first America’s Cup contest of 2021, the FAI SWR, was held on January 16 and 17 in Eloy, Arizona.
The weather was perfect, mostly all blue skies. The temperature in the mornings was 35°F (2°C) but then warmed up to about 73°F (23°C) both days. The wind speed on both days was 3 mph (1.3 m/s) to 10 mph (4.4 m/s). The wind direction was out of the SSE during the first 3 rounds, then changing direction, coming out of the NNW after noon to the fly-offs.
The Covid-19 pandemic caused the entry numbers to be down by 30% compared to previous years. We still had 25 competitors flying in the 8 FAI events. The contestants were from AZ, CA, CO, KS, NV, TN, TX, UT and WA. We had 5 ladies flying FAI events, Julie Parker (F1Q, F1S), Janna Van Nest (F1S), Myra Morris (F1S), Jasminka Pecenkovic (F1A) and Skylar Donnelly (F1B, F1S) – she is a FAI Junior and she will be on the USA Team for the Junior World Championships in France in August of this year.
On Saturday F1Q was won by Jack Murphy with Julie Parker in 2nd place and Rich Wegener in 3rd. Combined F1C/P had only 2 entries with Faust Parker (F1C) beating Mike Fedor (F1P) by 9 seconds. F1A had 9 flying. After 5 rounds there were 6 maxed out. 4 made the 6-minute fly-off. Jim Parker, Jim Farmer, Risto Puhakka and Peter Brocks then attempted the 8-minute flight in which Risto dropped. For the 8 minute flight the windspeed had increased a bit. All 3 that made it had long retrievals. Peter Brocks’ mechanical M&K long wing copy dt’ed at 7:46 and landed at 8:08 and flew 1.8 miles (2.9km). But then, at about 4:40 pm, in the 3rd, 10 minute F1A fly-off round Jim Parker won 1st place, with Jim Farmer in 2nd and Peter in 3rd place. F1B had 3 flyers. Jerry Fitch won F1B by being the only one maxing-out and Walt Ghio dropping the last round by 10 seconds for 2nd place. Our Junior, Skylar Donnelly, did well by maxing the first 3 rounds.
On Sunday we flew F1G, F1H, F1J and F1S in 5 rounds. F1G had 7 flyers with 4 in the fly-off. Don DeLoach won the F1G Bear trophy by winning the 2nd fly-off round with Walt Ghio in 2nd and Brian Van Nest in 3rd place. In F1H we had only 2 participants. Here Jim Parker won the F1H Bear maxing in the fly-off round with Mike Fedor coming in 2nd. 4 participated in F1J. Only Faust Parker maxed out winning the F1J Bear. Mike Fedor was 2nd in F1J and Mike McKeever came into 3rd place. In F1S, the small electric event, we had 10 flying and 8 maxed out in the 5 rounds. The F1S fly-off went for two rounds trying first to make 2 minutes and then 3 minutes on a 5 second motor run. Myra Morris was the only one making the 3 minutes to win the F1S Bear trophy. Jack Murphy was 2nd and Robert Donnelly 3rd.
A big thank you to all participants and to Rich Lyon and my wife Brigitte who all made this contest a memorable, happy event.
Peter Brocks, CD
RESULTS 2021 FAI SOUTHWEST REGIONALS AT ELOY, ARIZONA
January 16-18, 2021 Peter Brocks, CD AMA Sanction No. 10696
F1A F F F Total
1 Jim Parker 180 180 180 180 180 360 480 380 2120
2 Jim Farmer 180 180 180 180 180 360 480 313 2053
3 Peter Brocks 180 180 180 180 180 360 480 196 1936
4 Risto Puhakka 180 180 180 180 180 360 392 1652
5 Brian Van Nest 180 180 180 180 180 259 1159
6 Mike McKeever 180 180 180 180 180 107 1007
7 Enes Pecenkovic BIH 180 180 134 180 180 854
8 Steve Spence 180 165 180 162 161 848
9 Jasminka PecenkovBIH 180 180 180 122 180 842
F1B 5 Total
1 Jerry Fitch 180 180 180 180 180 900
2 Walt Ghio 180 180 180 180 170 890
3 Skylar Donnelly Jr 180 180 180 120 155 815
F1C/P 5 Total
1 Faust Parker F1C 180 180 180 171 180 891
2 Mike Fedor F1P 167 175 180 180 180 882
F1Q 5 Total
1 Jack Murphy 180 180 180 154 144 838
2 Julie Parker 160 180 180 180 8 708
3 Rich Wegener 160 164 180 D DNF 504
F1G F FO Total
1 Don DeLoach 120 120 120 120 120 180 208 988
2 Walt Ghio 120 120 120 120 120 180 196 976
3 Brian Van Nest 120 120 120 120 120 180 149 929
4 Peter Brocks 120 120 120 120 120 119 719
5 Jerry Fitch 120 120 120 120 84 564
6 Alan Petersen 81 100 69 74 120 444
7 Chuck Powell 81 D D D DNF 81
F1H FO Total
1 Jim Parker 120 120 120 120 120 180 780
2 Mike Fedor 120 120 120 120 120 130 730
F1J 5 Total
1 Faust Parker 120 120 120 120 120 600
2 Mike Fedor 120 120 120 120 68 548
3 Mike McKeever 98 120 118 120 456
4 Neal Menanno 120 120 D D DNF 240
F1S F F F Total
1 Myra Morris 120 120 120 120 120 120 180 900
2 Jack Murphy 120 120 120 120 120 120 141 861
3 Robert Donnelly 120 120 120 120 120 120 138 858
4 George Morris 120 120 120 120 120 120 117 837
5 Skylar Donnelly Jr 120 120 120 120 120 120 113 833
6 Julie Parker 120 120 120 120 120 96 696
6 Allan Mecham 120 120 120 120 120 96 696
8 Charles Morris 120 120 120 120 120 15 615
9 Janna Van Nest 120 120 120 113 54 527
10 Richard Wegener 50 120 95 105 120 490
Flyoffs.
From:Michael J Woodhouse
Regarding fly offs we appear to have reached with Aram’s idea an “angels dancing on the head of a pin” scenario. In other words, with all that math a subject of enquiry which has little or no value!
Michael Woodhouse
Mike@freeflightsupplies.co.uk
Back in the good old days
Editor
That’s when I was just a simple sportsman and not a full time professional sportsman like now. At work, I was heavily involved on product and service innovation for some large and respected companies. If anyone had suggested that the solution to complex problem was to introduce more complexity they would have been ejected from the room!
Way back they processed every F1B motor before the contest and they put a special tag on them etc which the time keeper had to check. Extremely expensive in terms of manpower and time and did not prove anything. Now they spot check and do the winners, the potential for being DQ’d keeps those honest who need being kept being kept honest. Like Gil and Alex said you have to wind your own motor but there is probably not need to have to wind it right in front of the time keeper. I have seen various degrees on competence and confusion around this at even the best run World Champs. A wandering CD or his helper will keep people honest. If we see Alex (or Oleg, Stepan, Evgeny, Igor, …) running up and down the line winding and collecting a C-Note each time it will be very obvious. There are parallels in the other classes, such as actually doing the towing or starting the motor, …
So keep it simple and if solution is complicated think laterally and look for the elephant in the room.
Fab Feb FollowUp
The Fab Feb events for Feb won’t be held as was announced earlier in an earlier SEN. The organizes are working on rescheduling for the October-November time frame. Potentially this would include World Cup status. This depends on finding appropriate dates and the covid situation. On the latter hopefully the vaccines and other actions will improve the situation by then. If you are far away enough from California that you would have to fly there, missed the Fab Feb and would consider going if “things are better”, reply to this SEN with a brief note. The note won’t be published unless you ask for it to be.
Heads up for SoCal locals
There will be/may be a big R/C glider event at Perris on Feb 28 and on April 24th and 25th .
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San Valeers Annual
With FAI and AMA events at Lost Hills 10 an 11 April