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SEN 3086

 

  1. Fab Feb Results online
  2. Fab Feb Finished

Fab Feb Results online

We have put the results of the Fab Feb events online on the SEN website http://sen.faifreeflight.org/index.php and it is currently set up so you see them when you first logon.  There is also a menu choice down the left-hand side. The Ike AMA events will be added shortly.  If you spot an error, you can notify us but if you want it fixed you should notify the CD or Event Director of the event.

  • Kiwi Cup – Roger Morrell at r_morrell@yahoo.com
  • Kiwi Cup F1E – Peter Brocks at brocksarizona@cox.net
  • North American Cup – Tony Mathews at tmathews180@gmail.com
  • Cal Cup F1E – Brian Van Nest at bisheatf1a@gmail.com
  • MaxMen International – Bill Booth at wakefieldarch@outlook.com

 

Fab Feb Finished

Firstly, it was a wonderful series of contests. Great Sporting Results. Saw many old friends and made new ones. Lost Hills put on a great show with the green grass and great weather. Looking at it this week the best thing to say is that the large amount of rain yesterday and today will go well towards keeping that green longer and setting up for next year. Perfect timing on the weather.
Participation was up on last year but still not as good as pre-pandemic.  Increased travel costs, general travel uncertainty and the Russian invasion of Ukraine were all contributing factors. We were happy to see a small Ukrainian contingent.  Not enough young flyers, never is, although those who attended acquitted themselves well.  International flyers from Germany and Israel. The most encouraging from the USA point of view was David Gao who flew his first F1A event and in the Ike HLG/CLG. This is because David made the transition from the Science Olympics, a STEM event for High Schools (and all indoor) to an outdoor event and a major one too.  Excellent coaching by Tim and Sevak.

Great to see flyers stepping up to help time in some of the big flyoffs. The close to perfect conditions gave us over 50% of the field in flyoffs and in F1A and F1B this was a lot of people.  Some visitors like David Lindley, the NFFS president, stepped to help some of the organizers.  Although I hear that David has visited the Andriukov shop so next year we hope to see him in the F1B events.
Special thanks the Lost Hills Association in particular Glenn Schneider and Brian van Nest who did a number of important things behind the scenes, including finding a new, better and cheaper Porta Pottie vendor.  The Lost Hills Association and some others help maintain a good relationship with our neighbors. Holloway Gypsum lets us store our bikes and helps maintain the access roads. The Wonderful company, oil field workers, farm workers, adjacent landowners, people and merchants of Lost Hills, especially Gabby’s, all contribute to our enjoyment.  Janna Van Nest worked with Gabby’s to get their Food Truck out to the World Cup events and stay open Thursday evening just for us. Janna also helps with using the Community center, getting the Wonderful Pistachios for the Kiwi and Ike events and of course showing hospitality to our visitors with the Ladies Tea party.  Jim Parker, America’s Cup coordinator, moved the banquet and prize giving to the field like last year and that went well.

Lindy Murrell did a great job in running online entry system, checking the FAI and AMA credentials and making it so you only had to pay in one place for all the FAI events. Without this we would not be able to run an event like Fab Feb. At the sign up day she was helped by Laraine Koerbin, who had come from NZ to help her husband Antony in F1A.  Also at the sign ups the Van Nests, Tanya Buskell, Glenn Schneider (NFFS) , David Murrell and Tiffaney Odell (MaxMen) all helped to welcome people to Fab Feb, provide information and make things go smoothly.   Even if you are only entering one event or if there is a question if you can attend, always enter on-line.  It is much easier to send an email to the organizer saying “I entered but can’t come”  than to arrive just before the first round as you will have do the online entry there on the field, or have some one type in while you stand there and dictate the information.  Also entering online beforehand assures you that your FAI and AMA information are checked well ahead of time where any issue can be fixed.
Every CD had their special helpers so I can’t speaker for the others. For the Kiwi and Ike. I’d like to thank:

  • Lindy for help with the organizational stuff, doing the online score board and advice on the trophies especially this for the Ladies.
  • David Murrell for coming out from Virginia to help with the running of the Kiwi Cup. I can confirm that he is old enough to have a 23 year old son, Wes, who some of you know.
  • Glenn Schneider for running the Ike AMA events.
  • Tim Batiuk for help on the Ike AMA HLG,CLG events.
  • Peter Brocks, the F1E evangelist in the USA for running the Kiwi Cup F1E event.
  • Len Surtees, a HLG/CLG maestro from Australia who came all the way to see what the Ike was all about and donated a special Award. Len says he will be back.
  • Brian and Janna Van Nest who helped getting some of the bits and pieces when I was out of the country, giving flight line and other set up advice and a bunch of little things that make things go better. Also, for bringing Chloe to make sure no food scraps were left on the field.
  • Joy Clarke, a friend from way, way back in New Zealand who helped me find the Kiwiana items that we used a trophies.
  • Norm Furutani, one of the founders of the Winter Classic for his wisdom.
  • Colleen Pierce from the AMA , Liz King from Flying New Zealand and Ian Kaynes from the CIAM FFTSC all of whom helped negotiate the various governing bodies involved in an International Sporting Event like this.

And I’m sure there must be more….

Now there are couple of bad things.

  • Trash, Rubbish, Garbage.  Chloe as mentioned above deals with some of the food scraps, probably including some she should not eat. We did not have the noted Viking Sportsman, Henning here this year. In previous years he has picked up sacks of trash and taken them into Lost Hills to dispose of properly. This year there were clearly a number of people who do not have Henning’s sense of Danish tidiness.  This is a way of saying – you left too much trash/rubbish/garbage on the field.
  • The second case are some sporting incidents.  This is a big event possibly bigger than some of the participants have flown in before. It is very important to be considerate to others and aware of what is going on around you. I noticed a couple of incidents in F1A or F1H events where there were line tangles that did not end well. This happens –  but the first objective should be to get out of the tangle.  It appeared that some did not know how to do it or did not try, causing models to crash.
  • Finally be nice to the time keepers and other helpers. They are doing their best to run the event for you.  We know you are an international sportsman of great renown, but you probably don’t run events and that person you were not nice to won’t be back next year and possibly neither will others.  If there is an issue, talk with the CD or Jury, politely.
  • Always enter online.

From the organizer’s side we all know there are things we can do better. We try to learn from each year.  There are some organizers who are moving on and new people joining the teams. It is clear we always need help. Let us know what we can do to make an even better Fab Feb next year!

SEN Status

Our new web site is online with archives of SEN going back to 1997 plus many items about FAI Free Flight. It can be found at http://www.faifreeflight.org

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New users can sign up at  this link http://eepurl.com/crOnvj
or at the SEN website

 
…………..
Roger Morrell