Albermahle F2C Centralised Event - May 10th

This was the first time for several years that we had decided to hold a centralised event so far north and it was a case of having fingers crossed that the weather would not ruin the day. The Saturday had been fine and clear but with constant high winds so when we awoke in Newcastle on the Sunday morning we we amazed to find that we had clear blue skies and hardly a breath of wind. A number of flyers had criticised the decision to use the northern venue and only 7 pairs turned up on the day but we were able to have a good days racing in almost perfect conditions.

All races were held as three-ups for a change and will therefore count towards team qualificationfor the 1999 Euro Champs.

With the low entrant count the races were organised with an attempt to give all pairs an even distribution of 1st/2nd/3rd choice on segments (althought with virtualy no wind this was unimportant) and also to try and get everyone to fly against everyone else during the day.

Ross/Turner put in the fastest time of the day in the very first heat and thus set the mark of 3:26.6 for everyone else to aim at, the only team being able to get near this during the first three rounds being Heaton/Broadhead (the first time we have seen Derek and John this year) who put in a couple of 3:31's.

In the final round Fitzgerald/Thomason, who had been struggling most of the day, put in a time of 3:28.2 which was even faster than it looked when you consider that Mark dropped a catch at the one pitstop. Fry/Whorton also had a good race to record a 3:29.6 and grab 3rd spot from Heaton/Broadhead.

The final turned out to be a bit of a let down - from the start Ross/Turner were having setting problems with the other two teams clearly building up a lead. After the second stops Fitzgerald/Thomason were in the lead from Fry/Whorton and had a clear airspeed advantage but not so much of a lead because the latter team were on a 40 lap strategy thus saving a stop. Disaster, however, struck soon after the second stops when the two models connected in mid air and performed a mid air loop locked together - amazingly landing within the circle with virtualy no damage apart from that caused by the initial contact. Ross/Turner were thus able to carry on and record 8:29.9 giving them victory on the day.

As no clear blame cauld be seen it was decided that this was just a flying incident (no one was sure what had caused the initial contact) and the results were thus taken on laps completed at that stage giving Fitzgerald/Thomason 2nd place and Fry/Whorton 3rd.

Our thanks must go to the Novocastrian club for providing the venue and also to Bernie Langworth who ran the F2C event on the day. I hope the flyers will support us if we plan to hold a similar event next year because this is a super site and, if we get this type of weather (more than one of us were in shorts all day !) there is no reason for us not holding competitions up at Albermahle.

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