The Preparation

As the day of the contest approaches, you should make a list of things that need to be done and materials and equipment that need to be rounded up. Let's start with the equipment; Arrangements for food, i.e. cooking hamburgers, hot dogs, and possible Saturday night cook out. Round up a barbecue for several days, LP is best, but settle with charcoal if that's all you can get. computer, scoring program w/ latest updates, (learn how to run the software) clip boards (4 or more), pens and pencils, writing paper, 3x5 cards to use for the flight order cards. lots of copies of the Official NSRCA Score sheets, which you can copy off this web site. You will need one score sheet per round, per person. Put another way, if you plan of flying 6 rounds and you have 20 contestants, you will need to have 120 score sheets printed out (double sided) from this web site. At an average of 5cents per copy, the cost will be about $6 total. Make a few extra, just in case. make up some end poles, maybe about 6 ft. high, brightly painted or with a flag. These will be used to mark the ends of the maneuvering box. Then you will need some center markers. Some old orange road cones work well for this. make up a tool to measure the angles when laying out the field. A simple tool that uses three yard sticks is described in this article, with a photo. (For further information on how to use these Yard Sticks, go to the "Hints and Tricks" page in this web site.) Then buy some athletic field paint. It's great for drawing lines on the grass and it's not permanent. Look at the field lay-out illustration. You may need several folding chairs and a sun shade. The chairs would be for the judges and the scribes, four each at every line. Some CD's provide sun shades for the judges and scribes. Not a bad idea, knowing the seriousness of sunburns. You may want to build several simple poles with clothes pin clips to hold the contestant order cards with name, class, and frequency. These 3x5 cards will be filled out at registration and will be placed on the poles in the order of flight for each line. It would be a good idea to buy 3x5 cards in 4 or 5 different colors. That way, you can have a different color for each class. See the accompanying photo. Next comes the set-up. If you will be flying off a grass strip, then have the grass mowed closely on the day before the contest. If possible, plan on rolling the field also. Next, you will want to get the box lines painted on the grass and the end poles and center markers set up. You will have fliers coming in from out of town, and they will want to practice a little, so have the field ready by early afternoon, because you won't have any other time. Get to the field early on Saturday morning and set up the registration table and the registration forms. As every one signs in, be sure to check for their AMA card. This is an AMA requirement and should not be neglected. At the same time, fill out the 3x5 flight order card for each contestant. Another idea is to set up a coffee pot and some donuts or muffins for morning refreshments. Orange juice would be a good idea also. A little refreshment at this time can help start the day out right. If a club is sponsoring the contest, the members may want to sell coffee and donuts to help the club coffers.