Fun In The Sun Pattern Contest
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The Fun In The Sun Competitors |
We had a total of 12 contestants flying in FAI, Masters, and Intermediate. We ran only one flight line resulting in a pretty relaxed event.
Saturday night Dennis and his wife Linda prepared a BBQ dinner for the pilots and their family at the field. This was a lot of fun relaxing and talking about the day's events. There was a little fun flying and Mike Lance was putting on a show with his Muffet.
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Saturday Evening's BBQ |
Jim Hiller from Spokane returned to pattern competition after several years away. Jim did an outstanding job in Intermediate winning all 6 rounds! Andrew Beranek had a bit of bad luck with his Olympian while practicing on Friday so he was unable to fly it in the contest. Mike loaned Andrew his Muffet so he could fly in the contest. Andrew will be back in the air very soon because Rex Lesher gave Andrew his Prophecy! The Prophecy is ready to fly just needs a motor and radio installed. This is the same airplane Rex flew in Advanced for a couple of years and will really help Andrew get back in the competition. This was a fantastic gesture on Rex's part, so think about letting go of your old pattern airplanes cheap or for free to help get new people involved or to keep someone in the competition. Rex's only requirement was that Andrew pass the airplane on to new pattern pilot when he is done with it.
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Jim Hiller with his own design, Option 120 |
As has been the case in several contests most of the competitors were in the Masters class. Gary McClellan won after winning 4 rounds and Dennis was in second place until the last round where Gordon pulled a head on him by only 13 points. As you can see by the scores the Masters pilots are all strong competitors with less than 300 points separating 1st from last.
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Brett Bowen and Bill Carder serving time in the judges chair! |
FAI saw 3 competitors with Brett Bowen giving Dave Villwock a run for his money! Only 20 points between Dave and Brett, Dave won 4 rounds and Brett won 2 with all his other rounds in the high 900s. Dave better watch out! Lyle moved up to FAI at this contest and flew very well, unfortunately he could only fly two rounds on the first day so he was unable to drop any low scores!
Standings:
Intermediate 1st James Hiller 4000.00
2nd Bill Carder 3598.23
3rd Andrew Beranek 2189.29
Masters 1st Gary McClellan 4000.00
2nd Gordon Anderson 3928.14
3rd Dennis Cone 3915.18
4th Rex Lesher 3816.38
5th Michael Lance 3809.17
6th Bill Bowen 3777.21
FAI 1st Dave Villwock 4000.00
2nd Brett Bowen 3980.38
3rd Lyel Laughery 3425.92
Click here to see scores for all rounds.
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Erin Beranek cooling off in the mister! |
A big "Thanks" to Dennis and his family for all their hard work in running this event and preparing the wonderful BBQ. Thanks also to Bill Bowen who worked hard to make this event a success and to all the pilots for attending and helping out through the weekend. I will close with a very special thanks to Rex for his generosity as well as coming to the Tri-Cities on Thursday and mowing the field with Meri!
See you in the pits…
Click here to see more pictures!