Emerald Aircorp 20th Annual Pattern Contest
Creswell, Oregon
Written by Gordon Anderson, NSRCA District 8 Vice President
The D8 2006 season is history! The 20th Annual Emerald Air Corp Pattern Meet in Creswell, Oregon September 2nd and 3rd marked the close of pattern competition for 2006 in D8. Those of you who are paying close attention may notice that last years contest was also called the 20th annual contest, there seems to be a little confusion as to whether this was the 20th or 21st. I prefer to believe that it’s such a significant accomplishment that we will celebrate for two years!
The EAC group.
This contest was very well attended with 24 pilots including 9 pilots from out of district. This included 4 pilots from Canada and 5 from district 7. This was our best attended contest this season and as a result we ran two flight lines with 3 rounds flown both Saturday and Sunday. The weather was perfect, clear skies all weekend with very little wind; perfect contest weather.
Most of the pilots arrived on Friday and we had lots of practice flying and visiting. Friday evening we were treated to a spaghetti dinner including hour devours and dessert.
Most of the electric gang, Don, Rex, and Craig.
This contest is also the D8 District Championship and the honor was up for grabs in several classes. The way the championship works is, the points acquired in this contest are doubled and add to three additional D8 contests to calculate your total. Masters had a close race between Brett, Gary, and Gordon.
The level of competition at this contest was very high; you can sure see the difference in the quality of flying between the opening contest to the closing event. The pilots have been working hard all season honing their skills.
Gary working on his YS, there are always field repairs to do!
Rob Hoover from the Molalla area joined us again this year and competed in Sportsman. Unfortunately he was the only sportsman so he had no competition. We have a couple of active sportsman pilots in the district but they had conflicts this weekend. I heard a rumor that Rob was looking for a new pattern plane and is planning on attending more events next year. I hope so, Rob is a great pilot and I’m sure he had a good time.
The Intermediate class had 6 pilots! This is the best turnout in Intermediate all season. Mike Miller and Jim Hiller battled it out all weekend for the first place honor. Mike and Jim tied in the 3rd round; this is not something you see very often. In the end Jim took first place honors and won the Intermediate district championship as well.
Todd getting a practice flight while Jenny calls.
Andrew Beranek appears to be a little upset with his performance!
Advanced had one pilot, Dave Kephart. Dave has returned to pattern after several years away from the action. He said he had a great time and we sure hope to see him next season.
Dave Kephart at the awards ceremony.
Masters was our largest class with 9 pilots from 3 NSRCA districts. It was great to see Roy Speights back this year and he did an outstanding job taking second place behind Brett Bowen. Brett was flying his trusty old Hydeout and he did his usual amazing job. Brett had not flown for a couple of months and his first round flight was his practice flight. He kept getting better all weekend and won the contest by a little over 2 points. Unfortunately Ray McClellan lost his Icepoint when the wing failed during the spin in the reverse avalanche.
Roy and Dorothy Speights, EAC regulars.
Brett and Bill Bowen watch Roy as they wait there turn.
The FAI turnout was a surprise with a total of 7 pilots from D7, D8, and Canada West. This is the largest FAI turnout we have seen in D8 for many years. It was great to see Pavel. This is the first contest he has been able to attend this season due to work commitments. Pavel donated an electric tooth brush that his company developed, for the raffle. Thanks for the support Pavel! Craig Blodgett dominated FAI winning 4 rounds. The race between Don Atwood, Dave Reaville, and Derek Koopowitz was close with only 50 points between them, it came down to the last round! Dennis Cone won the D8 FAI district championship, Lyle Laughery where were you?
Sportsman
1st 4000.00 Rob Hoover
Intermediate
1st 4000.00 Jim Hiller
2nd 3961.65 Mike Miller
3rd 3557.15 Todd Cook
4th 3519.66 Bill Carder
5th 3289.85 Andrew Beranek
6th 3259.77 Grant Sharp
Advanced
1st 4000.00 Dave Kephart
Masters
1st 3969.09 Brett Bowen
2nd 3966.77 Roy Speights
3rd 3958.25 Gary McClellan
4th 3908.13 Frank Capone
5th 3876.70 Gordon Anderson
6th 3787.12 Rex Lesher
7th 3625.62 Bill Bowen
8th 3132.88 Hartley Hughson
9th 2582.08 Ray McClellan
FAI
1st 4000.00 Craig Blodgett
2nd 3891.83 Don Atwood
3rd 3862.38 Dave Reaville
4th 3843.39 Derek Koopowitz
5th 3522.68 Mark Byrne
6th 3339.55 Dennis Cone
7th 2519.62 Pavel Satarik
Click here to see scores for all rounds.
The ladies of the EAC did their usual outstanding job of feeding the pilots and taking care of all the details including the traditional raffle. I’m not sure how many items they had to raffle but I would say it had to be close to a hundred. I hear that the effort start almost a year before the contest creating and collecting all of the gifts for the raffle. Thanks for all your efforts!
Transmitter impound and the raffle table.
This contest was a great end to the 2006 season, lots of fun flying and enjoying each others company. We had a great BBQ dinner on Saturday evening that included some foamy flying near dusk. Hope to see you all in Creswell next year!
Saturday nights BBQ.
See you in the pits…
Click here to see more pictures!