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- Category: Archive 2011
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- SCAT Annual on track
- ICE MAN
- WESTFAC
- More on the new US Team Selection plan
SCAT Annual Update - on track
Some people has expressed concern that this weekend's SCAT annual might be postponed because of possible bad weather. The Thurs-Fri are forecast as showers and with only 10% chance on Sat morning thru Sunday, low winds-- should be a good weekend. So there are no plans to change the schedule.
Past experience says the new road is passable within 24 hrs of heavy rain. This past Fab Feb the road remained passable during the rain / heavy showers.
While last weekend there was quite heavy rain in the Los Angeles and other coastal areas and snow in some mountains, the rain fall in the San Joaquin valley was much less and a report from the field indicates that it is OK.
Iceman 2011
This year Mikhail Kosonozhkin was the IceMan in F1A. This could be considered his second victory, as in the first year of the series, 2008, you had to register separately. Mikhail collected then the biggest score of World Cup points in the three winter contests, but had not registered to to IceMan. Since then, there has been no separate registration, but all contestants in the three frozen-lake competitions have been counted in. Mikhail took two wins on this years tour, quite an achievement! Per Findahl, the winner of the Matfors contest, was the follower-up.
In F1B, you had to score well in all contests to make a placing in the IceMan. Tony Luman of Estonia made rock-solid flights in all the flyoffs, took two second places and one fourth, to claim the title. Walt Ghio from the US won the Finnish contest and was second in Sweden, but had bad luck in Norway and placed second, followed by Yrjö Waltonen who took the title in Sweden. Alex Andriukov flew only in Norway and won there, but one victory was good enough only to sixth place!
F1C is somewhat lacking participants, I guess flying power models is not that fun in the wintertime. Juri Roots of Estonia flew in all three contests to take a clear victory over Drozdov of Russia and Kuukka of Finland.
This year the IceMan was organized so that the Norway contest started, followed by the Swedish contest in the middle of the week, and ended in Finland one week after the start. Quite a tight schedule, which is intended to make it possible to fly all three contests on one trip, as many people did. It can be quite easily managed if you travel by car, but if you choose to fly, then the traveling is a little more complicated. The Norwegian and Finnish sites are within 2 to 2 1/2 hours drive from an international airport (Oslo and Helsinki), but Matfors is four hours away from Stockholm. There is an airport also in Sundsvall, but this is served mostly by domestic flights (from Stockholm). This year there were some rumors that the Swedish contest would be held closer to Stockholm, I guess it is not that straightforward to move an established contest to another location. Anyway the plan is to run the IceMan also next year with a "three contests in a week"-format.
-Tapio-
For more information go to the MatforsVT web page; the precise page is http://www.matforsmfk.se/matforsvt/entry_form/main_iceman_results_view_2011.asp , but if you type into your browser "MatforsVT" to come to the home page of Matfors VinterTävling, and on the left bottom corner there is a link to IceMan Results, and following that you reach another page where the results from all years can be opened.
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WESTFAC III..PRE-REGISTRATION IS UNDERWAY
WESTFAC III will be held on June 22nd through the 25th in Denver Colorado on the famous 27,000 acres of fabulous Free Flight field managed by the MMM . Our Contest Director is Chuck Etherington and we will provide 23 FLYING ACES Events during the three days of flying after scale judging on the 22nd of June.Our website has your Pre- Registration form on the Events page and you can download it with ease. The Hq. Hotel is listed on the form with a telephone number for reservations. Just mention WESTFAC for the nice discount on rates. There is overnite parking on the field at a small cost.
For those of you who have not flown or built FLYING ACES type aircraft, check out the Event list...there are plenty of Events for you to compete in and have a great time. Visit our website at www.westernfac.com Many Maxes to All Roger Willis
Further Discussion on the latest TSC proposal
First off, when I said that the TSC failed to Highlight the changes, I did not mean in any way to imply that it was intentional to hide the changes. But, the TSC did fail to check the proposal after it was printed and before it was mailed out. A simple phone call to Colleen would caught the fact that that AMA did not correctly print your document.
Now...... I have read Chuck's reply, one from Aram, one from Jim Bradley, and Mike McKeever's. I understand what and why the TSC attempted to do what they did, i.e., shoe horn 2 contests and two sets of flyoffs into the same time frame as the single contest previous finals.
I have had Chuck, Aram, and Mike say essentially, don't worry..... if there are retrieval problems the CD and/or the jury will delay the start of the next round. I will tell you right now that I do not believe that will happen, and here is why!!
Everywhere in the team program it states that the CD will run the finals exactly as the laid out in the program. The Jury is told the same. What is the CD to do, not start a round until all fliers on on their pole ready to fly, does he take role, seek out the fact that the flyer(s) has/have not returned from retrieving his/there model(s). The program does not tell the CD to check that all fliers are present on the flight line, The program states when the contest can be delayed, and there is nothing there regarding delaying because of retrieval problems.
NO, if one or two fliers are missing the CD will start the round without the delay. If a flyer has just returned with his model and is in the process of moving his equipment to his next assigned pole, which could be at the other end of the flight line, the CD will start the round on schedule.
Now maybe if 10 or 12 flyers are late returning from retrieving the CD may think about delaying the start of the round............ but I contend, and correctly contend, the CD will be hesitant to delay any round start times, as any delay impacts the other event that is flying that same day, and impacts the flyoff schedule throughout the remainder of that day!!! The CD will not do that!!
If the CD WOULD delay the start of the round, does he do it only when 10 or 12 return late from retrieving and not for the one or two? Are not the one or two fliers that are late returning from a retrieval just as important as the 10 or 12 who returned late????
I am saying again that the time frames laid out in the proposed program just are not realistic! Let me include here a statement from another email I received regarding the proposed program. I am not the only one who has studied your proposal and have seen it's glaring problems.
"Another problem of course is trying to hold the previous day's 10 minute round flyoff, the next day BEFORE that day's events get started! This definitely will not work. Depending upon each class, EITHER the flyoff will include those who are later expected to be timing the real day's events (and who may or may not get back in time to discharge their duties), OR they will be in a 10 minute flyoff and then have to get ready at the assigned pole position (which likely will be different than they just flew-off from) to start their own second-day, 7 rounds, plus more evening flyoffs, contest. Again, I cannot imagine this could possibly work without seriously disadvantaging the competitors involved, ie, the top candidates for a Team Place."
It appears that the TSC did not take into consideration the following real life facts:
The weather..... it will dramatically impact retrieval time, it alone dictates the direction the models drift, and how far they drift and there are some directions at Lost Hills that do not allow quick retrieval.. Aram said that Lost Hills is the easiest retrieving field in the Country........... okay, but there are still difficulties involved. Saying it is not as bad as retrieving west over the canal and into the swamp at Palm Bay does not resolve anything.
Moving equipment on the flight line........ With 30 entries in an event, the flight line is 300 meters long. It takes time to move your equipment and models that far if you are at one end of the line and then have to move everything to the far end. This could take 10 to 15 minutes, and then you have to prepare your model for the start of the next round. All of this time is part of the 35 minute retrieval period. The TSC (through the programs schedule) owes the flyer sufficient time to fly in the round, regardless of when in the round he flies, time to retrieve his model, and time to move his equipment and models to the next pole, and time to prepare his model for the next round, prior to the start of the round, so he can compete equally with the other fliers in his event.
If the TSC do not allow the fliers sufficient time, (and they have not) then the TSC has not provided a program that will pick the best team possible to represent the USA at the World Championships. The TSC is tasked to do just that by AMA in their blue book!!!
SAFETY......... Everything done at the finals must be accomlished safely, I'm sure you agree with that statement. If the program forces the flyers to rush everything, his flying, his retrieving, moving his equipment........... bad things can happen, especially in the retrieving...... in the pits, in the big crop fields, (know this, the flyers are going to take their bike into the fields if there are time constraints), the farmers are not going to like this, the Academy of Model Aeronautics is not going to want to hear of a safety problem or injury, that could have been avoided by giving the fliers the sufficient time they require. Do you understand what I just said?????
I am going to step out here and question just who on the committee came up with these time frames and schedule. The only one on the committee who has any experience in 1) running a finals, and/or 2) running a large contest (the MaxMen World Cup Contest) with large flyoffs is George Batiuk. How much was George involved? Yes, there are a few others who have run smaller contests but a event entry of 10 with few flyoffs does not give the experience required to determine our finals flying schedule. And I say this with a smile but I am serious when I say disregard input from a F1A flyer who thinks moving his equipment is riding to the next pole with his tow reel.
Mike McKeever said the NO vote I called for would mean that we would be stuck with last years team selection program. I say that is absolutely not true. A NO vote would tell the TSC to correct this proposed program with realistic time frames and to send it out again for approval which it would probably get. That could be accomplished in a very short time frame!
However the one thing I cannot understand is why the proposed program was so late in being presented to the program entrants for consideration. The normal schedule is for the proposed program to be presented to the entrants by the middle of January, 6 weeks after the in-person meeting. The program was not mailed out from HQ AMA until March 11th. Why not, if the program was considered so difficult to put together, (it is not, I put 2 of them together by myself when I was chairman of the TSC) then I see that we do not have the experience and expertise required on the TSC, or those who want to be involved, to accomplish what AMA tasks them to do.
And just yesterday I received my 2013 Team Selection Program entry form for a program that is suppose to begin 1 April. What program.
Respectfully,
Roger Simpson
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Roger Morrell