The weather prediction for the day was for cloudless skies and almost no wind, and that was exactly the way it dawned and stayed the whole day!
I was there early, as usual, I prefer assembling my planes and having a quick flight on each before most of the people arrive. It allows me to concentrate on what I am doing, when the other competitors then arrive I have time to chat to them.
Because of the weather prediction for little wind I assembled 2 planes, the new Pike Perfect ET I wanted to test in it's first contest and the trusty Supra as a backup, just in case. Today the Osprey was taking a rest.
A few quick test flights, and practice landings using RC-Timer Pro on my phone showed that all was well.
Supra and Pike ready for action.
Soon the other competitors arrived and we started flying. Round one went well for me, I did not manage a max but nobody else did either, landing last and getting close to the spot gave my my first round win and 1000 points for the day.
I flew round 2 immediately after the first round, this time I managed to find lift and even though it was still early and the lift was not strong it was an easy 10 minutes. My landing was again good for the second round win and 1000 points. Now the pressure was on, if I could keep this up.....
Round 3 was exciting, I could not find lift only sink so finally deciding I must land and at around 4 minutes to at least get a decent landing. Fortunately I found a small bubble on the base leg that I managed to work, winning some altitude and then loosing some again while I was trying to find the core of the thermal. At around 7 minutes the thermal finally broke away so I rode it up for a few circles before heading back to land. Another round win and 1000 points. This time I had to work really hard for the win!
Round 4 was almost a mess for me. At about a minute before launch I did a final control check only to find to my shock that the right flap was vibrating at around the 60% down position, it did not go down any further and refused to go up at the first try, only after a few cycles.
Since there was no time left to change to my backup model I decided to just fly carefully and avoid using the flaps. The result was a rather nervous flight, I found a good thermal but started coming down sooner than normal, loosing height with some aerobatics. The final approach was also not fun, keeping low and not too fast. As I got close to the spot I was still a bit fast but at least low so I managed to plant the nose to prevent a slide on the hard ground. I ended up landing a bit short, 3m from the spot but the landing along with the flight was again good enough for a round win and a 1000 points.
For round 5 I changed to my trusty Supra. I managed to find lift early in the launch so this launch was my lowest of the contest. The lift turned out to be weak and just about overhead and right in the bright sun. It was not moving since there was no wind so just about the entire flight was flown right above me! Not comfortable but since the lift was weak I was low so I could not really go look for other lift. I managed to hang onto the lift, despite my neck's complaints for the full 10 minutes. A decent landing gave me a round win and 1000 points. Getting this round win was rather painful!
Starting the last round I realized I have a good chance to win the contest, maybe a bit over confidant I did not really try to read the air before the launch as I normally do. I soon saw the errors of my ways as I launched into huge sink. The whole, very short flight was a battle to stay higher than the competition in my slot. As it turned out the other guy landed at 4:02 and I landed at 4:04, really terrible times but my 50 points landing over his 5 point landing gave me the round and a final 1000 points.
So I am happy to report, 4 months after starting to fly RC gliders and F5J, I managed to win my first contest with a perfect score of 6000 out of 6000.
We are now two short weeks away from out National championships, I am hoping I can get a bit more practice in before then!
I checked the flap servo on the Pike when I got home, looked like a stripped gear on the Graupner/JR DS 3210 servo but when I opened it up it looks more like a faulty, misshaped gear that must have come like that from the factory. Anyway, the servo was replaced and the plane is functional again.
