Tuesday 20 September 2011

Welsh Open results and photos


What an interesting three days!  It was rather weird for me driving 400+ miles to my old home competition. I arrived around four on Thursday and had a lovely hour or so drifting back and forth with the Precision in light air.  She continued to impress, more than enough for me to fly her in the event as my number one plane.

Friday dawned with low cloud on the back of the Wrecker.  There was almost too much lift for sport flying as it catapulted those that tried swiftly into the low cloud.  There were several hurried landings but only one fatality.

Using various different websites, most accessed from Simon's hardy iPad, we gambled that when the rain came in it would bring a shift of direction to SW and put us on Mickey's slope. Right on cue the rain arrived and we boldly took the waiting course down and got all the pilots back in their cars for the three minute drive to Mickey's Slope.  It turned out to be a great decision and within minutes the rain had cleared and the wind was bang on SW.

Bjorn certainly thought is was an inspired decision as he posted a 31.59 to win the round. Mike Evans took second with 33.05 and Gerardo was third with 33.72.  In fact the top 19 pilots all posted times below 40 seconds, which I don't think I've ever seen before.

We got two thirds through round two and then the rain came back.  As previously agreed we took the decision to group score and as the natural split was virtually two thirds to one third and the forecast was dire we decided to go with that rather than go 50/50 and force pilots to re-fly.  Dag won the first group with 34.92 and Martin Newnham won group two back on Mickey's the following morning with 37.56.

Alvaro took round three with 33.90. Jose took second with 34.64 and Carles took third with 34.73.  

Joel took round 4 with 36.19, Dag was second with 36.24 and Adam was third with 36.79.

We'd braved a lot of showers to get that far but part way through round 5 the shower turned into something far more significant and we had to abandon the hill.  Again the natural split was two thirds to one third so we went with that again to ensure consistency.  The winner of group one was Stefan with 39.45.

The next morning we respected the weather forecasts and sat out the rain in the car park by the T junction until getting on for 2 o'clock.  Simon's trusty iPad predicted we might get a brief window that could allow us to finish round 5 and possibly get another round in.  So we marched everyone across to the Ice Cream slope despite the huge showers on the horizon and most people thinking we were bananas.  Sure sure though we only had one small shower and we managed to finish round five and get in a sixth round as well!

The winner of the second group in round 5 was Mike Evans with 41.41.

Round 6 went to Richard Bago with 39.61, second was Bjorn with 40.16 and third was Joel with 40.57.

That final round was to prove crucial for Joel who slipped ahead of Alvaro to win.  I think all agree that Joel was a worthy winner as he used every ounce of air and didn't give away an inch yet made no mistakes. In fact if you look at the top 10 you can see that the spread of points was minuscule and certainly the closest race I can remember. Seventh to fourth covered by only six point is just bizarre!

Huge thanks to T9 who arranged great sponsorship with MKS that gave the the winners hats, T shirts and 6 top spec servos.

More on models and stuff tonight.

See photos on iPad/iPhone



place pilot Team Country total
1 Joel West Mickey's Massive England 4682.89
2 Alvaro Silgado Watering Cans Spain 4669.25
3 Dag Skoglund Bubble Norway 4655.71
4 Bjorn Tore Hagen Bubble Norway 4606.49
5 Simon Thornton Team GBU England 4602.19
6 Gerardo Plaza Watering Cans Spain 4602.18
7 Kevin Newton Team GBU England 4600.01
8 Mark Redsell Dragon Slayer England 4561.87
9 Greg Dakin Tea Swillers England 4543.82
10 Mike Evans Dragon Slayer England 4525.66
11 Espen Torp Bubble Norway 4521.02
12 Richard Bago Team Web England 4520.33
13 John Phillips Tea Swillers England 4519.49
14 Adam Richardson Dragon Slayer England 4477.78
15 Stephan Bertschi Mickey's Massive Switzerland 4470.60
16 Martin Newnham Team GBU England 4437.91
17 Angel Lopez Forever Aldayso Spain 4427.26
18 Jose Luis Alvarez Birds Spain 4405.61
19 Iñigo Herrera Millan Mic Spain 4382.71
20 William Jul Ringkjob Norway 2 Norway 4368.21
21 Jorgen Wake Stensen Norway 2 Norway 4343.79
22 Carles Aymat Mic Spain 4342.82
23 Peter Gunning Mickey's Massive Scotland 4339.06
24 Kjell Sture Johansen Norway 2 Norway 4321.17
25 Iñaki Elizondo Watering Cans Spain 4298.46
26 Fernando Moro Forever Aldayso Spain 4264.05
27 Keith Wood Team Web England 4258.32
28 Mark Abbotts Exiles England 4220.01
29 C M Cheng
Hong Kong 4215.28
30 John Bennett Foggy Bottoms England 4208.04
31 Frank Hulton Exiles England 4171.48
32 Jesus Herrera Forever Aldayso Spain 4150.47
33 Jon Edison Team Web England 4146.14
34 Mike McCracken Team Sofa Can Fast Scotland 4101.63
35 Scott Ravenscroft Barbarians England 4033.59
36 Miguel Gutierrez Lecue Birds Spain 4017.45
37 Marcelino Punal Mic Spain 4008.80
38 Iain Medley-Rose Foggy Bottoms England 3999.12
39 George Young Team Sofa Can Fast Scotland 3985.60
40 Ian Mason Exiles England 3949.18
41 Dave Rumble Team Wreckers England 3931.96
42 Alfredo Arjona Garcia Birds Spain 3893.60
43 Mike Shellim Foggy Bottoms England 3852.82
44 Jason Bioletti Team Wreckers England 3843.91
45 Mick Walsh Team Sofa Can Fast Wales 3822.16
46 Andrzej Tabero Tea Swillers Wales 3722.81
47 Wing Wong
Hong Kong 3711.57
48 John Trebble Dream Team England 3696.54
49 Vic Eldridge Dream Team England 3431.30
50 Tony Robertson Dream Team England 2830.72

place team sum
1 Bubble 13783.22
2 Team GBU 13640.11
3 Watering Cans 13569.89
4 Dragon Slayer 13565.31
5 Mickey's Massive 13492.55
6 Norway 2 13033.18
7 Team Web 12924.79
8 Forever Aldayso 12841.78
9 Tea Swillers 12786.11
10 Mic 12734.32
11 Exiles 12340.67
12 Birds 12316.66
13 Foggy Bottoms 12059.98
14 Team Sofa Can Fast 11909.39
15 Dream Team 9958.56
16 Team Wreckers 7775.87
17 Barbarians 4033.59

Sunday 18 September 2011

Welsh Open update


Two days gone and we have three rounds completed and two thirds of round four done.  To achieve that with all the rain we've had has been quite a challenge.

We're in the car park of the Ice Cream Slope at the moment waiting for the rain to clear. When it does we'll finish the last third of round four and sprint through as many others as is possible.
It's been an interesting couple of days so far.  The standard of piloting is really good so when the good air comes along there's always someone on the sticks that can use it.
Fastest time so far is a 31.xx, with lots and lots of 35 to 39 second times.  The conditions have been variable but not ultra variable, except for a bizarre patch of around 10 pilots where the wind dropped to 3ms from 14ms, with the resultant impact on times. Myself and Joel were caught up in that, which effectively uses our discard.  Poor Dag is also without a discard after a launching incident, so it's very tight at the top with no room for error!


1
Dag Skoglund
2886.73
2
Joel West
2839.54
3
Gerardo Plaza
2798.65
4
Kevin Newton
2791.82
5
Alvaro Silgado
2788.66
6
Jose Luis Alvarez
2757.46
7
Simon Thornton
2722.90
8
Mike Evans
2721.56
9
Adam Richardson
2714.38
10
Espen Torp
2712.17
11
Greg Dakin
2710.99
12
Bjorn Tore Hagen
2709.48
13
William Jul Ringkjob
2707.47
14
Martin Newnham
2706.09
15
Mark Redsell
2698.44
16
John Phillips
2696.17
17
Keith Wood
2690.80
18
Iñigo Herrera Millan
2677.46
19
Richard Bago
2667.91
20
Iñaki Elizondo
2663.22
21
Stephan Bertschi
2633.53
22
Peter Gunning
2562.79
23
Jorgen Wake Stensen
2558.46
24
John Bennett
2542.16
25
Angel Lopez
2537.10
26
Carles Aymat
2522.94
27
Alfredo Arjona Garcia
2518.02
28
C M Cheng
2500.80
29
Kjell Sture Johansen
2498.43
30
Jon Edison
2497.74
31
Frank Hulton
2494.61
32
Fernando Moro
2477.79
33
Mark Abbotts
2453.47
34
Jesus Herrera
2447.81
35
Ian Mason
2445.59
36
Jason Bioletti
2437.85
37
Mike McCracken
2409.91
38
Marcelino Punal
2406.24
39
Dave Rumble
2404.58
40
George Young
2403.38
41
Miguel Gutierrez Lecue
2401.53
42
Mick Walsh
2365.72
43
Scott Ravenscroft
2332.04
44
Mike Shellim
2320.09
45
Iain Medley-Rose
2306.25
46
Andrzej Tabero
2279.40
47
Wing Wong
2263.71
48
John Trebble
2225.86
49
Vic Eldridge
2212.62
50
Tony Robertson
2172.19