We flew 12 rounds, with plenty of sub 40s. It was great to get out on Bishop's again, only the second time for me. It surprised me how subtle it is for a big hill, there are some definite lines and styles to use. I was pretty rusty - this is only my second comp since September last year - but by round 4 I was really starting to enjoy it and feel in the groove. In fact I'd go as far as to say by the last few rounds I was flying better than I've done in a few years and certainly with a more competitive edge.
I hope I can keep work at bay for a while and get out more as it completely reminded me what I first saw in F3F.
The Rotmilan was a dream to fly. By lunchtime the fuz tube and joiner were full up and she loved it! She was so well mannered it allowed me to be really aggressive without fear of getting caught out. This is definitely a keeper and I've already sold a few other planes. More on the Rotmilan in a few days.
The results are below and I've taken the liberty of copying Peter Gunning's most excellent match report, I hope he doesn't mind, he's designing bits of my house so his revenge could be long lasting!
Finally, huge thanks to everyone who helped run a fantastically smooth and professional event.
We had 12 rounds on Bishop today in fantastic sunny conditions starting about 10ms and building through the day to around 15ms.
There was a surprising amount of wind when we met at East Lomond and it was clearly more west than forecast so we headed for Bishop and were up and running by about 11.20am. The benefit of only 16 pilots is that you can crack through the rounds and that we did.
Dave Watson (who had a very eventful) won round 1 in some decent air with a 40.53 and got the round of applause that he didn’t get at Horcum last time out. Round 2 was taken by Paul Upton with a 39.77 who along with Kevin was using the compression on the edge to good effect.
Round 3 saw Dave Watson have to scratch as he had knocked the pushrod connection off the tail of his Needle and Mick Walsh spectacularly hit the slope, did a flat spin and carried on flying but did not finish as he thought it was a zero. In the end we concluded that it wouldn’t have been if he had carried on as nothing fell off the model. I think Tom may have this on vid so am looking forward to seeing it! The round was won by Mark Redsell with a 40.98.
Ewan Maxwell took round 4 with a 38.31 (maybe a PB?) and Mark Redsell took round 5 with a 38.71 and round 6 with a 40.16, after this the thermal influence started to really assert itself and the times got quicker. Round 7 was won by Paul Upton with a blistering 35.77 flown with his RaceMx in very effective full reversal style. Round 8 was won by Kevin Newton with a 37.49 who had now fully re-gained his mojo and was ripping it up with his Rotmilan. This marked the start of Kevin’s string of sub-40’s which took him ever so close to the win.
Round 9 saw Dave Watson flick his Cyril twice and hit the hill about 50m down, amazingly his model was totally intact, he is a very lucky boy despite falling on his face walking to land after the next round! The round was won by Tom Foreman with a 37.74 who was getting some better air and flying it well with a very heavy stinger flying reversals. Mark Redsell took round 10 with a 37.10 closely followed by Mark Treble with a 37.21.
Round 11 saw Kevin Newton take fastest time so far with a blistering 35.29 followed by Peter Gunning with a 37.68. Having announced a (firm) last round in progress at 4.30pm, we just squeaked into round 12 which saw Tom Foreman and his heavy stinger take FTD with a 35.20 and David Reid come in second with a 36.07 with his Crossover.
So all in all a great weekend of flying in Scotland. We were very lucky to get up Bishop again with T in the park in full view below us and full size gliders galore sharing the slope.
