F5D World Championships Day 2

The day started out cloudy and gray but by noon it was sunny and muggy hot.  The weather system has moved on and clear skies will prevail for the rest of the contest.  Today we had a 90 degree cross wind out of the north at about 15 km per hour.  It did not present any problem on take off straight towards pylon #1 but landings had to be negotiated as the race pilots seemed to come in from all directions.  No problem, everyone survived.

Today we flew four rounds for a cumulative total of seven rounds so far.  Team and individual scores are totalled with each pilot's worst score being dropped.  The first piece of news is that Gunther Mayr of Austria reclaimed his world record stolen a day ago by Marcel Schalage.  Gunther posted three times under 60 seconds and the new world record [so far] is 59.6 seconds.  Congratulations to Gunther.  His plane is a rocket and Gunther flies well too !!!   He reminds me of a young Chris Callow of F3D (gasser) pylon.

Team Canada flew well today with Roy and I each cutting only once in four rounds.  Delbert had some challenges with achieving 10 lap motor run time but he didn't have to glide too far or long to reach the finish line.  We are flying tight but not taking too many chances.  The name of the game here is consistency and ten laps without pylon cuts.

Team Germany (one of the favorites) took a hit with one of their pilots posting his second 200 score.  This has hurt them for now but this may go away and shuffle the deck once again after we complete nine rounds tomorrow when we will drop the two worst flights for each pilot.

Team Austria is confidently in front and just have to keep doing what they are doing -- fly fast and consistently.

Team USA is chipping away at the field.  Danny Kane is certainly doing his part by posting some 60.0 times.  This has also helped him in the individual standings.  Travis is still fighting to get 10 laps under power.  In one or two races I saw, Travis was forced to take a "Super Cut" after his motor quit shortly after completing his 9th lap.  A Super Cut is a cut of pylon #1 just shortly after passing the start/finish line when the motor quits.  This saves the time of gliding all the way around the course, which is far more than taking the 10% penalty for the cut.

The team standings are jam packed near the top and it's still anyone's game.  Things can change quickly when the second score is dropped after nine rounds.  So far the standings are:

Austria              1124
Canada            1150
Switzerland     1168
USA                  1182

Individually, the Mayr boys from Austria are clearly out front.  Danny Kane crept up to third place today by posting some good times of 60.  Sixty seconds is hard to reach in the Muncie air here.   Hot, humid, and a bit of a crosswind.
I am sitting in fourth place with Delbert and Marcel Schlage only one second behind.

Gunther Mayr     359   Aut
Daniel Mayr      367    Aut
Danny Kane     376    USA
Randy Smith     379    CDN
Delbert Godon     380.1   CDN
Marcel Schlage    380.3    SUI

Complete team and individual scores posted in the attached photos.

Team standings after seven rounds (worst score dropped)

The energy limiter testing continued today.  At least one pilot from each team has had their energy limiter tested to comply with the rules of 1000 watt-minutes.  They are allowing a tolerance of 1.9%.   If you limiter is deemed to allow 1020 watt-minutes you will have a re-test.   If the second test is 1020 watt-minutes or more, you fail the test and score a 200 for your last flight.   Roy and I have each been tested and have passed.  Delbert voluntarily had two of his spare limiters tested and found at least one of them failed.  Delbert has installed a 'legal' limiter into his plane.  The limiter testing has certainly brought times back to reality.  You will notice that there are only two or three pilots under 60 seconds in the world championships while, in the NeuCastle Cup, there were several.  In the NC Cup, limiters were not tested.

Individual pilot standings after seven rounds (worst score dropped)

My backup plane is flying well as expected.  It is essentially identical to my #1 plane.  Here's hoping that it all hangs together for the balance of the competition.  One of the pilots from Team Russia crashed today shortly after turning pylon #1.  A plume of gray smoke was seen rising from the crash site.  Rob Ashley of the UK had his spinner and prop come off during launch which resulted in a nose-in crash into the pavement damaging the motor and fuselage.

For those of you familiar with pylon racing in North America, you will know Peter Bergstrom our contest director for this world championship.   Roy has acquired a Peter Bergstrom doll and has added it to his collection of stand up comedy.  Peter runs a real tight ship here at the contest so Roy adopted the Pirate theme.   See photo.

"Guess Who"

'Not much else to say.   Trying to turn in a bit earlier tonight.  Four more rounds of racing tomorrow.  Stay tuned for tomorrow's results as we drop a second race.



Randy