The ESL's 2010 Unlimited Competition Season got under way on 5/21, 5/22, and 5/23 (Fri/Sat/Sun) in Waynesboro VA. While this contest was coordinated by the Hampton Roads Silent Flyers and the Blue Ridge Area Soaring Society, everyone contributed to the event in true ESL fashion.
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View of the Blue Ridge Mountains looking South East
We had a great group of flyers and helpers who contributed to the contest to make it a success and a very enjoyable time for all and open-up the ESL’s 2010 Unlimited Competition season. While mother nature threw us some challenging weather to deal with, we were able to get 5 rounds of MOM on Saturday before the rain hit and 6 more on Sunday. The first three rounds of each day were 8 minute tasks so that we could have a better chance to “get official”, the remaining rounds were 10 minute tasks. We used a hybrid landing task that combined a 100-pt 1pt/inch tape with a 25 point 45 ft in/out circle. If you landed within the 45 ft in/out area, you got 25 pts, unless you were within the 100” tape. While this provided the possibility for more points than 25, it also created the so called “disk of denial” where you could get a landing score below 25 points if you were between 75” and 100” of the center point and we had a lot of “fun” with that ;-).
First things first. As has become a tradition of the first ESL contest of the season, the highest-ranking ESL Official on-hand gets to throw-out the ceremonial first sailplane. Here Steve Lucke (ESL Quartermaster extraordinaire) gives his Agea a big toss to mark the start of the season!
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Second, as mentioned before, we had a lot of help getting this contest together. One person to really help make this possible is the site owner Frankie Coyner. Here Frankie is shown with his three impressive dogs riding on his golf cart. Evidently, the dogs love to go for rides. Not only does Franky let BRASS fly on his field, but he also loaned us his golf cart to shag-chutes. This was fantastic!
The scores for Sat/Sun/Overall Exp/Sportsflyer are below.
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Saturday: Most pilots chose to fly their Supra and we had a pretty good 1 design contest going. There were many Supra Pro-Comps on hand and a few Supra Pros. There was at least one Agea on hand as well, so Dr Drela's handy-work was well represented. New to our area (and straight from Switzerland) Reto Fiolka was on hand and flew his F3B Cross Fire. Reto demonstrated some great flying and did well, even though he was spotting us many ounces of wing-loading. A few flight-groups had trouble making the max due to the cloudy conditions. Thermals were around, but more often than not, very light with lots of piloting-stuff needed to make the max time. We flew 5 rounds, then took a short lunch break. During that time, the rain moved-in and we took cover for a while. Several hours later we tried to sneak-in another round, but mom nature rained some more on us. Reto and Luis flew very well in Expert Class, but just couldn't catch me. In sportsflyer, Duane Beck was turning-in some great scores for most of the day, except for a little tree incident (wooops), see image below. Unfortunately, the tree landing was a zero flight score, but he still came in second! New flyer (to the ESL) Anthony Procino shared Steve Lucke's Agea, due to an unfortunate incident with his Mantis Friday evening. Anthony won sportsflyer class by a large margine. Duane was all smiles later as the aircraft was rescued without a scratch! The ESL pole was on hand and Tony Guide nudged-it out of the tree. I was able to get a hand on it just before impact and all was well.
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Reto with his Cross Fire. Anyone for F3B?
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Duane's plane in a tree
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Duane after a successful tree recovery
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Expert heat ready to go on Sunday!
Sunday started very foggy, but it pretty much burned off by 9:30am. We flew a lot of rounds amidst the threat of rain. The Nexrad showed a lot of storms in the area, but they were scattered and missing us. The lift was good at times, however, some pilots did not make their time. Several great battles broke out very far from the field and we had really good MOM rounds. After round 6, it looked like we were done-for with many storms surrounding the field. We decided to call the contest at 1pm and let all pack-up before the rain hit. By the time we had the pilots' meeting, the sun was out and there were blue-skies (so much for having real-time Nexrad). Ending a little early did give everyone a jump on the trip home.
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The threat of rain kept Chris and Rob Turner at home on Saturday, but they both showed-up on Sunday. Chris Turner flew well and won Sportsflyer.
Anthony Procino was second in Sportsflyer on Sunday but won Sportsflyer on Saturday and won overall for the weekend. He got one of the US F3J shirts given out. I won Expert overall for the weekend, but gave my shirt to 2nd Overall Expert (Luis Bustamante).
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Anthony gets his US F3J Team Shirt for 1st Overall Sportsflyer.
Winning the "Best Competitor Award" was none other than Steve Lucke. Steve's contributions to the contest were amazing, even by Steve's standards. Steve transported the winch batteries, battery chargers, chutes, and power cable and helped setup the field Friday evening. However, the winning act was moving the winches Sat evening in a heavy rain. However, in a great act of sportsmanship, Steve gave his shirt to Tom Broeski. Tom also did an amazing amount of work for the contest, which included getting all the nice awards together and coordinating the field and equipment. In addition to that, while we were moving the winches on Saturday, Tom cut down some heavy grass with the lawnmower (also in a heavy rain, but without a rain coat!) to give us a much-needed 20 extra yards of launch space. Most outstanding!
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Here Tom takes a moment to enjoy the day.
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Also in the running for "Best Competitor Award" was Pete Schlitzkus who brought all the winches down and then took them with him to the next event. Pete also re-worked the turn-arounds over the winter and they are in great shape. Here is Pete with James Gifferth (Pete on the right). Pete also provided several key inputs regarding running the contest and right all weekend. His special wild-hair hat evidently provided super-brain powers as well as being attractive ;-).
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Luis and Joanne Bustamante came down for the contest and helped out a lot. They brought down a really nice sound system to use in the contest. Luis flew very well and came in 3rd on Saturday and 2nd Sunday as well as 2nd overall. Here he is assisted by his favorite timer, Joanne. Evidently there is some Kareoke options with the sound system as well according to Joanne. Joanne also helped a lot in the scoring tent and Luis helped with the scoring program.
Lots of folks contributed to helping to make this event a success. New soaring pilots and HRSF members, Rob and Angela Johns, came up to help run the contest. Angela Johns is shown here working in the scoring tent. Angela has a Radian now and is making great progress learning to fly. Rob helped out a lot by timing. For smaller events, such as ours, having folks able to time really helps keep things moving.
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Dawn and Neal Huffman came down from the DC area for both days. Dawn helped out a lot in the scoring tent when she was not timing for Neal. This is the second year in a row that Dawn has helped us a lot.
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Chris Turner and his Dad made it out for Sunday and it was good seeing them both. Chris helped out a lot during the mid-rounds when the golf cart went down for an hour. Chris is training for a marathon and shagging chutes was a good way to do it :-).
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Here the golf cart is getting some attention to get it going again. It definitely took a group effort.
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Josh Jr and Luke came up on Sunday and kept the golf cart going. Here is Josh Jr ready to ride. Josh Jr also put on a demo Sunday morning with his Horizon Hobbies micro P-51 with lights when we were fogged-in.
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Trish Glaab came out Sunday and was the Official Photographer. Trish also timed many flights and even shagged-chutes when the golf cart was down.
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One of Trish's great shots was this one. Here Tony Guide "lets it loose" launching his Supra Pro Comp. Very nice! Tony did a great job re-working the winches over the winter and they were in great shape! Many thanks Tony!
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Luis helps measure Tony's landing.
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Another good shot from Trish is this one of Josh Jr flying with some help from Dad.
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Josh Jr flew a WACO Merlin shown here on approach to landing.
We are definitely planning on doing this again next year. Please plan to attend.
Thanks, Josh.
Saturday Expert Scores
Combined Standings as of Round # 5
Sorted by Normalized Scores
Raw Norm
Place Contestant Class Score Off-Max Score Percent Percent
----- -------------------- ----- ----- ------- -------- ------- -------
1 JOSH GLAAB E 3045 95 4959.444 100.00
2 RETO FIOLKA E 2966 174 4945.069 99.710
3 LUIS BUSTAMANTE E 2782 358 4706.033 94.890
4 STEVE LUCKE E 2581 559 4387.106 88.460
5 NEAL HUFFMAN E 2489 651 4203.056 84.749
6 TONY GUIDE E 2296 844 4158.045 83.841
7 TOM BROESKI E 2307 833 4142.651 83.531
8 KERRY COCHRELL E 2354 786 4124.113 83.157
9 PETE SCHLITZKUS E 2348 792 4103.167 82.734
10 JAMES GIFFERTH E 2238 902 3828.164 77.189
Saturday Sportsflyer
Combined Standings as of Round # 5
Sorted by Normalized Scores
Raw Norm
Place Contestant Class Score Off-Max Score Percent Percent
----- -------------------- ----- ----- ------- -------- ------- -------
1 ANTHONY PROCINO S 1922 1218 4850.591 100.00
2 DUANE BECK S 1383 1757 3379.714 69.676
3 CHUCK PINNELL S 1068 2072 2892.925 59.641
4 KEITH EBELTOFT S 1189 1951 2752.873 56.753
#8195;
Sunday
Expert
Combined Standings as of Round # 6
Sorted by Normalized Scores
Raw Norm
Place Contestant Class Score Off-Max Score Percent Percent
----- -------------------- ----- ----- ------- -------- ------- -------
1 JOSH GLAAB E 3749 91 5960.966 100.00
2 LUIS BUSTAMANTE E 3613 227 5893.245 98.864
3 STEVE LUCKE E 3659 181 5892.252 98.847
4 KERRY COCHRELL E 3521 319 5745.366 96.383
5 TOM BROESKI E 3599 241 5743.564 96.353
6 NEAL HUFFMAN E 3581 259 5673.092 95.171
7 PETE SCHLITZKUS E 3528 312 5662.288 94.989
8 JAMES GIFFERTH E 3502 338 5639.948 94.615
9 TONY GUIDE E 3083 757 4950.606 83.050
Sunday Sportsflyer
Combined Standings as of Round # 6
Sorted by Normalized Scores
Raw Norm
Place Contestant Class Score Off-Max Score Percent Percent
----- -------------------- ----- ----- ------- -------- ------- -------
1 CHRIS TURNER S 2849 991 5826.625 100.00
2 ANTHONY PROCINO S 2626 1214 5502.901 94.444
3 DAVID ASHINSKY S 2478 1362 5379.659 92.329
4 KEITH EBELTOFT S 1795 2045 4319.931 74.141
5 ROBERT TURNER S 1929 1211 3917.261 67.230
6 REGIS WHITE S 1493 2347 3855.735 66.174
7 JOSH GLAAB JR S 1715 2125 3577.613 61.401
8 CHUCK PINNELL S 1537 2303 3357.310 57.620
9 LUKE GLAAB S 0 3840 0.000 0.000
Weekend
Overall Expert
Combined Standings as of Round # 6
Sorted by Normalized Scores
Raw Norm
Place Contestant Class Score Off-Max Score Percent Percent
----- -------------------- ----- ----- ------- -------- ------- -------
1 JOSH GLAAB E 6794 186 10920.41 100.00
2 LUIS BUSTAMANTE E 6395 585 10599.28 97.059
3 STEVE LUCKE E 6240 740 10279.36 94.130
4 TOM BROESKI E 5906 1074 9886.215 90.530
5 NEAL HUFFMAN E 6070 910 9876.148 90.438
6 KERRY COCHRELL E 5875 1105 9869.479 90.376
7 PETE SCHLITZKUS E 5876 1104 9765.455 89.424
8 JAMES GIFFERTH E 5740 1940 9468.112 86.701
9 TONY GUIDE E 5379 1601 9108.651 83.409
10 RETO FIOLKA E 2966 174 4945.069 45.283
#8195;
Overall Sportsflyer
Weekend
Combined Standings as of Round # 6
Sorted by Normalized Scores
Raw Norm
Place Contestant Class Score Off-Max Score Percent Percent
----- -------------------- ----- ----- ------- -------- ------- -------
1 ANTHONY PROCINO S 4548 2432 10353.49 100.00
2 KEITH EBELTOFT S 2984 3996 7072.804 68.313
3 CHUCK PINNELL S 2605 4375 6250.235 60.368
4 CHRIS TURNER S 2849 991 5826.625 56.277
5 DAVID ASHINSKY S 2478 1362 5379.659 51.960
6 ROBERT TURNER S 1929 1211 3917.261 37.835
7 REGIS WHITE S 1493 2347 3855.735 37.241
8 JOSH GLAAB JR S 1715 2125 3577.613 34.555
9 DUANE BECK S 1383 1757 3379.714 32.643
10 LUKE GLAAB S 0 3840 0.000 0.000
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HRSF/BRASS/ESL 2010 Unlimited Season Opener
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Posted - 05/27/2010 : 9:55:53 PM
