State Championships 2015

This year the following control line disciplines were contested at Frankston and Knoxfield.

This page will focus primarily on the Stunt Competitions. Team Racing and Combat results for events run at KMAC are posted further down on the page.

We must begin by by giving thanks to mother nature for turning on the most magnificent weather for the long weekend. There are many people that contribute to creating a successful event. For the weekend we would like to acknowledge Kochies efforts as CD and in getting the grounds into the best shape they have ever been. The club would like to also thank KNOX City Council for the support in weed control and funding for grass seed and landscaping, not to mention the new toilet.

Thanks also to our caterers Les, Sylvia, Vera and Jade the maleficent I mean magnificent for their outstanding effort. We are still receiving praise for your work. Chris and Frank for their first aid skills and our expert dogs bodies Mark, Peter, Gavin and Bernie who can turn their hand and feet to all allotted tasks, without them the show would fall in a heap. Thankyou also to Bruce and Steve for keeping up with the tabulation and posting results quickly for competitors.

Photos for this page have been provided by John Boys, John Lamont, Doug Rochlin and Les Varga. Thanks guys

Without competitors there would be no show and without judges there would be no results, so take a bow. Thank you in particular for those who travelled from interstate in support of the event.

Next year Australia will host the World Control Line Championships in Perth Western Australia. This is the first time the event has been hosted in Australia, consequently interest is keen amongst pilots to represent their country. Being in Australia opens the door for some people who may otherwise not be able to attend. There are only three places available in the Australian F2B team. To secure a place you need to compete in 2 State Championships and the Nationals which this year was held in Brisbane. Places are awarded on the aggregate of scores from the three events with the National event counting for double a State event score. Here is how it stacked up in Victoria.

It is not obvious from the table above but this competition came down to the wire in the last round. Leading into the round there was only 22 points separating the top 3. Murrray drew 5th in the flying order for the round and needed a top score of the day to be in contention. Unfortunately it was not to be with the cloverleaf pulling him down. Mark and PJ were the last two flyers setting up a tense situation. Mark put in the best flight of the day so far by 16 points really dishing it out and putting the wood on PJ. Who is to say what happened on this last flight, the wind certainly picked up and psychologically there was a lot of pressure. For PJ there was no one manoeuvre that scored poorly rather an inability to better his previous rounds impressive score.

Congratulations to Mark who showed consistent improvement throughout the competition, saving the best for last.

There was what has become typically, a small number of entries for Classic which made for a quick competition, being the best of two flights. Defending his winning performance of 2014 was Frank Battam flying his familiar Bearcat. There was no Dougie Grinham to campaign against this year. Instead there were a couple of rivals from his home state against the boys from CLAMF and our own Peter Koch. Well we all know the rivalry between NSW and Victoria has deep roots. However on the Day the main contest turned out to be between the boys from NSW. From the outset Frank proved that last years win was no fluke, posting the top score for the first round. Kochie might have provided some stiff competition if he hadn't been so careless in sticking his thumb in the propeller, just to see if he could shave it down a bit. Needless to say the prop did comply and shortened itself against the best nature of the laminations and the Enya .60 hardly missed a beat. With a long deep gash down to the bone on the back of his thumb the country boy wrapped a hanky around it and marched off to the centre of the circle and took off. With an inch missing of one side of the prop, heaven knows how the engine did not vibrate itself off its mounts. When it came to the vertical eights the engine decided it had just about had enough, it struggled through to the overhead eights where it finally said that's it! The score sheet tells the story. THANKYOU again, Frank and Chris for your first aid skills.

Well this little diversion must have been enough for Tony to refocus, he came out smooth as silk and put himself in the lead with a margin of 5.7. Could Frank who was yet to fly, better his first round performance by 6 or more? It was a tense moment. It should be mentioned at this stage that Adam, also from NSW put in a great flight, improving on his first round score by 71 points but not enough to threaten the top two. How disappointed must Tony have been when the scores went up and what great competitors and sportsmen they proved to be. Frank finally pipping the post by .4 of a point.

All competitors should be congratulated. I would like to acknowledge Graeme Wilson's support in particular.

Vintage has both a flight score and a static score which are combined to produce the final score. Like the Classic Competition this year, Vintage was won from the best of 2 flights. Maris's Wombat is always difficult to top as it ticks all of the boxes in the static score. Against that however it is not the easiest model to fly. David Nobes's Guided Whistle on the other hand performs a very nice pattern (at least in his hands) and is only 19 points behind in the Static department. Looking at the results you can see that Maris did not have the best flight whilst David scored as might be expected in the first round. In fact taking into account the difference in static score David was 66 points in front. Ken was in front of Maris also but only by three points. Unfortunately Dave Lacey had a bad tune and did not get past level flight for the round.

So what could Maris pull out of his hat for the second flight, would Davey get his engine on song, would Nobes's Atwood keep it together and could Ken catch him? Well Maris must have had something else other than ether and castor in his fuel bottle and had a big sniff, whatever it seemed to settle him down and he posted a strong score of 340. David improved on his previous score also but fell short by 7 points for a win. Kens Fox let him down badly and put him out of contention. Davey recovered well but fell 5 points short of taking 3rd from Ken.

It was an enjoyable spectacle

VINTAGE MORAL: "Old engines and small biplanes like a lover need experienced hands and an attentive mind". SV

TEAM RACING and VINTAGE COMBAT