Bill Vos Memorial Handicap March 2005 -- Dave Greer

BVMT 2005
HANDICAP
March 3000 4000
Pilot Norm net tway Total
1 Alan Sneedon 1000 3000 1000 4000 Eish
2 Dave Greer 1000 3000 986 3986 Esprit
3 Scott Munn 1000 2999 809 3808 2M
4 Russ Conradt 999 2998 623 3622 Sangoma
5 Simon Nelson 999 2998 528 3526 Eish
6 Warren Butler 984 2951 926 3877 Cobra
7 Brian Fanning 972 2915 606 3521 Sagitta
8 Dennis Bird 969 2906 748 3654 Eliminator
9 Fred Wittstock 937 2810 643 3453 OD 2M
10 Ryan Nelson 910 2729 678 3407 Eish
11 Brad Conlon 830 2490 615 3105 Ellipse 3
12 Paul Boswarva 798 2393 0 2393 Eish
13 Paul Munn 778 2334 318 2653 Riser 2M
14 Sheldon McGlone 697 2092 480 2572 2M OD
15 Norman Smith 536 1608 0 1608 2M OD
16 Don Slatter 364 1091 0 1091 Star

Whew, an extremely hot and thermic day made for helluva bunch of maxes but there were occasions where slots had down and dirty air and this is what made reading the round scores so absorbing for me. A young lad was able use his handicap to good effect and many of us never saw Scott Munn and his two metre gas bag on the podium trail, well done Scott!

Of course we could have made it easier on ourselves and listened to uncle Dennis's good advice not to go four rounds in the oppressive heat. Actually, having a group of four approach me about teaming together, skewed my thinking to four slots instead of a quicker three slot approach, which would have speeded things up. I also took some stick for team members yet again packing up and pottering away part way through event, thus hampering the remaining folk. I honestly don't have any answer for this, it is nigh impossible to rationalise with someone who has just bent their pride and joy......

Maxes were the order of day and an indication of the closeness of the contest was in Warren having four almost perfect maxes but missing two spots, thus one too many and relegated down to sixth. Alan Sneedon was perfection, his throw away being a max, but more interesting is the excellent performance he is coaxing out of gasbag team members Scott Munn and Brian Fanning. Actually, seeing how well Russ Conradt worked with Sheldon McGlone and Brand Conlon suggests that semi permanent teams comprising one or two experts with the novice guys may make for more consistent improvement.

The day started with a huge fright when John Coulson's OD ship did a nasty swan dive to left at the contest commencement. I was standing directly behind and it is sobering that, despite some decades of experience, I (and all) froze instead of screaming "down" when the craft was in a stalled position from the word go. I must confess I saw no flappy bits moving at all......

This was probably the biggest Summerveld club gathering ever with a welcome visit from Sean Oellermann and Chris Helmbold plus better halves, along with Sean's Dad, Neil, an active F3B'er in the 70's. Neil also sent up his trusty Legionnaire on a bungee to revel in the conditions. Die hard slopers Mike Warren and Cameron were also very interested onlookers. Adrian Baker popped in but work is all consuming at the moment.

We had been teasing Paul Boswarva the day before and he had been considering a mode swap from two to one. I suggested that starting with a foamie might be a gentle introduction but Paul leaped in with a mode swap on the Eish! Did damn well too until the circuits fried on the maxed third flight landing. Norm Smith proved again that balsa spars don't work and his useful OD 2 metre smote the earth off the line, otherwise there were no other real dramas.
The gasbag kings, Fred and Dennis, did pretty well and spoilt the 1000's for a couple of folk like Simon and Russ, but this was a day for zero slips. Watching the Eish lads made me wonder how one improves on craft performance like that.....

John Lightfoot queried oblique references to Craig Goodrum standards in previous reports. After a couple of decades, I have seen much but still measure competitor performance against Craig's peerless current standard. Two flights at the Bill Vos fell in to that category. An amazing scratch by Warren Butler and the Cobra to start the day and a just as amazing scratch by Russ Conradt and the Sangoma to finish the day, both from indifferent launches.

Sunstroke and dehydration is a dangerous thing, I was seeing two Esprits on the last flight and Sean sported a nasty headache by the evening. We still joined the out of towners all following Mike Warren and Cameron up to Switchblade to finish the day on blissful note with some magic slope flying in the powerful but smooth air. Interest in this site has come alive again with some of the power lads joining in the fray and there has been pretty much a queue of flyers over the last couple of weekends. Chris Helmbold put the immaculate Wizzard and Acacia moldies through their paces for us enthralled foamie flyers and we finished up heading home at sunset.


BILL VOS 2005 LOG
With TWO t/away Total T/A2 T/A1 Jan Mar
1 Dave Greer 2000 1000 1000
2 Russell Conradt 1969 969 999
3 Brian Fanning 1898 927 972
4 Alan Sneedon 1862 862 1000
5 Simon Nelson 1816 817 999
6 Dennis Bird 1803 835 969
7 Ryan Nelson 1793 884 910
8 Brad Conlon 1792 962 830
9 Paul Boswarva 1614 816 798
10 Fred Wittstock 1451 514 937
11 Don Slatter 1160 796 364
12 Norman Smith 1157 621 536
13 Scott Munn 1000 0 1000
14 Warren Butler 984 0 984
15 Adrian Baker 849 849 0
16 Paul Munn 778 0 778
17 Sheldon Macglone 697 0 697
18 John Coulson 651 651 0
19 Piet Strauss 460 460 0
20 Tim Potter 334 334