Report on the 2006 Aerobatic Nationals -- Quintin Schroll

I would like to start off by saying a huge thanks to all the pilots. 56 pilots entered the competition and each pilot had to fly 4 rounds, thus giving the organiser a nightmare from the start: 224 flights had to be completed within three days.
To start by saying this was a huge undertaking is an understatement. With only a couple Northwest comps behind my name and dare I forget my better half, we tackled this mountain step by step.
To take all the credit would not be fair, a lot of communication between lots of parties made this event a huge success; Andre Stockwell, Pierre Marais and Ivan Olivier, Burt Botha and Nico Erasmus (my right hand man) need to be mentioned.
Then to make a competition work I need to thank the following people:
1. Judges- Ivan Olivier, Nick Dreyer, Kas Hamman, Noel Booysen, Neels Bergh and Paul Hern
2. Scorekeepers- Roy de Beer, Andrew de Beer and Elaine Martins
3. Score runner and Mr DO EVERYTHING - Stephan Malherbe
4. Chief Official and Mr ANYTHING ANYTIME - Thys Du Preez
5. TX control - John Trethewey and Piet Malherbe
6. Cd - Danie Potgieter Snr
7. Food and Catering - Klerksdorp Spur
Then one final BIG thank you goes to the four ladies that helped tremendously during the week of the Nats: Nikki Schroll, Louisa Schroll, Phelani and Petro Erasmus. These ladies ensured the smooth running of basically everything behind the scenes.

The wonderful atmosphere and camaraderie between the pilots was present from the official practise day that took place on the Thursday, and continued right through to the closing banquet on Sunday night.
All the classes proved to be very competitive till the final round.
Sportsman class- (17 pilots) was huge with Jonathan Vosloo 1st, Mark Hubbard 2nd and Divan de Kock 3rd vying for top honours.
Advanced class- (9 pilots) saw the local boys (Stephen 1st, Siggie 2nd, Quintin 4th and Nico 5th) competiting for positions with Dirk van Rhyn clenching the third place.
Expert class- (11 pilots) saw the two young guns Josh Smit 1st and Calvin Schroll 2nd battle it out for the top two with Pierre Fouche closing the top three positions.
F3A class- (8 pilots) saw a once off class that flew four rounds of PO7 schedule and the top three were Dean Grobbelaar 1st, Walter van Huysteen 2nd and Burt Botha 3rd.
F3A Master class- (11 pilots) saw the old faithfuls taking the top three positions Andre Stockwell, Pierre Marais and Danie Potgieter with Ian Wentzel and Mark Wolfe snapping at their heels, this class flew two rounds PO7 and two rounds FO7 schedules.

Best wishes and many more flying hours till the next competition,
Quintin