FAI F3A 2023 Finals Day & Banquet

 Awake before six am as we have the events final competition day ahead of us. We will all head up at some point to the flying site to watch the last few rounds.  Flying starts at 08:00 until approximately 16:00 and the closing ceremony and awards from 16:30 till 17:30. 

Finals Flying Schedule

All the guys have been disassembling airplanes and getting them boxed up for the journey home. I took the time to look at my latest purchase, the VLV Contra V2 WC setup along with a battery tray, props, and a CF spinner.  Not really sure if I got caught up in the buying frenzy with John and Henry but I have it in my hands now. Seems like a bad idea considering I have no plane to put it in nor a place to fly it. We will see what happens. 



VLV Contra V2 WC

 

 We headed off to the plant nursery and joined Agnes, Chad and the kids. Henry and Terri had just finished their breakfast and were wandering around the area. It was huge in the back of the property with additional stores. Much more than meets the eye from the entrance.

John came back from a visit to the local zoo and we headed off to the field to watch the action.  Weather is fantastic with a light blown in with some scattered clouds in the distance. We managed to see the last 4 pilots doing the F-23 schedule. Andrew Jesky was last up and flew fairly fast. Some good flying with a few minor errors evident.  Henry and Chad joined us in the pilot section for the last couple guys. 

Trophies up for grabs!

Andrew's last F-23 about to be flown

Judges break now with the last flights of unknown #2 coming up.   I meet up with Felix Nieuwenhuizen, father of Peter whom I have flown with in D-8 back home.

With Felix Nieuwenhuizen!

About to finish off Unknown 2

 

We all watched the final round of Unknown #2 and the flying was, as expected, very close.  Gernot was up first and had a good round with solid scores. We had the benefit of the live scoring to assist us, although reception would fade in and out at times. Onda next followed by CPLR who put in a so-so flight with large correction error on his Vertical Eight. (Still got a 7 for it). 

Pete Collinson was up next and had clean flight along with Stephane Carrier who flew right after him. The judges break came and went and ironically the last of the heavy hitters were up next. Sandro Matte (flying the Pletty powered Advantage!) and Andrew Jesky flew next followed by Christian Niklass.  All flew very well with minor imperfections to my eye.
 

Jason "The Bearded One" Shulman flew a very strong round and finally Lassi Nurila took to the skies to top it all off. The pilots all receive loud applause on landing.  
 

With John watching the live scoring it was clear that an 8 was the “even score” per maneuver and the tell was the 7.5 or 8.5 (or 9.0) that would be the decider. We had an idea who had won but without the TBL algorithm applied, we just couldn’t be 100% sure.   (TBL stands for  Tarasov-Bauer-Long Process for Analyzing Aerobatic Scores... more on that here for those interested.)
 
While the scores were being tabulated, the pilots all posed for various picture with their planes.
 

Gernot

Top Ten

French Team

We all gathered around the podium and after some delay, the awards were presented. Just prior to this the organizers published the results, through the managers WhatsApp list for all to see.  

The crowd gathers!

Lassi is #1

Once the awards ended, we headed back to the motel to change and walk over to the RSL Club were the banquet was being held. It was a great evening with good food and drink! Lots of conversations ensued with much laughter, Best dressed went to Team Japan!

Banquet

A great evening had by all!