October 2022 Club 40 Race report
The last race of the 2022 season was held at the Monroe County R/C field. The weather had been windy all week and I was giving serious consideration to cancelling the event due to high winds. The last time I looked, the AMA rule book says winds need to be in excess of 40 MPH before a sanctioned event can be canceled. I know that would keep me in bed! My aviation weather forecast predicted lower wind from mid morning to early afternoon. As luck would have it the forecast was right! Several regular racers dropped out due to other commitments and the racers remaining assembled for some great racing.
Bronze class had David Poland resuming his typical, “smooth is fast, fast is smooth” style of racing to tantalize Tracy in the races getting close to a win.
We also want to welcome Var Brynildssen to racing! He has had an airplane for a while but needed final tune up to get everything sorted out. We ran out of time Saturday morning dealing with a fuel system problem. Now he will have plenty of time to get ready for next year. I also know of two other bronze racers that will be racing with us next year. In the Silver class we had Tim Porter step up and join the faster class of planes, he did a respectable job and by the end of the day he was finishing on the same lap as the race leaders. I hesitated to even mention it but we had gone the entire season without a mid air collision. On the last heat of silver Tim Sparks was leading and in the vicinity of pylon 2 when Matt and I got tied up. I lost one wing panel and Matt lost his horizontal stabilizer and elevator. My plane was doomed so I shut the engine off before it hit the ground. With some experience in observing pylon racing mid airs I knew that if Matt could keep his airplane inverted his plane would likely fly in a somewhat controlled manner and land out on the course. The wing was intact and due to oil soaking the fuselage, it will be retired. All the radio gear transferred to another racer. My LA Racer was a write off except for the elevator and Rudder being added to the crash box for handy replacement if need be. I also lost an aileron servo (Spektrum 4030) that was in the wing shorn off in the mid air. Searching the bean field for several hours didn’t reveal anything except a few pieces of covering and wood. They just ran the combine through harvesting the beans so it’s possible it is on the ground or contributed to some roughage in the feed, I’ll take another look to find it.
Race results in order:
Bronze David Poland, Tracy Spencer
Silver Matt Fornefeld, Tim Porter, Tim Sparks
Once again David Poland was our food guy. Jan and he put together a nice meal for all who attended. The course workers were invaluable and we can’t do it without you!
Rick Hill Starter
Roman Chrzanowski Score keeper
Terry Sloan Pylon #1
Eric Ruggles Pylon #2
Todd Kuebelbeck Timer
Var Brynildssen Timer