F3A Finals, Judges View

[Ron Van Putte]

On Jul 28, 2004, at 10:35 AM, Jerry Budd wrote:

> I can attest to that (in Masters anyway).
>
> All week long many of us, if not most, were "flying" the plane through 
> the Stall Turns and getting downgraded for it somewhat (we flew in a 
> lot of crosswind situations so making it "pretty" would be difficult 
> anyway).
>
> After the first round of the Masters finals it was clear that I needed 
> to win round 2 or the contest was effectively over wrt me winning 
> (Dave Snow had won the first round and was carrying a slightly higher 
> prelim score than I into the finals).  I decided that I would try and 
> do the Stall Turn correctly by holding a bit of power and waiting 
> until the plane had come to a stop before inputting the rudder.  The 
> wind was ~10 mph, quartering in from the left.  After the roll and the 
> straight line, I pulled the power, added some back, waited a brief 
> moment, added the left rudder, watched the plane yaw precisely around 
> its center for ~45 degrees, then pitch forward in that classic twist 
> flop maneuver that we all try to avoid (it wasn't pretty).  My heart 
> sank, and I was pretty sure I was now flying for second place (I flew 
> right after Dave and he had just flown his best flight).  IIRC, my 
> Stall Turn scored two zero's, a one, a five, and a seven (no question 
> in my mind, I would have zeroed it).

That's interesting.  I was judging and I gave Jerry a two.  Maybe Jerry 
remembered it wrong or the score was read wrong.  I was considering a 
zero, but decided that it was about a 90 degree 'flop', a six point 
downgrade, plus other errors for a total of eight points downgrade.

Ron Van Putte

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