<html><head></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 14px; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; "><div>I really was going to try and stay out of this , but…..I am left with questions and a few of my brain droppings.</div><div><br></div><div>So the 115 gram increase for Sportsman, Intermediate and Advanced was not enough? Masters needs a weight increase? Ok, I'll bite, lets consider that by the time you fly Masters you have clearly made a decision to compete and meet the rules. Let us further consider that Masters and FAI pilots can, for the most part, fly either. So if you allow heavier planes in Masters and the Masters pilot wants to try FAI he is now not in compliance. Then again if we want to make sure everyone that wants to compete at the NATS can then we need to make sure that those pilots that are making the jump from Sportsman, Intermediate or Advanced directly to FAI will not be unduly financially burdened by having to by a new airframe to make weight.</div><div><br></div><div>We can also go so far as to say that nowhere in the rules does it say that you must compete with a 2 meter airframe. That is a limit, you can use a smaller airframe and make weight easily. The Wind 1.10, Osiris, or Monolog 1.10 would all fill that role. If a competitor <u>chooses</u> to fly a 2M bird then you need to take the good with the bad, take the perceived better presentation along with the power system cost and weight. Also, if you are flying at the NATS, and lets just face facts that this is where these rules are enforced, you have made a decision to compete at a <u>National Level</u> and need to meet the rules. Oh, and let us not forget that you will also have the resources to get to Muncie and stay a week.</div><div><br></div><div>There was a 1/4 pound allowance given for Sportsman-Advanced which is a lot of balsa and/or epoxy. I'm no top competitor and never will be nor am I a master builder but I meet the rules without that allowance on the plane I built and will on my hand-me-down plane as well swinging an APC prop, and all heat sinks intact. I do not have deep pockets but I <u>chose</u> to fly a 2M plane so I did my homework and broke out the scale.</div><div><br></div><div>If it truely is cost that is the issue, don't buy the biggest and the best. This is supposed to be about the best pilot not the best gear which is sadly lost in the ambient room noise. Again a Wind 1.10 is legal and can fly Masters.</div><div><br></div><div>Just my $2.98 ($0.02 adjusted for inflation)<br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><span id="OLK_SRC_BODY_SECTION"></span></body></html>