The Friday afternoon Beginners event was able to start in mid-afternoon, albeit with in-flight visibility at the minimum 5 km mark and a consequently very poor horizon. In some cases, even keeping sight of the box from the airborne hold proved to be quite an unusual challenge. Eventually, seven brave souls completed the obstacle course, with the top three scores all within a couple of points of each other. So - special congratulations to veteran Harry Mason, Dave Cavell and Duncan Hamilton.

Even with a few late arrivals on Friday evening, the Standard field had been reduced from almost thirty to just under twenty. The strength of Yorkshire aerobatics was evident from the number of locally-based pilots, which included for the first time two "civilianised" instructors from nearby RAF Church Fenton, flying a big yellow T67M-260 from the Joint Elementary Flying Training School. Well done Pete and Andy for joining the fray. Another new aircraft on the scene this year is Charles Kirk's Jurca "Tempest", which I can't even begin to describe, but which is not to be confused with the Hawker version. You'll just have to come along and see for yourself.

Saturday's weather turned out to be a big improvement on Friday and a start was made without too much delay after the early briefing. Standard known and unknown were flown with a judges lunch-break in between. Many took sensible breaks to keep out of the occasional cloud in the top of the box, and the overall standard of flying was quite encouraging for the early part of the year. Almost half the field finished above the 70% mark. The majority of the top places went to various 2-seat Pittses, but top of the lot on the day was Roy Nicholson in the Skyboard Slingsby, once again showing how cool and un-biased is the judging at these domestic events.

After the presentation of the trophies there was still time available for 7 or 8 pilots to have a go at another unknown. This time they were treated to real-time radio critique from the ground-based CD, rather than to post-hoc judges scores. This proved an eye-opener to those who had not had such help previously.

Finally, mention should be made of our new transvestite registrar/scorer, Jen Paulson, who coped admirably with the demands of this vital back-room job.

Alan
 

             JOHN McLEAN TROPHY : Sherburn in Elmet : 10/11 May
             --------------------------------------------------
                          Beginners Results

Order Pilot              Aircraft type   Reg’n     Known #1  0/all %
====================================================================
  1  Harry Mason         Pitts S-2B      G-ICAS       458.5   69.468
  2  Dave Cavell         Yak—52          RA—44474     458.0   69.401
  3  Duncan Hamilton     T67A            G-BIOW       456.2   69.120
  4  Charles Kirk        Jurca-MJ2D      G-AYTV       399.7   60.566
  5  Peter Maycock       Robin-2160      G-BYOF       383.0   58.030
  6  Cheryl Smith        Robin-2160      G-BWZG       179.2   27.149
  7  John Dawson         Pitts S-2A      G-SIIA       133.0   20.154

                    John McLean Trophy Final Results

Standard level
Order   Pilot           Aircraft type   Reg'n    Known #1   Unkwn #2   All Grps   0/all 
=======================================================================================
  1  Roy Nicholson      T-67M           G-SKYC      962.7      894.4     1856.1  79.660
  2  Julian Murfitt     Pitts S-2A      G-STUA      985.5      851.6     1837.1  78.846
  3  Graham Smith       Pitts S-2B      G-ICAS      936.6      884.5     1821.2  78.157
  4  Stephen Wallace    Pitts S-2B      G-BRVT      987.8      791.9     1779.7  76.380
  5  Eric Marsh         Vans RV-4       G-BXPI      900.5      842.8     1743.3  74.820
  6  Alex Caramella     Pitts S-2B      C-BRVT      902.7      822.4     1725.1  74.038
  7  Robert Woollard    Pitts S-2B      G-BRVT      924.3      791.7     1716.0  72.646
  8  Steve Kirton       T-67M           G-SKYC      852.6      811.9     1664.5  71.437
  9  Polly Whitehead    T-67M           G-SKYC      885.6      749.1     1634.6  70.156
 10  Pete Anderson      T-67M           G-BWXF      819.9      784.0     1603.8  68.834
 11  Andy Kilvington    T-67M           G-BWXF      8Ol.5      759.0     1560.5  66.976
 12  Clive Butler       Pitts S-ID      C-LOOP      812.9      725.4     1538.3  66.022
 13  Duncan Hamilton    T-67A           G-BIOW      725.9      714.1     1440.0  61.801
 14  Steve Lofthouse    Yak-52          RA-44474    814.4      583.0     1397.5  59.977
 15  Charles Kirk       Jurca-MJ2D      G-AYTV      632,2      680.1     2312.3  56.320
 16  Alex H Smith       T-67M           G-SKYC      784.3      484.5     1268.8  54.455
 17  Corinne Dennis     Robin-2160      G-BWZG      647.0      558.5     2205.5  51.738
 18  Dave Cavell H/C    Yak-52          RA-44474    555.5      566.5     1122.0  48.154
 29  Tom Richards       T-67C           G-BLLR      328.2         -       328.2  14.084

British Aerobatic Association
Results after TBLP at 90% confidence with 1.20 threshold
Sequence & Group two-pass processing at 15:14:09 on 11-05-2002