The Fenland and McAully Trophies - 2009

CD's Report
It's always interesting to ponder exactly what drives people toward their targets in life, and the degree to which they encourage advice and assistance from others in the pursuit of strategic goals. In the final analysis the successful aerobatic pilot requires a broad mix of both solitary effort and expert knowledge - the range of skills required to rise from the crowd and grab the slot at the front of the queue in practice being more easily discussed on the ground than acted out in the confines of the cockpit, as each figure is tackled and the next jumps into focus. In shorter contests this is more of a personal cliff-edge to control, any simple mistakes instantly relegating the miscreant back into the pack; in expectation of more Standard and rather less Intermediate pilots this year the BAeA planners set two sequences for the former and four for the latter for Fenland .... in the event (and faced with Friday's not so wonderful weather for transit from all round the country) the McAully Trophy enjoyed 16 hopeful pilots flying twice, whilst the Fenland Trophy sported 19 who (mostly) flew four sequences. This set the stage for a whole range of entertaining brain f**ts that served to wriggle the order around throughout as the sequences came and went, so the result was in some doubt right up to the wire. Cracking stuff, Grommit!

By Friday's midday briefing time not too many had managed the trip through the drizzle and cloud that was often down to the deck from the south coast to Yorkshire, so as usual the brief brief was to wait a couple of hours and see how things developed .... pretty unpromising it looked too. However this is oh-so-flat Fen country, and everything is relative (or everyones' relative, as they say around here) so wait and see. By 15:00 the trend was positive, by 16:00 the briefing was done and after only one false start at around 17:00 we were up and running. There were a couple of cloud-busters to be sure, but by the 19:00 curfew all bar Brian McCarthy had done their stuff. I'm a firm believer in making good use of every scrap of opportunity to fly, and by close of business on Sunday this turned out to have been the Right Way to Go.

Saturday started looking quite reasonable, and with another brief to enable Jen to get the McAully paperwork business finalised we were in good shape. Alas one of our three Beginners was not able to extend to the weekend, so after clearing the rest of the Intermediate known away we were able to get the Chris Sills vs. Paul Isherwood show on the road - from which Chris duly emerged the winner by a short head (or just over 41 points).  Come back Paul, your turn next ... !

Next up came the McAully Trophy, with it's curious mix of Known and Free figures to add a touch of sequence design to an otherwise fairly regulated Standard pilots life. This is quite a slow sequence to run, it being necessary for most pilots to take a short 'breather' after the known figures to scrape their thought processes back into line for the additional three. Mostly it went quite well, the pilots individual score-sheets below showing that the requisite thought had been applied and the result duly emerged. When all was done the interim results sheet showed that Richard Welch had established a clear lead from Simon Barnard, with James Edwards snapping at their heels. The Delta-Victor trio were all very much into the communal help game, Simon providing the meat in this all-Pitts sandwich. Could the snarling blue-and-yellow one do the job? Ah well .... we had mooted an extra sequence for the Standard mob if there was enough time, and in an apocryphal moment young Barnard said "Give us a tough one, this stuff is going too well!". Tisk, risky
that ....

Back to the Intermediate Free after lunch then, although the hard working judges in fact took their Sarnies on-the-gallop down at their allotted position - by the south-west horizon just this side of the water tower, so as to provide the maximum flight time for those magnificent men in their various machines. A good deal of hand-waving went on all weekend, the few photos here being just a small set from the many images recorded. By the last flight in this sequence a clear needle match had developed between the experienced David Jenkins in his Laser and new man this year Marco Kalweit in Richard Rogers' Pitts S2-C (in fact with a quite recent PPL gained exclusively in the Pitts, and now an IMC under way in the same machine ...). The interest stems in part from the England vs. Germany aspect, plus this was Marco's first Intermediate contest, but more interestingly because virtually all of Marco's power flying has been under Richards keen eye - Mr Rogers having been no slouch himself when he last competed some years back.

Back to Standard again for the Unknown sequence during the last part of this packed day, and here we began to see a different story. Richard Welch did kind of alright, then held his breath whilst ... Simon blew his day away with a moment he'd rather forget, and young James put in a blinder to steal the sequence - but not by enough for the whole plot. John Scott's excellent rental skirmish in Mike Caskey's (remember him?) CAP-10 bought him a fine third place, but it was Richard Welch who bagged the trophy and McAully Gold for the day. Notable performances from the chaps in the Yorkshire T67 lined them up at 4th, 5th, 9th and 12th (Team prize?) whilst an ever-improving Annabelle Burroughes manoeuvred the spitting Jungmann into a fine 10th place. End of a very pleasant day, we all thought.

Having billed the event as running into the Sunday the majority of the Intermediates made it back for the slightly more leisurely 09:00 briefing, plus standard pilots James Edwards and Trevor Preston for a promised "fun" unknown. At this stage David-J had it from Marco and Luke Goddard, with Andrew H-W rumbling the Yak-50 close behind from a long line of hard working others. Not all had made it to the Sunday start-line, but without much delay to let some temporary low-Cu disperse we were off again. And then the Jenkins concentration faltered, a snap that wasn't on the sheet got in the way of the roller ... and Marco had the lead. So, as they might say, when the going gets tough - you just have to dig deep and get it right. We dallied for a brief "Fun" unknown to fill the left-over Standard day, for which Master Edwards secured the winning Mars Bar, then it was back to the serious Intermediate stuff - could he do it? Well, yes he could, but only just. A delighted David Jenkins thus carried off the Fenland Trophy by a mere forty-four points in nearly six thousand, whilst an almost as delighted Marco pocketed the silver and Brian McCarthy the bronze. This was a well fought contest with not a little to'ing and fro'ing amongst the likely contenders, and three great days of excellent flying. Well done everyone, a thousand thanks to Steve Green's small group of incredibly hard working judges and assistants, three cheers for Fenland's lovely airfield and first class catering, and to Jen and Jack B and the considerable number of other people it takes to stage these tremendously exciting events - our collective Thank-You's are the very least we can offer.
Nick Buckenham
Contest Director