Racin' in the Basin: Race Day 2

Today the Santa Anna winds blew into the valley. About 20 - 25 mph and gusting. The pilots decided to fly two rounds today and call the contest at a total of seven rounds. The wind was a challenge for most everyone. The race course was reversed and this caused for a challenging landing approach to settle on the pavement. Large trees beyond pylon #1 seemed to be causing some nasty turbulence at times.

What did I say about FAST guys at this contest? Four times under one minute were set by Rusty Van Baren, Richard Verano, Dan Kane and Mario Salazar. Mario took fastest fast time with 58.45. That is some fast company.

Rusty and Gary Schmidt flew off for first place. Everyone in the pit area was on their feet for a great flyoff only to have it end as quickly as it began. When the flag dropped for the start, Gary fuzzed his prop on takeoff and shut down the motor. Rusty took first place.

Our beloved Roy flew off with David Lloyd for third place. After four or five pretty exciting laps Roy and David had a mid-air on the way to pylon #1. Roy's plane was down and David managed to land intact. Roy took first place on time.

I was in a six way tie for fifth place. We all agreed not to fly off and have the placings decided by times. With my time of 1:04, I ended up in ninth position.

Lyle Baker put in two good races today and took two wins. This really helped to boost Lyle in the standings to a final position of 17th.

The rest of the Canadian crew finished as follows:

25 Allan Umbach

26 Kevin Moorehouse

29 Delbert Godon

30 Henry Redekop

31 Doug Houston

37 Kevin Umbach

Complete results are shown in my previous posting today. Scroll down to view it.

Many thanks to the Valley Flyers club for hosting the event. Travis, Doug and their crew did a great job. Many thanks and a hearty hand shake to Pete Bergstrom for being our Starter out in the sun and the wind [today].

I think there's a lot of workshop time required by a lot of the participants this weekend to re-build for the coming district race season.

This was my first race at the Basin. I really enjoyed it and had a lot of fun racing with everyone. See you in Muncie !

Thanks for reading.

Randy