The sun has set on another F3CN World Championships it’s time to reflect a little on the event.
Bruce and Ian returned home late last night after an epic road trip across Europe to Pitesti, Romania. Steve made it home on Sunday afternoon being fortunate enough to fly to and from the event.
The past 7 days have however flown by. With two rounds per day it made the event quicker and I think that all enjoyed the shorter program. This had the added benefit of people staying at the contest sight to watch rather then the usual dashing off to practice.
Weather- wow, what can we say other than it was great. The sun shined for the entire week, the winds were generally very light but boy was it warm! Mid to high 30’s most days.
We stayed in the centre of Pitesti which was ideal for walking down the high street looking for dinner. Lots and lots of places to eat at with superb food.
The flying site was on a full size airfield. F3N was based near the hangers at the base of the airfield and F3C was towards the far end of the runway. We faced north but this was at an angle across the runway. The airfield was still active during the event for ‘emergencies’ and the only instances of aircraft were during the first round of finals with a R44 coming into land, and an ultralight landing meaning that we had to clear the course entirely for it to land.
The organisers had a difficult build up to the event which lots of changes of personnel taking place. This did mean that some things felt very last minute, but the event ran smoothly with the experience of the competitors showing through. The practice site however were a disaster. The UK team had been allocated a piece of land on the airfield which would have conflicted with the main flight line, but it was also very overgrown with long grass and small bushes. We spent quite some time looking around the airfield for a place to fly and even had to buy some astroturf to fly off. The good will of the Austrian team allowed us to move and join them on a much better piece of ground, but it was certainly not ideal and access was difficult and very bumpy.
The team however worked extremely well together aiding each other throughout practice and competitive flights. All pilots made it to the semi finals with Steve and Ian making the finals. Our final finishing positions were Bruce in 26th, Ian in 14th and Steve in 8th. The team finished 5th overall.
This was Bruce’s first championships and the first world championships for Ian so both need to be applauded for flying at such a high level in the presence for some incredible pilots.
For those who did not come, you missed out on a great competition in what is a lovely country. We too were concerned about security but at no time did we feel uneasy.
We would like to congratulate Hiroki Ito from Japan, Ennio Graber from Switzerland and Yasuichi Sawamura from Japan for reaching the podium, and teams Japan, France and China. Outstanding flying skills.
Lastly we congratulate Stefan Wolf and his team for producing a world championships that will hold a special place in our hearts.