RC Combat Nats rundown
by Don Grissom
dongrissom@hilltopflyers.com
It was once again a great year for Combat and it is almost time to start building wings and airplanes for next season.
I had a good year, and don’t have many airplanes to rebuild, so my
winter will be spent working on some new Scale aircraft, as well as some new Gnat models, because I did not get to fly in those events this year. I look forward to a new year of Combat since I wasn’t able to attend many events this year.
Many people
do not get the chance to go every year, but if you have the time in the summer, one of the best contests to attend is the RC Combat Nats in Muncie, Indiana. This year, 16 pilots from across the country competed. The winner of the longest distance traveled once again went to Tom Neff
from Aurora, Colorado.
This year we planned to fly five events with 10 rounds in each event. The first two days ended up with poor weather, and we had to use wet-weather streamers. We were able to get in all of the rounds of Open B and Slow Survivable Combat (SSC), but the wind was so bad that we ended up only flying four rounds of Gnat Combat. This was the first year for that unofficial event at the Nats.
In SSC, William Drumm III had a great contest with a score of 3,980 points after 10 rounds. Dane McGee, who was one of the Radio Control Combat Association (RCCA) overall winners last year, was second with a score of 3,432. In Open B, Eric Gilkey dominated with a score of 4,200, which nearly doubled David Smithgall’s second-place score of 2,452.
Gnat Combat was more of a kite-flying competition because the wind was so strong. Many other Nats events were canceled that day. Eric finished with a great score of 1,376 in only four
rounds. Andy Runte came in second with a score of 680.
The last two days of Combat, we flew Scale 2948 and Limited B. I really enjoy flying Limited B. It has more power, but not the high speeds of Open B. This helps on windy days such as those we experienced during the
Nats. Most mornings we still needed to use forestry tape for our streamers because there was a lot of moisture in the air.
After flying 10 rounds of Limited B, Eric finished with a score of 4,700, and in second place was David with a score of 3,246. In Scale 2948, first place went to Eric with a score of 4,108 and Tom Neff was second with a score of 3,064.
This was the first year for William Drumm III to run the RC Combat Nats and I want to thank him for running a good contest, despite the poor weather we had the first two days. There are many pictures and more details that can be seen in the NatsNews section on the AMA website. The link is in the “Sources” list.
If you want to attend a great contest, then this one is for you to try next year.
Sources:
RCCA
www.rccombat.com
