At the start of 2017 I got a call from Sion. We had originally planned to just do F2F in Landres together but he was now suggesting doing our first ever F2C races too. My ill-measured response of ‘why not?’ was about to cause an unimaginable amount of stress as we properly underestimated the requirements of the premiere racing class
Having picked Sion up from Gatwick (I was politely late as usual, he was politely patient as usual), we headed to Dover for the journey South. The car journey is a great time to catch up and generally talk racing. We can’t practice apart from race meetings so rely on a thorough ‘verbal warm up’.
Landres
A fantastic venue for CL flying is set 4 hrs drive south from the Dunkirk ferry, in the Lorraine region. We camped on site as there are good facilities, including a nice flat grass pitches and a shower block. Arriving well after midnight we put the tent up in the dark, we were done by 02:00, after a refreshing shower a comfy sleeping bag awaited. I was soooo tired.
We had the almost unimaginably cunning plan of getting a full days practice on the Wednesday, ensuring we could learn F2C (in a day) and have the entire CL racing hierarchy eating the scraps from our table. Possibly. A flawed plan as it turned out.
Hardware
We had taken our full ensemble of models to France. Our plan was to use two oldish Makarenko models powered by Zalp K’s, on the basis that swapping if required would be straightforward as the two models would handle similarly.
My orange model had been flown a few times solo at Barton but not in anger as it came with a damaged wheelbox which prevented much flying. No two up, no three up, no practice pitstops and no races. Perfect!
On reflection I was just gathering plenty of excellent material for my new book ‘How not to start competing in the most demanding CL Racing class‘…..
Dutch GP (13/14th July)
Unofficial practice at Landres started at 08:00 on Thursday and saw us attempting to get a setting on the yellow model, learn its handling quirks and generally accrue much needed experience. The engine/tank/prop set up was obviously new to us but Sion very quickly got a handle on things, and we had a setting we could race with. The quality of the equipment was evident straight away.
I quickly became aware that the ground handling characteristics of the models would take me some getting used to. In fact a lot of getting used to. And then there was the spinning round fast bit too….
F2C
Sadly the racing was an unmitigated disaster. Confidence dropped to the floor as we wrestled with operating and flying the equipment correctly. We didn’t manage to record a time in three stressful attempts . Very, very disappointing. Confidence factor: 1/10…
F2F
Stepping back to F2F in the late afternoon was a bit of a relief. I find the speed is that bit more manageable, and they are a known quantity. I relaxed a bit and started enjoying myself with the more familiar models. With the Landres flying circle being in a bowl my perception of where the horizon should be was challenged and I ended up flying a bit high for the majority of the second heat. Not that I knew at the time.
On leaving the circle the vastly experienced and overly aggressive Roland Surugue came up to us and without so much as an introduction berated us in the line check area. The gist was that I was flying too high (Sion and I both agreed), but he was frustrated the Jury had done nothing about it. I’m not sure Roland intended to be so rude, but I decided to make the lines up and manfully left him and Sion to discuss it! I wound the lines up hoping he would calm down a bit but he was still going at a graceless Gallic gallop. I attempted to defuse the situation by formally introducing myself and Sion, Roland took a breath and shook hands, then went straight back into it. A bizarre way to handle a situation involving newcomers. We weren’t arguing, we started by apologising but there was absolutely no reasoning with him. Confidence factor: -3/10.
The Finals
Part of our reasoning for going to Landres was to see the standard of competition first hand. It was inspiring. To see the French in action, as with the Ukranians and many other top teams, was a true pleasure. There was a fair bit of attrition in the semis but into the final went Surugue/Surugue, Bondarenko/Lerner and Rodin/Osadchiy.
This was a really classy race with the result being decided in the last 10 laps.
Huge congratulations to all competitors or a fast, clean race and especially Pascal and Georges for a great win.
After two days flying Sion and I ended up plumb last in F2C and 4th overall in F2F. Our confidence roller coaster left the rails and plummeted in a fireball of flaming despondency. A jubilant Mark Greenwood saw fit to add to the misery with a jovial alcohol enhanced piss-take over the evening BBQ. You’d expect nothing less from a great friend! A glass of good red (or two) accompanied by delicious French cheese followed by more wine smoothed things out nicely….
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French GP (15/16th July)
Our strategy changed. From kidding ourselves we could do this (we clearly couldn’t) we aimed to finish a heat in F2C and record an official time. That would be a satisfying enough achievement.
To his credit Roland came up to us on Saturday morning and shook our hands. Fair play. Fresh day, fresh start. I must behave myself in the middle.
F2C
Early morning practice went ok and despite the first heat being a little wild we recorded a 3:39! I have to say it felt pretty good to get to the end for the first time. After minimal familiarity time Sion did a great job of pitting and setting the motor. I managed not to get DQ’d (that was probably the high point) and bingo! Our first ever official F2C heat time. The second heat saw a 3:45, it was a bit uglier, but again we finished. Our third heat ended with a run in, but the motor wasn’t sufficiently warm anyway. The run in was probably my fault and clearly something I have to work on. But we ended up being not last at all which was nice…..
Special congratulations have to go to Pascal and Georges for taking the GP double, unfortunately in a disappointing French GP final with two missed catches and subsequent run-ins for the opposition. Nonetheless, a fantastic effort. No point posting a video though as it was mainly Pascal looking stylish walking in circles, with Georges doing a faultless job pitting and sadly Yuri and Thierry were sat down watching on helplessly.
F2F
Due to the attrition rate of the top teams, we made it through to the final with a steady 4:02. This is way off our PB pace, and it was suggested by MG that our setting was rich but we decided this was not the time to faff about so we went with what we had.
F2F final
We were up against a team that had recorded a ridiculously fast 3:35 heat in the Dutch competition and a French team with broadly similar performance to ourselves. Expectation level was set at medium.
The final race went pretty well. We had competitive airspeed, but I managed to get a couple of warnings early on having a proper tussle in the middle. This continued throughout the race and the Dutch/Swiss team withdrew at 179 laps. By now I had accrued 2 more warnings, we’d had one dodgy stop and I was physically shattered but fairly sure that even with the 5 second penalty we would be ahead. And we were!
A huge thank-you to Jean Paul, Matthieu and the entire F2CMBL team for selflessly putting on these two competitions and being great hosts. It was humbling to see the amount of work involved and the number of people required to make it happen. The whole Club appeared to have turned out to lend a hand. A great effort that is much appreciated by all competitors. Roll on the World Champs in 2018.
CL racing 
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