Tyler & Warren Mees on the way to the line
It was great turning up to the Cohuna field on Saturday morning to a mass of activity, camper-vans, caravans and gazebo’s and the field in the process of being setup. A hive of activity that started the day before with many pilots arriving early to practice; the Cohuna field looked in great condition. To top it off, the weather was spectacular and promised to be good for the whole weekend.
Walking through the pits, it was great to see a good number of competitors, including interstate compeditors, Chris Callow, Tyler Mees, Ranjit Phelan & Tony Howse in attendance for the 3rd F3D team selection trail for the 2013 F3D world championships.
Plane ID - Chris Callow's Voodoo being held high
F3D
After some initial timing equipment setup issues (which were resolved thanks to Kevin Callow), the scene was set for 9 rounds of F3D. As the day went on, the usual suspects rose to the top of the timing sheet with some really fast times being flown. There was a great deal of interest world wide with regular postings of the results on Facebook and many comments posted. As we started a little late and the sun was getting too low, the day’s racing was finished after completing 7 rounds.
We had our usual evening dinner out to talk all things pylon (and the occasional non-related subjects) and after a good night’s sleep (for some), it was back to the field for the remaining 2 rounds. On completion of these rounds the results were:
1st Chris Callow
2nd Ranjit Phelan
3rd Leigh Hocken
See Full Results>>>
AUST WC Team Selection Standings
With the 3rd team trial completed and only the VIC State Champs left, where the 4th trial will be run, this is how the scores look as of 18/9/2012:
| Name | AMPRA | QLD champs | Cohuna trial | VIC champs | Final result |
| Chris Callow | 56.85 | 56.72 | 56.78 | ||
| Leigh Hocken | 60.28 | 62.44 drop | 59.92 | 60.1 | |
| Ranjit Phelan | 61.54 drop | 59.64 | 57.65 | 58.64 | |
| Frank Cassella | 63.41 | 62.58 | |||
| Barry Murphy | 63.47 | 140.51 | |||
| Tyler Mees | 65.28 | 60.42 | |||
| Beau Murphy | 80.9 | 60.32 | |||
| Rick Townsend | 63.5 | 63.2 | 63.35 |
F400 VIC
After all the excitement of the F3D, we had 7 rounds of F400 to fly. There was the first significant carnage for the weekend with a mid-air between Mike Kellet & Tony Howse. Tony came off 2nd best, but Mike was able to land with just half a horizontal stabilizer. Andrew Davies also lost a plane after impacting the ground during a race.
Gary Davidson & James Hurley (hiding behind his wing - his first time in F3D)
Gary Davidson came 1st making great use of his new Loki, Rick Townsend came 2nd and Tom Wetherill 3rd.
See Full Results>>>
“All in all, this was a great event. Thanks goes out to the Cohuna club for the great food and help all weekend. Another thank you goes to David Axon and Mike Kellet for cut judging for F3D Trials (David’s voice doesn’t carry as far as you would think when he is 100 meters away!). Lastly to starter extraordinaire and all-round good sort, Toni Axon who slugged it out and kept the guys in line for both days.” – (Quote – Terry O’Connor)
Also thanks to Terry and Kim (walking wounded) for the smooth running of the event.
The championship table has been updated and there is also a photo gallery from this event.
The next event is the VIC State Champs at Hamilton on October 20-21, 2012.
John Schmidli