Event Report – Bendigo 2018

Back on August 4th-5th, the VMPRA headed to Bendigo to go racing. We ended up with better numbers than we first thought would be in attendance and the weather was quite good. Thanks to the Bendigo Club for hosting this event and for providing a field that was in such great condition.

Photo Gallery >>>

Results

It was unfortunate that pylon #2 was not manned all weekend so no fastest time will be recorded for this event.

Class – FA1

Places:
1st Daniel Arapakis
2nd Andrew Davies
3rd Barry Murphy

No. of competitors: 9

Results

Class – F400

Places:
1st Jim Orenshaw
2nd Andrew Davies
3rd Brian Steele

No. of competitors: 6

Class – Q500

Places:
1st Tom Allen
2nd Tom Wetherill
3rd John Schmidli

No. of competitors: 7

Check out the full results>>>

Season Championship

This is the start of the new 2018-2019 Championship Season after last season’s trophies were presented at the AGM at Bendigo.

The 2017-2018 Champions Jim Orenshaw (Q500), Leigh Hocken (FA1) & Brian Steele (F400).

 

 

 

 

 

 

Check Out Season Championship >>>

Next Race

The next event is the VIC State Championships being held at Cohuna on September 8th – 9th. This will also be a selection event for the 2019 F3D world championships Australian team.

Check Out Complete Calendar >>>

Event Report and Photos  – John Schmidli

The written content in this post is accurate to the best of my/our knowledge at the time of publishing. It is written from my/our perspective and reflects how I/we have experienced this event.

Photos published as feature images are selected purely for their quality, general interest or topicality. They are chosen from a pool of photos taken by myself and others when time permits.

If a perspective is not being represented, I am more than happy to publish any written content or photos that are supplied to me provided it is fair and reasonable.

Quick Reference

Event Results
Photos
Season Championship
Event Calendar

Bendigo 2016 – Event Report

Each year in July, the VMPRA head off to Bendigo, a regional city situated in the gold fields of central Victoria. It is also the start of the new season championship and we hold our annual general meeting at this event each year. Traditionally, this generally being in the middle of Winter, we can have some pretty cold and wet weather. Luckily, this year we were blessed with quite good conditions and Sunday felt positively Spring-like.
Hot Stuff Model Fuels
As we gathered out at the Marong Model Airfield, conditions were a little foggy but this soon cleared and test flights were carried out. The challenge for the weekend came when setting up the pylon course and in particular the #1 pylon cage. Both the trailer and car towing it dropped into a particularly soft patch of earth as there had been quite an amount of recent rain. Next Tom Allen’s 4-wheel drive ended up stuck while trying to extract the car and trailer. It took another 4-wheel drive of James Hurley’s and some harder ground to start extracting all the vehicles and the cage. As a result, it was just before midday before racing got underway.

First up was Formula 400 with the aim to run only 3 rounds due to the very late start.
Next up was Quickie 500 to also fly 3 rounds. As this class has a relatively easy and quick turn-around time (with only 6 competitors), we refueled out on the line. 3 rounds were quickly completed and we had lunch.

After the late lunch it was time for FA1 (F3D) to race. There were unusually low numbers with only 4 competing so the races where over quickly but model prep/turn-around was slow. Even still, 4 rounds where completed before the end of racing for the day.

During the day, I took the opportunity to test out Facebook Live to film and televise a Q500 and FA1 race. It worked quite well with some well known names from around the world of pylon racing, coming online and viewing the video live. You should be able to view these from the VMPRA facebook page.

In the evening a group of us went off to the Marong pub for dinner. For the size of the town of Marong, the pub is excellent. After dinner, we headed back to the Marong caravan park for our AGM and general meeting. The main change to come from the meeting was James Hurley being elected as our new President of VMPRA taking up the vacancy left by Glenn Matthews after many years as president. I know all the members will join me in thanking Glenn for all his hard work in the past, of which we are only now really starting to get a real appreciation of what he has been doing and congratulating and supporting James in taking up this position.

With Saturday being a rather grey, cold and threatening day, It was a real pleasure to come out to the field on the Sunday morning to sunny still conditions which continued all day. It became warm enough for a few of us to end up stripped down to t-shirts.

Test flying was supervised by Toni Axon in line with our new safety requirement as discussed at the general meeting the night before (these will be published and communicated before the next event).

Racing for the day was the same order as Saturday with F400 and then Q500 doing 5 rounds each with Q500 gaining another competitor in local, Shaun Powers. It was good to see him there having raced with us 2 years prior. FA1 started fairly late and only ended up flying 7 rounds for the weekend whereas F400 and Q500 flew 8.

With this event being one of the 1st with Glenn & Nerida being way, it was good that we had people chipping in to help run the event. In all it went fairly well with only one glitch with the new laptop which had the old version of the timing program loaded, so we had to manually drop the extra round. This will all be sorted for future events.

Check out the event photo gallery>>>

Results

Class – FA1

Places:
1st Brian Steele
2nd Andrew Davies
3rd Leigh Hocken

Fastest Time: 59.75 – Leigh Hocken
No. of competitors: 4

Class – F400

Places:
1st Andrew Davies
2nd Jim Orenshaw
3rd Gary Davidson

Fastest Time: 63.93 – Andrew Davies
No. of competitors: 6

Class – Q500

Places:
1st Tom Allen
2nd John Schmidli
3rd Jim Orenshaw

Fastest Time: 95.21 – Jim Orenshaw
No. of competitors: 7

Check out the full results>>>

Season Championship

Below is the 2015-2016 Season Championship for FA1 F400 and Q500. Congratulations Daniel, Brian and Jim. It is quite an effort to string together good performances, event after event to be in the position to win the season championship.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now we have already started the 2016-2017 season championship so let’s see who can get to the top this year. There is nothing like a challenge to made us lift our performance.

Season Championship after 1 event.

FA1

1st – Brian Steele
2nd – Andrew Davies
3rd – Leigh Hocken

F400

1st – Andrew Davies
2nd – Jim Orenshaw
3rd – Gary Davidson

Q500

1st – Tom Allen
2nd – John Schmidli
3rd – Jim Orenhaw

Check Out Season Championship >>>

Season Fastest Time

We have reset the fastest times with the start of a new championship year. A huge congratulation goes out to Leigh Hocken for taking out the fastest times for last season in both FA1 and F400 and Daniel Arapakis for taking it out for Q500.

 

Next Race

The next event for VMPRA is a Q500 and Sports/Scanner race down at Crib Point on August 28. The race we had there earlier in the year was great with a lot of new comers to pylon competing. This one is really worth getting involved with. It is also part of the season championship for Q500.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Check Out Complete Calendar >>>

Event Report and Photographs – John Schmidli

The written content in this post is accurate to the best of my/our knowledge at the time of publishing. It is written from my/our perspective and reflects how I/we have experienced this event.
Photos published as feature images are selected purely for their quality, general interest or topicality. They are chosen from a pool of photos taken by myself and others when time permits.
If a perspective is not being represented, I am more than happy to publish any written content or photos that are supplied to me provided it is fair and reasonable.

Quick Reference

Event Result
Photo Gallery
Season Championship
Event Calendar

Hot Stuff Model Fuels

Bendigo 2015 – Event Report

Event Report

VMPRA held its traditional mid-winter event at the Bendigo Radio Control Aircraft Club (BRCAC) in Marong on the weekend of 1 – 2 August 2015.  A number of competitors travelled on the Friday and checked out Rick Townsend’s new pylon field, which is located near-by in Newbridge.  They enjoyed fine but cold weather and all gave a “thumbs up” on the field as a future venue for competitions.
Hot Stuff Model Fuels

On Saturday morning everyone gathered at the BRCAC field, including the regular contingent of dedicated racers from South Australia.  The field was in excellent condition as the club had mowed it the week prior.  However, the weather was very cold and test flying could not start until the rain had cleared.

Racing finally got underway in the late morning.  F400 has proven to be a very popular class – there were 11 entries and five rounds were flown (10 ½ laps).  Shaun Jacobsen set the pace with a fast time of 68.68 and he finished in first place with a score of 280.5.  Brian Steele finished second with a score of 284.9and Glenn Matthews was third with a score of 292.6.

Q500 Sport was the next class to be run and there were six entries.  It was decided to run 6 rounds and to postpone FA1 until the following day, with the hope for better weather.  John Schmidli and Jim Orenshaw had a number of close races.  Andrew Arapakis was also showing good form by reducing his times significantly.  James York and John Yianni from SA were chasing hard and Matt Young’s hopes came to an end when his engine parted way with the fuselage in flight.

Saturday evening involved getting a hot dinner at the local hotel, followed by the VMPRA Annual General Meeting.

Sunday morning dawned very cold -4 degrees – but clear, so a further two rounds of Q500 Sport was flown.  John and Jim had a very specular mid-air in Round 7, and they both pulled out their back-up models so they could continue to do battle.  After eight rounds, John was in first place with a score of 621.9and Jim was second with a score of 627 and fast time of 95.97.  Andrew Arapakis finished in third with a score of 645.5 and a personal best time of 105.64.

There were eight entries in FA1 and racing got underway later in the morning.  Conditions were still very cold and the wind had picked up – making conditions challenging for both competitors (toget their engines running) and for the course workers (to stay warm).  Six rounds were flown before it was decided to call it a day.  Daniel Arapakis flew very consistently and finished in first place with a score of 322.5.  Tom Wetherill finished second with a score of 467.1 – getting an extra couple of 200’s due to a broken pipe.  Tom Jacobsen was third with a score of 474.0 and Ranjit Phelan posted the fastest time for the event with a 63.16.  Glenn and Brian both found the same airspace in Round 5, resulting in another spectacular mid-air.

Certificates were handed out to the place getters at the end of the day and the BRCAC club and its members were thanked for their hospitality, for helping out working the course and for the hot food that was served up throughout the weekend.  VMPRA also expressed its thanks to the SA group for travelling and supporting the event.

Check out the event photo gallery>>>

Next Event

The next event is back at what is quickly becoming the home of pylon racing in Victoria, Barry Murphy’s field at Munro on August 29-30, 2015. And the great news is that Andrew Arapakis has offered to put on his superb spit roast dinner. So, make sure your planes and gear is sorted for what promises to be a good week end.

Check Out Complete Calendar >>>

Web Editing  – John Schmidli
Photos – John Schmidli

The written content in this post is accurate to the best of my/our knowledge at the time of publishing. It is written from my perspective and reflects how I have experienced this event.
Photos published as feature images are selected purely for their quality, general interest or topicality. They are chosen from a pool of photos taken by myself and others when time permits.
If a perspective is not being represented, I am more than happy to publish any written content or photos that are supplied to me provided it is fair and reasonable.

Quick Reference

Event Result
Photo Gallery
Season Championship
Event Calender

Hot Stuff Model Fuels

Bendigo 2015 – Results, Championship and Fastest Times

This season, I’m looking to break the report up into 2 separate posts to assist with getting some information out quicker while giving me time to compile other information such as the report a little later.
Hot Stuff Model Fuels

Results

Class – FA1

Places:
1st Daniel Arapakis
2nd Tom Wetherill
3rd Tom Jacobsen

Fastest Time: 63.16 – Ranjit Phelan
No. of competitors: 8
Course – 10.5 Laps

Class – F400

Places:
1st Shaun Jacobsen
2nd Brian Steele
3rd Glen Matthews

Fastest Time: 68.68 – Shaun Jacobsen
No. of competitors: 11
Course – 10.5 Laps

Class – Q500

Places:
1st John Schmidli
2nd Jim Orenshaw
3rd Andrew Arapakis

Fastest Time: 63.16 – Jim Orenshaw
No. of competitors: 6
Course – 10.5 Laps

Check out the full results>>>

Season Championship

Being the first race of the season, the championship standings are the same as the place getters. It’s not too late to get in and give it a good go for this season.

Full Championship Results>>>

Season Fastest Time

This season, we are going to keep a record of the fastest times recorded of each class. So the fast times after the first events is:

FA1 – Ranjit Phelan – 63.16

F400 – Shaun Jacobsen – 68.68

Q500 – Jim Orenshaw – 95.97

Check back soon for the Event Report, Photos, Next Event News.

Web Editor – John Schmidli
Hot Stuff Model Fuels

Bendigo July 2014 – Event Report

VMPRA returned to the Bendigo Radio Control Aircraft Club (BRCAC) for the annual pylon event that was held at the club’s field in Marong, Victoria on the weekend of 5 – 6 July 2014.  This is a very popular event on the VMPRA calendar for many reasons. The club and field are great, the accommodation is very close to the field and the local hotel serves up excellent food, which is very important for getting some extra insulation on the cold winter nights.

While weather can be a factor at this time or year, competitors enjoyed very good overall conditions during practice on Friday and over racing during the weekend. The racing program included Q500 Sport, VIC F400 and FA1, with the objective of flying as many rounds in each class as possible. Per usual VMPRA practice, racing was held over 10 ½ laps to reduce the requirements for the number of course workers.

Friday practice was a somewhat leisurely affair as the weather was good, except for a brief rain shower, and there was plenty of opportunity to get in flights. The field was in excellent condition – and special thanks go out to Rick Townsend spending nine hours with his lawn mower.
Regular competitors came from Victoria and New South Wales as well as a large contingent of racers arrived from South Australia.  The host Bendigo club was also well represented with a good number of entries.

Racing got underway on Saturday morning with four founds of VIC F400. There was an impressive 17 entries in this class and it immediately became clear that if Shaun Jacobsen could tame his new DKT powered AR-6, that he would be putting in some good times. Brian Steele had also pried open his wallet and purchased a new Nelson.

By the end of Round 4 he had posted an impressive time of 64.76 seconds, just short of a 64.6 that was posted by Glenn Matthews with his Nelson powered Supercat. Daniel Arapakis and Ranjit Phelan were also fast with times 65 second times.

Next up was Q500 Sport, and this class attracted 13 entries. John Schmidli and Barry Townsend were debuting impressive new Banshee models. Daniel Arapakis “unretired” himself from Q500, as he was saving his FA1 models for the next Team Trial. Three rounds were flown and James Hurley posted the fastest time with a 101.03.  Behind him there were many close races.  John and Barry were still coming to grips with their new models.

After a brief break, four rounds of FA1 were flown.  This class attracted nine entries, including Rick Townsend’s new Veyron and Glenn Matthews new VooDoo.  After four rounds, Rick was about 2 seconds ahead of Tom Wetherill, with Bryan Steele in third.  Ranjit Phelan had posted the fastest time with a 60.69.

On Saturday evening, most of the competitors met at the Marong Family Hotel for dinner. This was followed by the VMPRA Annual General Meeting, which was held at the caravan park.

Plans for an early start on Sunday morning were thwarted by fog, which did not clear until mid-morning.  As a result, the target was re-set at completing seven rounds for each class.

First up was Q500 Sport and times were improving significantly. In the end, James Hurley was in first place with a score of 612.6, Daniel Arapakis was second with a score of 703.4 and John Schmidli was third with a score of 726.6.  Tom Wetherill had a score of 606.7, but opted to let the class regulars take the placings.  Daniel Arapakis had the fastest time with a 93.95.

The next task was to complete the remaining three rounds of VIC F400 and the pace also improved from the Saturday.  In the end, Ranjit Phelan was in first place with a score of 392.3 and the fast time of 62.92…not far behind the pace of the faster FA1’s.  Shaun Jacobsen was second with a score of 401.8 and Brian Steele was third with a score of 416.1.

The final class to be flown was FA1 and three additional rounds were completed.  Conditions had changed from the prior day and a few 200’s were showing upon the scoreboard.  Late in the afternoon the position of the sun became problematic, so starter Mick Kellett would wait for cloud cover to appear before starting the final few heats.

After the seven rounds were completed, Brian Steele was in first place with a score of 391.0, Tom Wetherill was second with a score of 524.6 and Glenn Matthews was third with a score of 526.5.  Ranjit Phelan posted the fastest time with a 60.11. Rick Townsend detonated an engine in spectacular fashion.

At the end of the day the awards were handed out to the place getters.  VMPRA and the competitors expressed their thanks to the Bendigo club for hosting VMPRA and supplying hot food and drinks, to Rick Townsend for preparing the field, to the people who had worked the course in the cold conditions and to the group from South Australia that had travelled to compete.  Tom Jacobson is the ring leader for the SA group and their presence and camaraderie really enhanced the event.

Check out the event photo gallery>>>

Results

FA1

Places:
1st Brian Steele
2nd Tom Wetherill
3rd Glenn Matthews

Fastest Time: 60.11 – Ranjit Phelan
No. of competitors: 9
Course – 10.5 Lap

F400

Places:
1st Ranjit Phelan
2nd Shaun Jacobsen
3rd Brian Steele

Fastest Time: 62.92 – Ranjit Phelan
No. of competitors: 14
Course – 10.5 Lap

Q500

Places:
1st James Hurley
2nd Daniel Arapakis
3rd John Schmidli

Fastest Time: 93.95 – Daniel Arapakis
No. of competitors: 13
Course – 10.5 Lap

Check out the full results>>>

2014-2015 Season Championship

This was the first event for the new season championship for 2014-2015 and this is how the positions sit.

FA1

1 – Brian Steele
2 – Tom Wetherill
3 – Glenn Matthews

F400

1 – Ranjit Phelan
2 – Shaun Jacobsen
3 – Brian Steele

Q500

1 – Tom Wetherill
2 – James Hurley
3 – Daniel Arapakis

It’s early days for the championship and everybody has a chance to be in the mix for the championship. All you have to do is go racing.

Full Championship Results>>>

Next Events

The next event is the Victorian State Championships being held on August 2-3, at the fantastic pylon racing field of Barry Murphy’s. Not only is this the State Champs, but it is also another of the F3D 2015 World Championship team trials, so there will be some hotly contested racing in F3D. We will also be flying the 10 lap course and obviously, F3D will take priority due to the importance of this result to selecting the next Australian team. As this is a private field, If you would like to attend this event and don’t know the location, please contact a member of committee for directions. See you all there.

Check Event Calender >>>

Event Report: Tom Wetherill
Additional Post items & photos: John Schmidli 

The written content in this post is accurate to the best of my/our knowledge at the time of publishing. It is written from my perspective and reflects how I have experienced this event.
Photos published as feature images are selected purely for their quality, general interest or topicality. They are chosen from a pool of photos taken by myself and others when time permits.
If a perspective is not being represented, I am more than happy to publish any written content or photos that are supplied to me provided it is fair and reasonable.

Quick Reference

Event Result
Photo Gallery
Season Championship
Event Calender

 

Bendigo 2013 – Event Report

Event Report

This will be a short report. I’ve been told to pretend that the weekend went off without a hitch but this was not quite the case. With already lower numbers than usual due to the many members that were in or on the way to Holland for the World Champs, the forecast of rain all weekend wasn’t very encouraging.

The reality was that we only flew 5 rounds of F400 on Saturday morning and 1 round of FA1 on Saturday afternoon before rain stopped proceedings and that was it for the weekend. There was no Q500 flown at all.

This meant that F400 was the only class that could be counted as a result.

F400

1st place – Andrew Davies
2nd place – James Hurley
3rd place – Daniel Arapakis

See results.


Season Championship

As a result of the washout, only F400 was awarded championship points with the exception of all entries for FA1 and Q500 being awarded 1 point each for entering.

This was the first event for the 2013 – 2014 Championship Year.

See Championship results.

World Championships

As I write this, all the Australian and New Zealand competitors are in transit to Holland.

There are several ways of keeping in touch with what is happening.

Next Event

The next event is at Cohuna on August 17-18 and we are racing FA1F400 and Q500.

We expect to run the VMPRA AGM and general meeting at the local motel on the Saturday night and this will take place following a spit roast dinner (TBC). VMPRA members will be notified when this has been confirmed. It is important to come along to the meeting and support pylon racing in Victoria

See Calander

John Schmidli

August Update

Next Event

It’s time to start preparing for our next event which is down at Munro at Bazza’a Padock on the week end of  August 11-12, 2012. If you haven’t raced down there before, it’s a fantastic field and purpose built for pylon racing. I encourage you to come down to compete, especially if you are flying Q500. So sort out where you’re staying, Stratford is the closest accommodation with a Motel and Caravan Park. If you don’t know where the field it, as it is a private field, contact a member of the committee for details.

Bendigo 2012 place getter's

Our last event at Bendigo went really well and the weather was kind to us this time. There are more photo from the event now on the gallery page courtesy of Bill Matthews from the BRCAC club.

Calender Update

If you check our calender you’ll notice that the classes and schedule hav been updated for the Cohuna event in September. The priority is F3D as this is one of the selection evens for the next World Championships in 2013. This important event could see some competitor coming from interstate. Once F3D has run 9 rounds, then F400 will run 9 rounds. There will not be any Q500 run this week end.

Look forward to see everybody down at Munro.

John Schmidli 

Bendigo 2012 – Event Report

Bendigo once again played host to the VMPRA for a weekend of FA1 (F3D), F400 & Q500.

On the start line and on time

Despite a bleak forecast, the weather was not too bad. Saturday, there were a few showers that stopped racing, but Sunday was much better and wind conditions were good.

All 3 classes completed 9 rounds, with 3 each on the Saturday and 6 each on Sunday. This event was competely void of any flying incidents which is quite unusual but a testiment to the skill and clean racing that went on.

Tom Wetherill's F3Ds

Saturday saw a lot of FA1s struggling with a quite a few flame-outs which wasn’t evident on Sunday and pylon 3 was a bit of a challenge for some reason (or was that just me?!).

Saturday night was the VMPRA Annual General Meeting where office bearers were elected. Glenn Matthews is now the president, I’m the secretary & Andrew Davies is the contest organizer. Gary Davidson was good enough to stay on as treasurer for another 12 months. Thanks goes out to the previous office holders, Davis Axon, Tom Wetherill and Mike Kellet for all their time and effort. Without these people, we wouldn’t be pylon racing in Victoria.

Special thanks should also go to Rick Townsend & Matt Young for their big effort in

Matt Young (left) - A very successful weekend flying F3D

preparing the airfield for this event. It was a great weekend of racing and congratulations goes to Matt Young for his 3rd place in FA1 in only his 2nd go at flying this class. Great to see new talent joining the ranks. This should inspire other young pilots to give pylon racing a go.

Check out the results >>>

Check out photo gallery >>>

The next event is Munro on August 11-12. Check out the calender >>>

John Schmidli

 

Bendigo – Next Event

Unless you were lucky enough to travel to AMPRA this year, it’s been a bit of a break since the last race. It’s now time to get ready for the next event which is being held at Marong, near Bendigo on July 14-15, 2012. Q500, F400 & FA1 (F3D) will be run on both days (see event calendar).

Also on this week end, is the VMPRA annual general meeting which is being held at the Marong Caravan Park on Saturday night. This is an important meeting as we are electing a new committee and taking care of important business that ensures the smooth running of VMPRA.

Come along and show your support for pylon racing in Victoria. You can even put your hand up for a position on the committee. Without having these committee positions filled, pylon racing in Victoria would not be as strong as it is or may not exist at all.

Look forward to seeing you all there.

Important:

Please note that the club has its regular flying day on Friday mornings, and they are generally finished by early afternoon. As such – it is not recommended to practice until after the club members have finished.

Also – the club wishes to remind us regarding leaving wire cuttings around the pits – please clean up after you have finished as there are sheep in the paddock and they do not want to have them ingest any wire.

Thanks