With the C19 situation heading in the right direction we decided that with some reasonable precautions it was time to restart our T28 racing. The first race of 2021 was held earlier this month on the 13th. We had 9 pilots sign up and fly. The format is the same as last year but this season there will be medals for the winners and a small raffle for the fliers and people that help run the contest. We also welcomed a new T28 racer to the series Daric Knight.
During the first flight of the preliminary round Frank Gagliardi’s T28 decided to head north for a refreshing swim in the bay—it washed up on Fiesta Island and was brought back to the filed by a passerby—the T28 was largely undamaged. Frank said it would live to fly another day!
The rest of the preliminary races went off without much drama—believe it or not there were no cut turns recorded during the preliminary rounds which left in doubt who would get the “better luck next time” medal for the most cuts. After the results were tallied the finals races were set everyone put their best batteries in their planes and got ready.
The Bronze cup race matchup resulted in Brad Bender taking first, Randy Wynant second and Daric Knight in third.
The silver cup only had two slots filled—Quan had smooth sailing to a first place finish after Steve Manganelli decided to see if he could reduce the course length by 3 feet by going through the #1 pylon rather than around it—other than dashing his chances of a win in the silver class there was no damage to the plane—it will return to do battle nest month.
The gold cup races were between Otto Dieffenbach, Alex Sutton and Steve Neu. The planes and pilots were quite well matched with the planes generally staying within a few feet of each other for the first half of the race—in the second half Otto and Steve moved a little ahead with Steve crossing the finish line first, Otto second and Alex third—the celebrations for the Steve and Otto were short lived however—when the cuts were counted Alex took first—Steve second and Otto third—proving once again that avoiding trouble often gives the best results. Congrats to Alex.
After the races the medals were handed out with Otto being the recipient of the “better luck next time” for his 3 cuts in the gold cup race. The raffle included batteries, chargers and various electric related accessories. A good time was had by everyone—if you want to have a taste of low pressure fun racing please come down for the next race which should be on March 13th at 10am. The rules and information on the series and how to setup your plane can be found here: https://www.sefsd.org/club-contests/t28-racing/t28-rules-information/
Steve Neu
