Well, the CCSC Region 6 South contest is now history, and historical.  We flew 6 days out of 7 possible, and winning speeds were higher than we have ever seen before here, including the 18m and std class nationals.  A number of pilots had firsts here – 7H had his first task completion, John Dudley (D2), Greg Murray (1RS), and Dan Reagan (MK) all flew their first contests, and several pilots experienced their first landout in one of our many mile-square perfectly flat soybean fields.

Eric Nelson completed his tour-de-force in the handicapped FAI class by winning the day with a raw speed of 71+ mph – not so shabby at an unballasted, traditionally weak-weather contest!  His overall score for 6 flying days, including his 391 points for a landout on Day 1, was 5391.  After Day 1 he was in 4th place overall, over 250 points behind leader Jeff  Russel (TZ).  By Day4 he had edged past Jeff by 20 points, and by Day 6 was more than 200 points ahead – wow!

In the Sports class, the “Race of Biblical Proportions” between two Genesi (plural for Genesis?)  Curt Lewis (95) and Don Kroesch (DK) ended in a fitting Solomonic tie for first place, with 5140 points each.  Interestingly, there were 3 Genesi in our regional, and according to DK there were only about 28 ever produced.

I’m writing this from home, after packing up the Micro-Castle and driving the 70 miles or so back to Columbus.  I’m looking forward to a few days of rest and relaxation after two continuous weeks of herding aerial cats, first as director of the XC camp and then as CD for the contest.  I have to say that the CD job wasn’t anywhere near as bad as I feared, mostly due to the efforts of veteran contest manager Rolf Hegele, scorer Poul Pederson, chief tow pilot Tim Christman, retrieve desk handlers Harolyn Burns and Joanne Pederson, ace line manager Gary Adams, and a host of others.  In fact, except for scorer Poul, I was the only nugget in the crew – everyone else has many prior regional contests under their belts.  Makes you wonder what they knew that I didn’t when I agreed to do the CD job ;-).

Believe it or not, I’m not signed up for any contests for the next month or so.  Not because I don’t want to fly more contests, but because there aren’t any that I can get to, unless I want to drive from Ohio to Montague, Calif in 2 days, or drive from Ohio to Reno, Nevada, or from Ohio to Truckee, Calif.  Next contest will probably be the Dansville, NY regional in August.  Stay tuned!

Frank (TA)