WESTFAC III AC III
FAC gets a Rocky Mountain high this year in Denver, Colorado!
By Roger Willis
PHOTOGRAPHY: ROBERT HODES W
ESTFAC has become the pre- mier scale freeflight contest in the Western United States and beyond. This year WESTFAC
Mk-III was held at the unbelievable free flight site near Denver, Colorado utilized by the MMM Club. It consists of 27,000 acres of open, unhindered freeflight wonder. This WESTFAC was expanded for a third time to three full days of flying in over 23 Flying Aces events. Pre-registration was completed over the internet with fully downloadable forms making life easy for the builder/flyer. Scale judging got underway at the Hamp-
tion Inn in Parker, Colorado just 14 short miles from the flying site. The six scale judges divided up the judging into three groups: FAC Rubber/Power Scale, Peanut and High Wing Peanut Scale and Jumbo/ Giant Scale. With plane runners working steadily, the judges, using the Flying Aces rules, worked from 2 p.m. until dark at a fast clip. One of the unique aspects of WESTFAC is
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how event Sponsors are recognized. Each Sponsor is given a special wall poster that displays his/her logo and describes the events he/she is sponsoring. These posters are displayed for all to enjoy at the judging, the flying field and are given to each Spon- sor at the WESTFAC Awards Banquet. This year, the posters consisted of original art showing portraits of famous freeflight mod- elers from past and present. The art work was accomplished by Duke Horn from Texas.
Flying began early on day 1 with clear, beautiful sunshine and mellow drift on a green grass field that went on forever. The first mass launch was Low Wing Military Trainers won by the WESTFAC II Grand Champion, Herb Kothe flying a Magister. As noon rolled around, The Thompson Race was held and Don DeLoach’s graceful Cess- na CR-3 raced for a 12-second win over an equally great flying CR-3 flown by Chris Starleaf. As all of this mass launch competi- tion was underway, flyers were launching
their judged scale models into the air and several duration events were being flown. Day 2 saw no change in the weather, but
lots of action as the WW I Combat event launched, under the direction of Flight Leader Mike Isermann. As those beautiful planes of yesteryear rose into the air to- gether and the elimination rounds flew by, it was a sight to see. This combat was won by Don DeLoach with his Martinsyde F.4 by only 10 seconds ahead of runner-up Mike Midkiff with his S.E.5a. The Greve Race was won by John Donaldson flying his Greve Racer, the Goon. This race featured over six different Greve Racers and the competition was hot.
Saturday was full of action as the Goodyear Race was held and the special event, the Grumman Mass Launch, was held with Ed DeLoach as the Flight Leader. This was a sight to see as most WW II Grumman aircraft were represented. Don DeLoach’s beautiful Wildcat was the far out winner af- ter three rounds with fantastic duration as
DECEMBER 2011
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