The tenth match for the 2010 Hong Kong F3F league was held successfully on Sunday, 24 October 2010 in Robin's Nest northwest slope. The match was not scheduled as league race initially because TR2010 was held just two week ago. Even though it was scheduled two months ago, the weather forecast for this Sunday was actually not promising at all due to the approach of a super typhoon, named Megi. Luckily, Megi steered away from Hong Kong at its final approach, and so we had a day with fine weather, but awkward northwesterly wind. The only known slope in Hong Kong that is possible to run F3F contest for northwesterly wind is in Robin's Nest in the north east corner of the territory. Pilots are a bit reluctant to choose this slope for F3F contest.  The northwest slope in Robin's Nest is known to be dangerously naughty for landing even for experienced pilots. It is not only a spot landing but also pilot has to steer his plane through difficult terrain before touch down.  There were large casualty in the last contest held three years ago!

Anyway, still, the contest has attracted a total of 29 pilots who gathered up in the mountain at 8:00am wanting to start the contest as earlier as possible, but they found that the wind was virtually absent, so it's a waiting game instead. The wind finally picked up to the racing level of 3m/s at about 10:00 am and the contest was immediately started. The first pilot to kick start the contest was Ah Keung, everybody was watching carefully how he battled with the weak cross wind! The most nerve-braking part of his flight was, however, to watch how he manipulated his plane and landed it safely. Applauses were thrown in as he did it faultlessly. The pilots' confident in landing their planes have grown since. Ken28, missing the F3F contests for sometimes, was able to manipulate his plane on a steadily fast track to grab the first 1000 points with the only sub-sixty in Round one. The fight for second round was more decisive, there were most sixties with only a few sub-sixties. Angus flew his Demo on an accurate course to achieve a 54.54s, which finally was the fastest time of the day. Wind speed picked up a bit in the third round, hence more sub-sixties were seen. However, the cross wind was also creating problem for many pilots which slowed down the plane significantly on the up wind leg. The times achieved varied a lot. Johnson flew his Acacia IV perfectly to grab a 1000 points for Round 3. Cross wind was getting more serious in Round 4 and the differences in times achieved can be as high as 20 seconds. Fat Fai flew his Ceres on a steady course to grab 1000 points for Round 4. The contest was interrupted on and off with many re-flies due to insufficient wind. Wind speed dropped further in the later part of Round 5 resulting in long wait with many nineties. Ah Kin took the opportunity of better wind in the beginning of Round 5 to grab a 1000 points. The contest was drawn to a close after the last pilot, Steve, has flown in Round 5. So 29 pilots with 5 rounds, the results are: 2nd runner up prize to Stanley, 1st runner-up prize to AC Wai and Kenneth is the champion. Angus won the best speed prize with a 54.54s. Congratulation to all winners! The summary of the score table is shown below, for details, please check the score sheet.
 

No wind! It's a waiting game

So boring, and nothing to do in waiting for the wind