Articles Speed Rally (Page 2)

By Cally Eckard
Keen aviators brought their fastest and favourite ‘toys’ along to the Mini Air Race at Kitty Hawk for the first air race of 2011

The Mini Air Race is regarded as a precursor and a ‘trial run’ for the President’s Trophy later in the year.

The weather was perfect, with just a few little white clouds in the sky. Kitty Hawk members and staff put their best foot forward, and as always welcomed all the visitors and put on a delicious breakfast, and ala carte dining throughout the rest of the day.

Thanks must go to Race Organiser Neels van Deventer, Chief Marshall Chris Burger, and Safety Officer Nigel Musgrave, all from Kitty Hawk. Robin Spencer-Scarr did the safety briefing with his usual unique flair, and Frank Eckard produced the results in quick time for prize giving.

One of the Cessna 210’s gave the spectators a bit of a scare when it settled back on the runway shortly after take-off. Fortunately he hadn’t retracted his wheels, so everyone breathed a sigh of relief.

There were a few first-timers taking part, the youngest being Ronan Brink, part of a father-son team. This event, although all about speed, was enjoyed by all the competitors, and the bug seems to have bitten a lot of newcomers.

For safety reasons, the race rules have been amended to include timing and exclusion penalties for being too high or too low over turn-points. Competitors found this a challenge, and only one team returned home without a single penalty.

The Spencer-Scarr’s provided the lesson for the day when they committed the error that Robin told the competitors very emphatically not to make. The experienced father-and-son team got hopelessly lost, providing much bantering from the rest of the field, and then flew too low over the few turn-points that they managed to find. “The lesson for us”, commented Robin later, “was that this sport is a great leveller and you cannot expect to do well unless you put at least some sort of effort into it”.
The navigation in the East of Johannesburg should have been quite straight-forward, but confounded many of the teams, four of whom were excluded from the results for missing turn-points . It will be interesting to see how these same pilots will manage the navigation over the vast expanses of nothingness around Mafikeng for the President’s Trophy Air Race in May.

The top position were as follows:

Full results are attached.

By Robin Spencer-Scarr

“What the hell are we going to do if the weather forecast is correct and we get rain?” Neels van Deventer’s nervous voice begged over the phone on Friday afternoon. “Don’t worry,” I said, “the weather man is an even bigger liar than a politician.” I tried to sound a lot calmer that I felt.

Well, as it turned out, the weather held and we all arrived to the welcoming voice of Nigel, the safety officer and advisory ATC for the day.

A hearty breakfast washed down with a steaming cup of coffee settled a few nerves although Neels, Nigel, Chris and Robin had to struggle with the decision of which runway to use as the wind remained in favour of 19 after it knew we were all set up for 01

“What if we let them finish here?” somebody asked. “…. and then let them land at Wonderboom,” came a quick response, “because when they’re screaming over the runway, we can’t have anyone on short final can we?” “Not unless we want to spoil everybody’s day with an aluminium shower!” “Well then what if we ……….” and so the conversation went on and on until finally an acceptable solution was found.

Derek from African Outdoor Group had set up his rig with a podium and P.A. and, more importantly, he had set up the most fabulous ‘lecture room’ situation with chairs and long tables that would have such a good idea if it weren’t for the wind again. We are all so looking forward to seeing this setup at the next event as it looked like exactly the right way to do a briefing.

The briefing was held in the clubhouse which was very comfortable after Derek’s guys had kindly moved the podium and microphone inside to avoid the weather. Robin did the safety and detailed briefing and Mary gave them the track and a quick lesson on how to navigate.

With the planned 01 runway no longer feasible and 19 having to be used, there were no fewer than 22 aircraft on the start line for a “PTAR day 2” type start. It was decided that this would be the most exciting way to start and more so because the Handicappers had managed to get the handicaps so well calculated that we anticipated a really exciting finish.

The start went off well with the ground marshals doing an excellent job in keeping the flow going whilst keeping the movement safe at all times. It wasn’t too long before the many spectators at or in the clubhouse were suddenly alerted by the sound of a 180hp Lycoming purring in the front of Rudi Greyling’s RV7 as he came bulleting over the finish a good minute or two ahead of the A2 (Botswana) Jabiru who was pedalling as hard as he could because, right on his tail was the Meerkat flown by Chris Spencer-Scarr and George Brink who managed to just pip him at the post for a second place.

The Jabby, sadly, had logger failure and therefore didn’t feature in the prize giving but, because it was a school and a fun race we are going to record his 3rd place for the day.

See the attached file for the full results.

The prize-giving was a huge success enjoyed by all who stayed. It was compered by Chris SS and ably assisted by Mary de Klerk. Prizes were generously sponsored by AOG, Zandspruit and International Flight Clearances. A spectacular trophy was awarded to the winners, Rudi Greyling and Jan Hanekom. Second third fourth and fifth also walked away with prizes. Emmie Oelofse won the First Lady Home prize and then loads of Lucky Draws were pulled out of the hat.

The weather held and many crews stayed to enjoy the clubs hospitality before barrelling off down Rwy 19 to head for home bases.

Another great SAPFA aviation event, a lot of happy pilots and navigators and exhausted ground crew completed the day, and returned safely home in anticipation of the next event at Swellendam on 6 March. See you all there!

President Lucas Mangope Air Rally

Held in Pilanesburg – 9 March 1985

It was a very worried group of pilots and officials that gathered in the overcast and hazy conditions early on Saturday morning, 9th March at Lanseria Airport. It certainly seemed to us all that the first President Lucas Mangope Air Rally could be a non-starter, and that the event would not be able to contribute to the Mafikeng Centenary celebrations. However, the clouds started lifting, and taking a signal from Tony Pennell, everyone got airborne, and were soon over the ridge, past the Hartebeespoort Dam, and over the Rustenburg flats – destination, the Pilanesberg airfield near Sun City, and the starting point for the first stage of the Rally.

Two aircraft did not make the start due to technical problems, and so 31 pilots and crew, after attending the customary concise Tony Pennell briefing, set off on the first leg. The course was around the northern edge of the Pilanesberg Game Reserve, and then back in a westerly direction along a long straight track to a turnpoint near Lobatse.

Those of you who have flown in this area will be familiar with the distinct lack of detail or landmarks in this area, so navigators had to be very attentive. As is his want Tony again placed secret checkpoints along the route to check that all pilots were flying within the 500 m corridor (250m each side of centre line) and that they were on time overhead that point. The main objective of the Rally being a test of pilot’s skill and navigation ability, and co-ordinating these two.

Penalties are calculated at one point for each second early or later than the prescribed time set to be over each checkpoint. One or three minute penalties are given for being right off track, or outside the 500m corridor. Each checkpoint carries a maximum three minute or 180 point penalty.

The first section of the Rally ended in a power on precision landing task at the new international airfield at Mmabatho. Pilots could not stop talking about the huge expanse of tarmac they landed on, and the usual single line to aim for was replaced by the oversized runway markings.

Once all down, the last aircraft being Gary Shield in a Grob 109, the pilots caught a quick lunch, attended the next briefing’and prepared for the second leg of the Rally.

This was a sort of triangular route in the Vryburg area, and included a double S curved track, a very difficult route to navigate and fly on. Unfortunately, a storm cell moved in overhead the airfield checkpoint at the start of the curved track, and Rally co-organiser Don MacKenzie had to hot foot it out of the airfield as he was the marshall there. This caused many pilots to miss several cheek points and complicated the scoring for the officials.

The final second stage checkpoint was overhead the Mafikeng town square where the celebrations were in full swing, and ended with an engine out landing task. Then was the time for talking, joking, pulling legs, and speculation. Pilots and crew set off for their their respective hotels in fine spirits as six balloons took of over the town, in the face of a threatening storm.

That night a grand feast was held at Mmabatho Sun and at the end of the day it was the seemingly invincible tearn of Springboks, Chris Kyle and Gavin Beck (Cessna 172) who walked away with the prize money. A very close second was the team of Erie Stratford and Colin Jordaan (Cessna 182 PG) with a local team from Stelia, T Bothma and M Serfontein in a Cessna 182 in third place. Cessnas seemed to have a field day. The landing competition was won by Roger Bradfield in a Grumman American.