Northern Ireland IMAC

fair bit of drama then, did well for a 3rd with a loaner airframe. Time to throw that BME in the bin then is it,

looking like it I think, altough perhaps not the bin but a certain Wilga

good shout

Here's a couple of photos of Richie's Yak repairs ongoing on Friday (practice day) morning. The Irish boys were terrific in sorting out the repair Trev Poots rang son Matt to bring out glassing gear from home and within a couple of hours the model was stripped and repaired and the put back together for test flying on Friday night and Rich ended up flying and tuning it till dark and all seemed well but as Rich has already said we were thrown another curve ball on Saturday morning. Any ways we had an eventful but satisfactory weekend and just made the ferry last night after a breakdown on the M1 in the Irish republic, where my AA card was of no use, we managed a temporary repair at roadside and just made the ferry in the nick of time

I shot over a hundred photos over the weekend so will post more over the next few days. Going flying this afternoon

Well done guys. Look forward to the full story when I catch up with you on the field.

DaveS

Here's a couple of pics of the venue which is an equestrian polo field which ajoins the beach at Tyrella and has the Mourn mountains to your left when looking at the field with the beach at your back. It's a fantastic venue as the polo pitch is so large, but also the fact that the fields used by the polo ponies has it's downside as they tend to leave rather large divots when making sharp turns. It's one of these divots that caused Richie's problems on practice day

This first picture shows one of a few matches that took place on the Friday evening, deffinately a richman's hobby this each string of ponies arriving in massive horseboxes one was an artic, and one rider arrived in his personal full sized heli, we were told he was the owner of Walker's Crisps.


This second shot shows the mountains of Mourn with the polo pitch/flying field in the foreground, our flight line camping line and beach are off to the left.

Now for a couple of pics from the Freestyle on Saturday which was the best round as the wind abated a little allowing the guys that do the "Free" to be a little more adventurous. It was mainly a slug out between the two Northern Irish lads Matthew Poots and Simon Mc Neil whose brother Richard used to fly with us in Rhyl. First up is a photo of Matt lowdown in the hover, smoke on and alongside is lookout dad Trevor



This second shot shows Si readying his QQ Yak for his Saturday freestyle and making a rude comment to me at the time as I recall, his lookout man is Scottish pilot Chris Currie

Here's a shot of them left in smoke as he blasted out of the hover

great photos Bri

Here's a couple more

This first one shows the beach, our tents and caravans were about 15 yds from the fence in the foreground



The second photo shows the flightline on Friday practice



Lastly the trophy table on Sunday, the cardboard boxes surrounding the table contain all manour of goodies which were give in both two public raffles, one Saturday one Sunday, and a pilots draw in which all pilots went home with something. The first prize for the Saturday draw was a Spektrum 7 Channel set of gear, Sundays top prize was a DA 85 petrol engine, and the top prize for Sunday was a DA 100 twin. There was all sorts to be won Powerboxes, chargers, carbon props, fuelling systems, sponsors clothing, all in they had attracted over £4000 in sponsorship a truly monumental effort

Here's the results

Well done both of you, good luck for the next one

Thanks for that Mel, if all our probs are sorted it'll be a week Sunday at Barkston for the next comp

Matthew has now posted an excellent report on the Irish comp on his website, here's a link if you're interested http://www.aerobaticsni.com/jml/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=37:imacni&catid=1:latest&Itemid=2

I've now posted a short report on this event on the club website if you do take a look hope you enjoy

a good easy reading,descriptive report.
Hope Rhyl IMAC day goes as well . If I can help just shout.

Thanks for that John I'd like to think we could do as well but our chances of running an event of that stature are limited and we certainly can't hope to attract the kind of sponsorship that Matthew did, however Rich and I have a few ideas up our sleeves.