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Report from the World Championship F3J 2002
by Lars Christensen (Translated by Peter Mikkelsen)
The World Championship F3J 2002 was held at Lappeenranta in Finland from august 5th to august 10th.
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What is F3J?
The object of F3J is to fly with remote-controlled gliders for as long as possible, within a timeframe of 10 minutes, and then land the plane as close to at marked spot on the ground as possible.
The competitors are divided into flightgroups (3 to 14 pilots in a group, depending on the size of the event) and fly against each other. This means that the gliders usually launch and land at almost the same time.
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The journey
Jesper and Lars left home on friday and stayed for one night at Ole's house in the northern part of Denmark. Saturday morning at 4 o'clock we were on our way again. We had to pick up Uffe on the way to Frederikshavn. We took the ferry to Göteborg and drove across Sweden all the way to Stockholm. Then we had to take another ferry to Helsinki in Finland.
It took 16 hours to sail from Sweden to Finland, witch might sound like a long time, but part of the time was during the night, so it didn't feel so bad. There was only a 150 km drive from Helsinki to the airfield. We got there sunday at noon.
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The Danes having lunch at their hut.
(Photo by: Lars Christensen)
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Arrival
We didn't have any problems finding the place. We had chosen to stay in a hut for the following 2 weeks, and we were not the only ones who did. Beside us, Finland, UK, Sweden, Norway, Ukraine, South Africa, Czech Rep. and Austria were staying in huts.
Ukraine and Denmark were the first teams to arrive. The rest of the teams showed up during the next few days.
Right after we arrived, one of the finnish officials - Markus came by. He was kind enough to give us a guided tour of the area.
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Practice
We had decided to practice for a week prior to the event. Unfortunatly, we couldn't practice at the same place as where the event was going to be held. This was because the airfield also was an airport with commercial traffic.
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Uffe's Starlight is getting ready to land. Jesper is assisting him.
(Photo by: Lars Christensen)
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During the week of practice, the weather was excellent. The temperature could reach 30° C in the afternoon and it was very refreshing to take a swim in the nearby lake.
One day, we were invited by one of the finnish officials to go to a sauna. The sauna was located at his holiday cottage on an island nearby.
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Markus's sauna and boat -
(using a boat is the only way to get to the island).
(Photo by: Lars Christensen)
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Pre-WC event
Before the World Championship was held, we attended the open international event "Wild Mans Trophy". All the danish pilots attended this event, but several other countries decided not to join us. They either wanted to save the money (it was rather expensive) or spare their models.
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The danish team.
From left to right:
Uffe, Lars, Jesper and Ole.
(Photo by: Lars Christensen)
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The competition
The championship lasted about a week and a total of 9 senior and 6 junior rounds were flown. The first flight startet at 8 o'clock each morning. We were warned about maybe having to fly until 9 o'clock pm, but we always finished earlier.
A local rule concerning the use of a ground anchor (stake) was applied troughout this event. To make the rule as fair as possible, the organisers decided to supply pre-installed stakes to all teams. Almost everone used the stakes that were supplied.
The championship started with the opening ceremony and afterwards we flew a 0-round. Then we finally started for real.
The weather was rather chilly the first couple of days, with a rainshower lasting 1 hour one day. But besides that, the weather was ok. The wind was calm (4 - 6 m/s) and came from different directions depending on where the thermals were. It was quite obvious where the thermals could be found, just by paying attention to the wind. Because of the changing wind directions, we rarely launched directly upwind.
Talking about thermals - they could be very tricky. In some flights everyone could keep on hanging for 10 minutes without any problem. But sometimes only a single pilot or two really gained height. Then the rest of the group would fight desperatly to keep the planes in the air, usually just above the treetops.
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Jesper had a perfect flight once again.
(Photo by: Lars Christensen)
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Protest
In Jesper's 6.th flight, he was disrupted during his launch. Another line forced his plane downwards and he was caught in his own line. Since his plane was stuck to the line, he was forced to land. We instantly thought he was entitled to get a reflight, but the contest director said no.
After the group was finished flying, we were in doubt about what to do. What did the rules say? Were we the only ones thinking this wasn't fair? After a while, we spoke to some other pilots from Germany, Finland and Holland. Now Jesper had no doubt in his mind. He wanted to protest against what had happened and claim a reflight. The protest was written by Uffe and Jesper in a hurry, because it had to be delivered before the next senior round started.
Later that afternoon Jesper and Uffe were asked to meet with the jury, so they could clarify what had happened. But it was not until the next morning we were told that the jury voted in favor of us. Jesper got his reflight.
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BBQ at the campsite.
(Photo by: Lars Christensen)
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Get-together
Halfway through the competition, all the teammanagers were invited on a field trip. We elected Uffe to go, and the rest of us went out to the airfield to do some adjustments on the planes. Later on, we went to the sauna, joined the BBQ-party and had a good time with the other teams.
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The winners:
From left to right:
Pasi Väisänen (Sweden), 3.rd
Joe Wurts (USA), 2.nd
Arend Borst (Canada), 1.st
(Photo by: Lars Christensen)
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The Danes ranked as follows:
Jesper Jensen, no. 13
Ole Blomseth, no. 69
Uffe Markussen, no. 73
Team Denmark finished as no. 22
Related links:
The official WC website with pictures and reports
Report and pictures from Canada
Report and pictures from France (only in french)
f3j.nl - report and pictures from Holland
f3j.no - report and pictures from Norway
Report and pictures from Switzerland (only in german)
Report and pictures from Germany (only in german)
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