F3F French league

The F3F season in France ended this week-end with the contest of Laurac.

We flew 15 rounds on VKR2010 Slope A, in very strong wind, from 12 to 20 m/s with some gusts above 20 m/s. I flew the Pike Precision most of the time full ballast and ended with the Rotmilan after damaging the Pike.

I won the competition by a large margin and got the fastest time of the comp with 33 seconds.

Few words about the plane I used: The Pike Precision is absolutely great. It carries ballast so easily that you don't feel it at the sticks.

It is always agile, very fast, but with still plenty of lift and grip in the turns. The pike is definitively in the lifty plane family (opposed to slippery planes)

Unfortunately, I damaged it at round 13th, while landing . The plane stalled at 1m of heigh in a sudden rotor, while full ballast. He touched the ground first with the nose, then with the tip. the nose is broken, and I have some damages on the wing that didn't touch the ground (delamination). Given the hit, it behaves rather well, I would say.

I'm flying at a CG of 102mm and add 15g in the nose when full ballast.

Overall a great plane !

I also flew the Rotmilan few rounds, with 1.4kg of ballast, 900g in the fuselage and 500g of tungsten in the joiner.

With the setting I already published on planet-soaring, the plane is great and carry ballast very well too. The straight speed is excellent, and the plane demonstrated very good capability to manage crossed wind.

The upwind turn is superb with a great gain of speed and altitude. The downwind turn is a little bit more challenging but with the right setting and if you don't pull too much on the elevator, you can keep the energy very well. The secret there is in the trajectory: In the downwind turn (wind in the back I mean) the strategy is to engage a large turn, flying away from the edge, diving a bit, before to really turn, but which much more speed and energy. Of course I use reflex camber (ailerons and flaps about 1mm up).

During the 30 s of gain of altitude, The rotmilan was also very good, pumping well and high, a real pleasure !

This last win allow me to win also the french league 2011, the 7th in a row, and a total of 10 leagues over 12 leagues organized since 2000 .

Below is the evolutive ranking and the plane list.