First Team Managers meeting of the championships today and it won't surprise scale championship veterans that organisation of the event has been taken over by the exceptionally capable Pål Anthonisen. From a competitor's point of view this is very welcome, the plan slightly changes but is easy enough to cope with.
At the Team Managers meeting, Pål relayed our situation regarding models locked in customs and asked for objections to accommodating us when we receive the models, our fellow competitors graciously raised no objections. The atmosphere at the competition is very friendly and supportive, we certainly have an appreciation for each other's creations and skills and we all get a kick out of seeing such beautiful models 😊.
The rules regarding F4B, control line, were a little vague regarding the optional manoeuvre of "taxiing" because the take-off and landing manoeuvres included "taxi" in their description. The Team Manager's meeting had plenty enough to deal with so, although I brought the issue up in the meeting, Pål sensibly had us go direct to the F4B chief flight judge. It just so happened that as we found the judge the American's did too, and they requested the same clarification that we did. Needless to say, surrounded by two F4B teams requesting the same reasonable interpretation, the judge agreed with our interpretation - very sensible!
That was a good start but our models are still stuck in customs and a conversation with today's Romanian NAC representative gave us little reason for optimism so the mood in the afternoon was somewhat sombre.
That all changed as we had the opening ceremony... Let's face it, none of us want to be standing around listening to speeches so Pål kept it simple, he did the bare minimum officiating and let us all get on larking around with our national flags, photographing each other, and basically having fun!
The flying part of the competition starts tomorrow but without planes we're left at a bit of a loose end so may well distract ourselves with a day off.
