The 2024 USRA Giant Scale Race is in the books and was successful in at least 2 specific ways. First, we rebooted our racing event that has been dormant for a few years. 2nd, we held the event at a new location, closer to civilization than we normally are with a control tower and active airport still functional on additional runways. Close to 200 spectators came on day 1, including many of the Spaceports active tenants such as Scaled Composite employees, and other RC enthusiasts that traveled to see our event get back into the air after a long layoff.
While we had a small number of entries for our reboot event, it’s worth noting that 2 of our competitors traveled from the Midwest and 1 from Texas. Of our small group, 3 entries were brand new into racing and showed up with newly built airframes for competition. Congrats to those pilots Rick Davis, who made the final 4 trophy dash, and Phillip Waul who was 1st Alternate(5th), and Chris Malo in Unlimited with his Miss Ashley. Travis Flynn from Burbank also dusted his plane hanging in his garage and entered this competition from at least a 12-15 year layoff from Giant Scale Racing and was certainly 1 to beat as he won’t most of his heats getting to the final.
A video from pylon 2 perspective shows how well the callers were turning their pilots around the pole without any lights or confirmation until after each heat race. This is a testament of how well the teams dialed in their calling skills during the qualifying heats on their way to the final trophy dash. After the dust settled on the final heat along, with a couple of cuts awarded, the Formula 1 GT Class winner was Doug Killebrew racing his Mike Johnson orange and blue Polecat, first build and raced in 1999 at Jean, NV. 2nd place was Scott Manning with his own design of a BS Polecat also from 25+ years ago. 3rd Place was Travis Flynn and his BS Polecat first raced in 1999 as well, and 4th Place was Rick Davis and his newly build GR-7, so new in fact there wasn’t time for any paint work before the event. It’s also worth noting the final trophy race delivered a record breaking run from Doug Killebrew by 1/4 of a second, a record that held since 2007.
The stock Unlimited Gas 150 Class had several new entries including the return of the much anticipated Super Corsair flown by Scott Baker. Just watching the speed and turns of that plane got the racing juices flowing. Tom Keating, who normally competes in the Unlimited Class, showed everyone how fast his Yak was in the stock class also. He was the fastest all weekend and delivered a record breaking run in the finals. It’s worth noting that Scott Baker would have also broke the record with his Corsair in that final run respectively. Our other 2 finalists Doug Killebrew who finished 3rd and Tom Easterday 4th, definitely battled for their position during the final race, but their speed was enough to challenge Baker or Keating. It’s worth noting that Chris Malo did exceptionally well as a rookie pilot and ultimately had a problem that retired him early unfortunately, but the plane will be ready for the next event. Scott Manning spent months repairing a scratch built Stiletto from the early 90’s and raced it in a couple of heats before some structural issues retired him early as well.
Mojave Airport was a fun place to race and while we don’t have a definitive answer for next year, early signs show they were impressed by our event and we have a meeting scheduled to discuss improvements on both sides to make it even bigger and better next time. We hope to have answers quickly so plenty of lead time for others to build, prep, and test for a future event. Besides California, plans are currently underway for an event in the Midwest also. Stay tuned!!!!
Pylon 2 judges perspective in the F1 final...... Mojave 24 Formula One GT Finals Race
While we had a small number of entries for our reboot event, it’s worth noting that 2 of our competitors traveled from the Midwest and 1 from Texas. Of our small group, 3 entries were brand new into racing and showed up with newly built airframes for competition. Congrats to those pilots Rick Davis, who made the final 4 trophy dash, and Phillip Waul who was 1st Alternate(5th), and Chris Malo in Unlimited with his Miss Ashley. Travis Flynn from Burbank also dusted his plane hanging in his garage and entered this competition from at least a 12-15 year layoff from Giant Scale Racing and was certainly 1 to beat as he won’t most of his heats getting to the final.
A video from pylon 2 perspective shows how well the callers were turning their pilots around the pole without any lights or confirmation until after each heat race. This is a testament of how well the teams dialed in their calling skills during the qualifying heats on their way to the final trophy dash. After the dust settled on the final heat along, with a couple of cuts awarded, the Formula 1 GT Class winner was Doug Killebrew racing his Mike Johnson orange and blue Polecat, first build and raced in 1999 at Jean, NV. 2nd place was Scott Manning with his own design of a BS Polecat also from 25+ years ago. 3rd Place was Travis Flynn and his BS Polecat first raced in 1999 as well, and 4th Place was Rick Davis and his newly build GR-7, so new in fact there wasn’t time for any paint work before the event. It’s also worth noting the final trophy race delivered a record breaking run from Doug Killebrew by 1/4 of a second, a record that held since 2007.
The stock Unlimited Gas 150 Class had several new entries including the return of the much anticipated Super Corsair flown by Scott Baker. Just watching the speed and turns of that plane got the racing juices flowing. Tom Keating, who normally competes in the Unlimited Class, showed everyone how fast his Yak was in the stock class also. He was the fastest all weekend and delivered a record breaking run in the finals. It’s worth noting that Scott Baker would have also broke the record with his Corsair in that final run respectively. Our other 2 finalists Doug Killebrew who finished 3rd and Tom Easterday 4th, definitely battled for their position during the final race, but their speed was enough to challenge Baker or Keating. It’s worth noting that Chris Malo did exceptionally well as a rookie pilot and ultimately had a problem that retired him early unfortunately, but the plane will be ready for the next event. Scott Manning spent months repairing a scratch built Stiletto from the early 90’s and raced it in a couple of heats before some structural issues retired him early as well.
Mojave Airport was a fun place to race and while we don’t have a definitive answer for next year, early signs show they were impressed by our event and we have a meeting scheduled to discuss improvements on both sides to make it even bigger and better next time. We hope to have answers quickly so plenty of lead time for others to build, prep, and test for a future event. Besides California, plans are currently underway for an event in the Midwest also. Stay tuned!!!!
Pylon 2 judges perspective in the F1 final...... Mojave 24 Formula One GT Finals Race