The Newsletter of the Northern California Aerobatic Club, IAC Chapter 38 www.iac38.org TheThe ACronauACronautt Volume 5 - Number 10 Prez’ Post Darren Pleasance reetings IAC 38’s Todd G from the road... ♦CHAPTER OFFICERS Whitmer Wins Darren Pleasance, President I'm running 650.212.1806 H Gold @ Nationals 415.318.5145 W from city to city [email protected] this month and Ben Freelove, logging dozens Vice-President [email protected] of hours in the air, though in Greg Pettit, Secretary 650.793.2387 H the back of the 650.210.9000 W plane, rather [email protected] than the front, Stephane Nguyen, Treasurer unfortunately. 408.261.0122 H 408.873.5522 W As such, my [email protected] Pres Post will be ♦DIRECTORS a little shorter Cecilia Aragon than normal, but 510.527.4466 H [email protected] no less inspira- tional, of course :-) Marilyn Dash [email protected] For those of you who missed our first "fly-out" of Rich Perkins [email protected] the year, it was truly an outstanding event. We had on the order of ~12-15 members in attendance at Gordon Sorensen 916.548.2079 H our meeting/lunch session in Petaluma with a ton 916.645.6242 W of fun had by all. We should aspire to do this more [email protected] IAC38 Welcomes often as a Chapter; perhaps twice a year at least. Sean Worthington Lee Jensen - Richmond 408.615.8555 H 650.864.2555 W As part of the trip, four of us got together to prac- David Platt - Oxnard [email protected] tice our formation flying, including a pre-flight Peter Jensen briefing, inflight maneuvers, and a worldclass [email protected] In This Issue overhead arrival in Petaluma that would have ♦DIRECTORS EMERITUS made the Blue Angels envious. Afterwards, we President’s Post ................................. 1 Dr. Richard Rihn Editor’s Column ................................ 2 510.938.4236 H talked about the idea of creating a Chapter initia- [email protected] tive to help more of our members learn how to Pilots On The Waivers ...................... 2 Jeanette Goodman safely enjoy formation flying. At our Chapter Flying High ....................................... 2 209.478.5462 meeting coming up in two weeks, we'll be sure to Heard It On The Ramp ...................... 3 Tom Myers talk a little about how many members would be Member Of The Month - Freestyle ... 4 650.328.2141 H interested in some type of effort to help add for- A Rare Story ...................................... 5 650.473.0200 x108 W mation flying to the spectrum of capabilities we [email protected] Unlimited Team ................................ 6 all have. ♦WEBMASTER Todd Whitmer Wins Gold ................. 6 Cris Flint [email protected] We'll also plan to catch everyone up on the ongo- Delano 2004 Pictures ........................ 7 ♦YOUNG EAGLES ing "box" topic. As we talked in Petaluma last Petaluma Flyout ................................ 8 Terry Ridgway month, there may be opportunities for us to co- Reno Airraces - Biplane Results ...... 10 [email protected] exist with the skydivers over in Byron so we're Delano 2004 - Results ..................... 11 ♦NEWSLETTER EDITOR pursuing discussions over there to see what we Classified Ads ................................. 12 Peter Jensen [email protected] Calendar Of Events ......................... 13 (Continued on page 8) Pitts S1S For Sale ............................ 13 October 2004 - 1 - The Newsletter of the Northern California Aerobatic Club, IAC Chapter 38 www.iac38.org Editor’s Column Peter Jensen This past month had lots of stories for the November issue. flying and racing activities. Thanks to Marilyn all of From a regional aerobatic standpoint, the Delano con- these activities are well cov- test was the ultimate highlight this month. It was the ered in this issue. best attended California contest this year, and I would suspect that it’ll probably be the regional contest with The Nationals just finished most participant nationwide this year. 56 participating so look for the results and pilots! Marta and Bob Meyer did a phenominal job or- stories in the next newsletter. ganizing it. I would love to hear from the Enjoy this newsletter! IAC 38 participants for some -Peter Pilots Currently on the Waivers s of 5/1/2004 our TCY waiver has expired. No one are Marilyn Dash Cecilia Aragon A allowed to fly in the TCY box until the waiver gets re- Stephane Nguyen Anil Kumar newed. Please observe this temporary restriction. The New J Darren Pleasance Rich Perkins waiver has been renewed. Please contact one of the desig- Jacquie Warda Doug Burr nated briefers, if you wish to fly in the box (below 1,500 feet). Mike Davis Alex Drobshoff Angie Niles Che Barnes Pilots on the TCY Waiver (10/1/2004) Brett Goldsmith Sean Worthington NO ONE. Waiver is expired. Awaiting renewal. Todd Whitmer Pilots on the New J Waiver (10/1/2004) Designated Briefers Greg Pettit Ben Freelove Cecilia Aragon Ben Freelove Peter Jensen Allyson Parker-Lauck Marilyn Dash Peter Jensen Peter Gillcrist Howard Kirker Darren Pleasance Flying High Darrin Silver - www.FlyingHighComics.com - 2 - October 2004 The Newsletter of the Northern California Aerobatic Club, IAC Chapter 38 www.iac38.org Heard It On The Ramp Marilyn Dash The month of there and back was memorable! What a peculiar group we September are… starts with De- lano, ends with Reno Nationals and engulfs the The next event for me – and many of us – was the Reno Air Reno Air Races. I was a Rookie this year and definitely learned a ton! I Races. This learned that my airplane is friggin’ slow! It looks fast, and means, plenty sounds awesome, but she is slow. Another thing I learned is has happened that Density Altitude STINKS! in the last 30 days. I was incredibly lucky to have so many people from Chapter 38 and from my home airport, Hayward, there to cheer me Delano onward. I appreciate everyone’s kind words and enthusiasm. Delano was a BIG HIT! As usual, the world’s hottest contest With many lessons learned and many lessons yet to come, I brought lots of memories. When we first arrived, we asked really enjoyed myself and am glad I took part. I’m 90% sure one of the locals where we could go to get a good meal, he I’ll do it again. So, if you want to know more – let me know. said, after some thought, “Bakersfield!” Which, as many of I’ll bore you with details over an adult beverage sometime. you know is about 30 miles away? So, off to the Cockoo Inn and the continuous tongue jokes. See the Cockoo Inn has an appetizer plate that offers -- no kidding, pickled tongue. Only in Delano… we hope. The Unlimited Category had some newcom- ers – who were also familiar faces. Bill Stein and Nick Nilsmeyer both competed in Unlim- ited for (if my memory is correct) for the first time. Both graced the audience with their tal- ents in the four-minute; which was amazing! Speaking of Unlimited, Mrs. Meyer beat Mr. Meyer – for the first time! “So, Mr. Meyer, when did you stop beating your wife?” Chapter 38 had a great showing at Delano. Team BARF was there – minus one (chicken!) and the new S2A got a good try-out! Attitude brought their Pitts and Decathlon, Eric Tucker brought the S2B with a gaggle of students, and Rich Stowell was also in attendance with Lyle Shelton’s S2B Now, about the Red Bulls Air Race… WOW! That was amaz- plus one student. This equated to twenty-something Sports- ing! I’m not sure how wise that sport is – but boy, it has some person Contestants! The sport seems to be gaining ground crowd appeal. I was watching the Red Bulls everyday with a with the huge number of entrants in the lower categories! group of Aerobatic Pilots – and we were cheering them on (Mike Mangold, Kirby Chambliss and Mike Goulian!) the The high”light” of the contest had to be the attempted Beacon whole time. It was really something to watch. There were Rides. Don’t try it. It’s just not a good idea. Apparently, the three sequences that needed to be performed using these in- Beacon is HOT! And it also stops when you try to jump on it. flatable pylons. For example, do a roll, go through the first set Make a note; do not try to ride the beacon in the future. of pylons on knife-edge, change to the other knife-edge through the next set of pylons, then pull to the vertical, etc. Since we had to scrap that idea, we decided to bring the party etc. As if that wasn’t hard enough, this was timed! So, pull to the Center Box instead. If you’ve been to DLO – you know HARD and tight and get it all done faster than the next guy. that Center Box is out in the middle of the street – so, we had to find yet a third place to bring the party. The Hay Ride out (Continued on page 6) October 2004 - 3 - The Newsletter of the Northern California Aerobatic Club, IAC Chapter 38 www.iac38.org Member Of The Month - Ben Freelove Marilyn Dash This month, we will be I was a professional jazz musician for five years before the getting to know Ben flying bug hit hard and I moved to California. Freelove a little bet- ter. Freelove, or Free- What other hobbies do you have besides flying? style, as we like to call him, is a CFI, Aero- I still play music occasionally. batic Competitor, Banner Tower and all What do you do for a living? around GREAT guy.