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In the beginning....The entries in the Thanksgiving Classic totaled 16 veteran
SSC fliers. All but one of the original entrants flew the entire eight round event.
Tim and Alex Treneff, along with Chris Quinn (more on him later) came from
Tennessee; Mark Schofield came from Indiana; Ohio residents Mark Cippolone
and Bob Loescher made the trek south for warmer weather; and from warm
and sunny Florida, Chris Handegard came north for a taste of fall weather.
Mother nature smiled on us all day long. At 9 am the temperature was 41
degrees. By the pilots meeting at 9:45 it was pushing 50 and when we started
flying at 10:20 the sun was coming out from the clouds and we eventually
reached a comfortable 60 degrees with a mild tail wind all day. Not shown in
the photo at left our best volunteer and camera man, Billy Wiggins really helped
us all, all day. Thank you Billy.
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Front row left to right: Wayne Voyles, Mark
Cippolone, Chris Quinn, David and Mike
McGinnis, Bob Loescher, Chris Quinn and Don
Pruitt. Back row: Don Grissom, Victor McIntire,
Darin Stevens, Craig Lynberg, David Eaton, Mark
Schofield, Lou Melancon, Tim and Alex Treneff
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What were the planes? .... the fastest ones were the Tennessee Battle Axes of
the Treneff's and Chris Quinn, but the absolute fastest were Mark "Roid"
Schofield's Indiana Cobras. We did tach checks on each plane before launch
to make sure all were legal (they were) but some are aerodynamically cleaner
and therefore unload a little more in the air.
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Compare the planes performance...the best description would be "parity". The Georgia BattleAxes, Gorillas, Tennessee
BattleAxes, and Indiana Cobras were very comparable in peformance. Wayne Voyles SSC Shark gave a very good accounting of
itself and Victor McIntire's Spad like Coro wing, fence post fuse plane did very well and was surprisingly fast even though it had the
smallest wing in the contest.
Today's event was decided on pilot skil and not equipment nor technology.
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2005 Georgia Thanksgiving Classic, November 26th, at Hilltop Flyers
click on any of the photos below for a larger size view
Here the winners are surrounded by all the pilots. Lou Melancon, in black sweat
shirt was the contest CD and is shaking the hand of 1st place finisher Darin
Stevens. With the win Darin will definitely stay in the RCCA NPS top 5. Mark
Cippilone from Cincinnati finished a very strong second and Mark "Roid" Schofield
place a well eared fourth. We generally agreed amongst ourselves that we are
going to stop inviting yankees to come to our contest if they keep winning the
hardware like the two Marks did today.
Darin Stevens had an outstanding finish with his final three rounds being 440,
540, and 640 to not only walk away but to run away from the competition.
Chris Quinn, back row, first on the left usually waltzes into Georgia and dominates
the events. Today Chris was finally able to break the 1,400 point barrier scoring a
total of 1,480. We've seen Chris better this score in three rounds in the past. He
was also strutting his 50 lbs lighter frame for all to admire and behold.
Bob Loescher
Alex Treneff and Battle
Axe from Alex Models.
Chris Quinn
Chris Handegard and Wayne
"Land Shark" Voyles with
helmets
Without helmets before anti-glare
coating is applied
Young Craig Lynberg. Had to fly against
Quinn, McGinnis, Stevens, Roid, and Wayne
all day long. Whew! what a baptism by fire!
Darin Stevens, a study of
intense concentration
David Eaton
David and Mike McGinnis holding Dad's
very stout Georgia Battleaxe
Don Grissom being presented with
an Alex Models Battle Axe by Alex
himself
Chris Handegard judging for RCC SE
District Representaiive Don Puritt
Enlarge this picture to
see the horrendous
damage to the engine of
the blue plane.
Mark "Roid"
Schofield. The
man has a way
with caps doesn't
he?
Victor McIntire
Victor's coroplast wing and tail fighter.
Uses a fence post for a fuselage.
Surprisingly fast.
Wayne Voyles Shark, putting sticky stuff
on the wing.
