For a full breakdown of scores, please visit AcroScore | Little Gransden Open Club 2024

Contest Director's Report

If the archives are accurate, British Aerobatics first held a Loop Beginners Day at Little Gransden in 2008 and has returned almost every year since. 16 years after the first Little Gransden event, we returned for our Open Club event, kindly hosted by solo and formation aerobatic display extraordinaire Mark Jefferies.

8 budding competition aeros pilots, 2 of whom took part in Get Into Aeros at Popham in May and were keen to build on that experience, signed up and we decided to stick with the tried-and-tested format of a morning training flight away from the airfield (with a quick run-through in the box on return), followed by a judged box flight in the afternoon. All competitors flew in one of our Preferred Training Partners aircraft with an instructor – thank you to David Hall (Ultimate Aerobatics), Rob Barltrop and Ed Stephens (North West Aerobatics) and Alex Peart (British Aerobatic Academy) for their excellent instruction.

Having been Contest Director for the Get Into Aeros event in May, and being blessed with aurora borealis at night and blue skies during the day, I prayed for the same weather for Little Gransden – the weather god’s did not disappoint (except for the lack of aurora borealis the night before the comp)!

Despite the usual weather challenges on summer days and transits from more Northern counties, all aircraft and instructors arrived in time for a 9am brief. Having provided comprehensive briefing materials beforehand, the main briefing focussed on safety and a reminder of procedures. As ever, a reminder not to fly over the chicken farm and other noise abatement areas was important!

And so to the flying. After competitors met their instructors and refreshed the Club sequence on the ground, the flying began according to a schedule detailed to the minute – something that seems to be a feature of competitions I run! It was more important than ever that we stuck closely to the schedule, as a large flying display at nearby Old Warden (the Shuttleworth Festival of Flight) was taking place on the same day and the Red Arrows were visiting 1155-1330Z, with their associated RA(T) in place. Careful liaison with the Flying Display Director and Shuttleworth organisers meant we could proceed with our event on 29^th June, but we agreed with them to remain on the ground while the RA(T) was in place. Thankfully, the instructors kept to the schedule and we were all back on the ground in time. It was also the perfect time to have some lunch ahead of the afternoon’s box flights – we are grateful to Mark for driving to a local sandwich shop to get baguettes/sandwiches for all competitors/instructors/officials!

Now it was time to focus on the box flights; we decided to give each competitor the chance to fly the sequence twice – the first time was a practice and the second time was officially judged, with scores being uploaded in real-time using the AcroScore system. It is an exciting development for our sport to be able to publish scores in real-time – not only can pilots get near-instant feedback on their flight (once they are on the ground!), but anyone can follow the event as long as they have an internet connection; we had Melanie Astles monitoring the scores in real-time from Poland! This was the 2^nd live test of the AcroScore system ahead of using it at the British Open & National Championships at Sywell and the system worked extremely well; thank you to Alex, Charlie and the CEVA team from Spain for originally developing the system.

It was great watching the pilots demonstrate their skills in the box, under the careful supervision of their instructors. Richard Gale, flying the Pitts S2-A, was the highest ranked pilot with an impressive 86.54%, closely followed by Lewis Alderson also in the Pitts with a score of 85.31% and David West in an Extra 200 with a score of 82.69%. All pilots flew exceptionally well, and most importantly, safely.

Before we awarded the medals, we were treated to an inspiration flight by Mark in his Extra 330SC – it was impossible not to be awe-struck by Mark’s demonstration of control and technical ability in his aircraft, which included tumbles, flicks, rolls and other manoeuvres that seemed to defy our understanding of what was possible in an aircraft. 40 years after taking part in his first competition, it seemed apt for Mark to be inspiring a new cohort of competition aerobatic pilots.

Back on the ground, Mark awarded the medals and provided some nuggets of advice to all pilots (notably that we must remain students, learn every day and learn from others’ mistakes) and we wrapped things up. An extraordinarily fulfilling day with everyone leaving with a smile on their face.

Special thanks must go to Mark, again, for hosting us at Little Gransden, the instructors for keeping the competitors safe, the judges/assistants (Ian, Brian and Rod) and Dom (videographer). Thank you all.

Utterly inspired by Mark’s flight at the end of the day, I took the opportunity as everyone else was leaving to try to convince Mark to enter our Freestyle competition at the British Open & National Championship, 15 years since Mark’s last British Aerobatics competition. Read a subsequent CD report to see if I was successful or not…

Jamie Williams

17th July, 2024