Well another Global 3D competition is in the books, and this was one of the most successful and entertaining ones ones yet! The weather today was absolutely perfect. About 20C with zero to near no wind the entire day. The crowd came early and was eager to be entertained by the professional level flying of the competition pilots.
The day started off by finishing up the preliminary rounds for the Expert level class. This morning they still had to fly their preliminary music rounds. The round went swiftly and was very entertaining to watch. After the Scores were posted for this round, we knew which of the Expert Pilots were going to progress to the Finals. The list going in to the finals was as follows.
5. Marius Gehle
4. Thanawin Kiatgungwalg
3. Aaron Cole
2. Henrik Clausen
1. Vava Boonmala (Team Scorpion)
Between the conclusion of the Prelims and the start of the demos there was a string of Sponsor Demos. The Scorpion Demo consisted of a demo from Lucas Biblich flying the MA Whiplash 730 Electro, a 3 way demo from team Gaui by Rasmuth Jakobsen, Peter Hsaio, and Ryan Chiu, then a very aggressive flight by myself, which, egged on by the crowd, ended in a pretty spectacular crash!
Check out the video here!! –*** Kyle Dahl Logo 700 Demo and Crash***
Other then the Scorpion demo there was many great demos from other companies which included amazing flights with pyrotechnics, midairs and more other tandem flights.
After this the Finals Rounds of the competition began. For the finals rounds, the starting order of the pilots is determined by the place which they qualified in. But, the scores themselves from the Prelim Rounds are wiped out and the Pilots all start from 0 at the beginning of the round. The finals Started with the Experts Set maneuvers flight, followed immediately by the Masters Set maneuvers flights. This round went off smoothly with no upsets or dramas. After this round there was no change in the score places so the Expert Class Vava Boonmala was still leading the pack, as well as Sakkarin Kongthron in Master Class.
Right after this it went directly into the Flight to Music Round! This round is always my favorite to watch as I love seeing how the pilots choreograph their maneuvers to the music. It really showcases the pilots creativity and control. All pilots flew beautifully with no crashes. I know for sure I can’t wait to see videos of all of the flight so that I can see them again. I think one of the most aggressive flights was from Henrik Clausen in the Experts Class, and the most innovative flight was from Marik Wiehenstroth in the Masters Class. But since the music round is judged on 6 different categories you have to have a flight which is the best overall. And those winning music flights again went to Vava, and Sakkarin in their respective classes!
After this there was another string of Sponsor demos which of course were amazing to watch! Since I had crashed my Logo 700 in the Sponsor demo, I flew my Glogo 690 in Tandem with Robin Lipke for the Mikado Demo.
After the conclusion of the Sponsor Demos they rolled directly into the last and final round of competition, and by far the most high energy round. The Final Freestlye Round!!! Going in to this round all pilots in the Expert Class still retained their Yellow Card, which meant that they could push their models very hard knowing that if something happened and they crashed, they could do a re fly. In the Master Class all pilots except Kyle Stacy had their yellow card. Kyle Stacy had already used his yellow card due to a crash in the prelims.
In the expert class all pilots flew amazingly well. There was one crash from Marius Gehle who crashed due to flying to low! The crowd loved it, and since he had his yellow card he was able to fly again at the end of the round. In my opinion, Aaron Cole had the most technical and precise flights, Henrik Clausen with the most entertaining flight, and Vava Boonmala of course with the best mix of all the judge able categories. This concluded the flying for the Experts Class and they went straight into the “main event”, the Masters Final Freestlye.
Kyle Stacy started the round off with a very aggressive flight. Even though Kyle Stacy didn’t have his yellow card anymore this didn’t seem to stop him from flying all out! He was pushing his model incredibly hard and even used Pyro Technics during his flight as a special effect. However the aggressive flying eventually caught up to him and unfortunately he crashed quite spectacularly about 2 minutes into his routine! While it was a good flight, without the ability for a re fly this essentially sealed his fate into the 5th place position.
Next up was Marik Wiehenstroth. He flew a routine which was full of new and innovative maneuvers as well as very aggressive! The crowd cheered every time they saw one of his new maneuvers performed and the flight was a pleasure to watch.
After this was Kenny Ko. Kenny Ko flying style is one that is so precise and nice to watch. Every move is very intentional and deliberate and you can see he has total control of his model. Additionally since he still had his yellow card, this allowed him to have some room to push his model and flying, in order to try and make up some points in the competition. A very nice flight indeed.
Up 2nd to last was Kan Poonnoi. Kan also was trying hard to make up points and see if he could catch up to Sakkarin who had a healthy lead going in to this round. He flew very well and layed down a very precise and technical flight.
Last but certainly not least was Sakkarin Kongthron who prepared for his flight with his Scorpion Powered Mikado Logo 700. Sakkarin knew that he would have to push it in order to keep Kenny and Kan at bay and all I can say is… he certainly did this!! His flight was literally one of the best I have ever seen in my life! It was full of new and innovative maneuvers, and was technical, and of course LOW and entertaining! After seeing his flight I had my suspicions that this flight was enough for him to keep his 1st place position but of course we were gonna have to wait to see what the judges said!
After about 30 minutes the Scores were Prepared and the Award Ceremony commenced. The results were as follows!
This was a FANTASTIC finish for Team Scorpion as both 1st Place Pilots were using Scorpion Power System! Congratulations to Vava Boonmala for your 1st Place victory in Experts Class, and to Sakkarin Kongthon for 1st Place in Masters Class!!!!
After this there was the legendary “Victory Flights” where the victors of both classes get to go out an let loose with their models and show the crowd just what they can do when the stress and regulations of the competitions are lifted!
Vava started off his flight very aggresvily and was pushing his model VERY Hard!!! Unfortunately a bit to hard as the model had a mechanical failure which resulted in a crash!
The CD stepped up to the plate and started his flight! He put down 3 minutes of absolute crazy flying which again just solidified his position as “World Champion”.
Well done to all the competitors who flew and again to Sakkarin Kongthon the new “World Champion” of RC Helicopters!!
As videos are posted we will post them in our blog! So Stay tuned!
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