Allianz Display

I just got back from a quick trip down to the Yarra Valley in Victoria. The aim was an aerobatic display for Allianz Insurance. The Allianz national team were having a function and yours truly provided some aerial entertainment! The trip down from Sydney required me to refuel at Wagga and then on to the destination, Lilydale Airport. Thanks to Jonathon at the Lilydale Club for looking after me on the day. The facilities there are first class and they have a lovely little grass air strip in one of the nicest locations of Australia.

The Allianz Aviation team of Mike Dalton and Chris Rose met me at the airport and took me to have a look at the display site from the ground. I had forgotten how nice (and big) the Yering Winery Complex is! I also had the honour of meeting the Allianz GM.

Unfortunately, the weather turned for the worse...the cloud base remained high enough at over 2500 feet but there was drizzle and waves of showers passing through the area. For the display itself I was lucky to be between the heavier showers but the dull and dreary conditions would have taken away from the display - even a large smoke trail can fade into the background in those conditions. However, the feedback was good and having done a few displays now, I'm getting a better feel for what people like to see. I must say it was a real blast to fly a display at such a venue.

I had decided to do a quick turn around and head back to Sydney after the display. The weather was lousy, in fact, it was probably the roughest weather I've flown in for many years. I sure was glad to be in a strong plus or minus 10 G aeroplane flying back over the hills! In hind sight it was a good idea to head home, the weather was worse over the next few days and I may have spent a few nights down there....

It was a long day but Allianz is working hard to be a major player in the Aviation Insurance Market and I'm glad to help out!

I've just taken a few weeks holidays from the Air Force. The family and I are heading up to the Gold Coast for 2 weeks on the beach and some time with my parents and brothers....I'm really looking forward to the break. After Christmas I'll need to get stuck into the training for the 2009 competition season!

New Decals

We are continuing our development of decals on the aircraft. You can see below, it is looking better. Many thanks to "Peninsula Sky Services" down in Victoria. David Schwarze, 0400 777 192, has been very helpful. David can send decals anywhere by express courier - it's a speedy service! Thanks David.

Richmond Open Day

The Richmond Open Day was held on Saturday. Unfortunately, the weather was fairly poor early in the morning which prevented about 35 planned aircraft from making it over. However, many still made it and even more decided to drive over. The weather came good about 9 am - a bit cloudy and warm but otherwise good! In fact, it was the smoothest air I've flown in for a long time.

With the kids Christmas treat also being held, there was a Herc handling display and a solo PC9 display and of course, I did 2 aeros displays. It was most enjoyable and the crowd seemed appreciative when I taxied back in.

The club did a great job running the event, there were people everywhere at times which made the RAAF security guys a little upset. ATC was also working hard, they managed to keep it together but I think they may have been glad with the lower than planned aircraft numbers.

My congratulations to everyone - it was a great day - lets do it again soon!

There are photos by Stu Hutchison at : http://picasaweb.google.com/RocketVHFLY/RRFCFIOD29Nov08

and photos by Darin Mclean at:

http://picasaweb.google.com.au/pilot.daz/RRFCFlyIn2008

and if that's not enough, a short YouTube video is at:

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=YlFfWEs04xw

My next event is a display for Allianz at their Christmas function in the Yarra Valley. I'm looking forward to paying back their support to me.

Safe flying,

Cheers,

Tony

Hoxton Park Airport Wake

The "Hoxton Park Airport Wake" was held this weekend. The local SAAA guys organised the event to mark the expected closing of the airport, planned for 15th December 2008. There was a very good turn out of visiting people and aircraft, highlighting just what a loss this airport would be.

Some interesting news ... the property is now up for sale again. The developers have not been able to sell any of the sub-divided blocks. The aviation fraternity is hopeful that someone will buy the land and keep the airport operating - rather than just close it on the way to making more profit. There was much talk of developing the site into an "Airpark", ie a residential place for aviation folk to live. This is very popular in the USA and is gathering momentum in Australia but mainly in country areas at the moment. In the states there are Airparks scattered everywhere, including busy city areas.

I certainly hope that Hoxton doesn't close - it really is the last small airport within easy reach of Sydney.

It was great to catch up with people I hadn't seen for a while. As always, I was busy with my aerobatic training and had a very successful day - it's feels good to make progress!

Thanks to Stu Hutchison for the pics....

2008 NSW Aerobatic Championships

We had a terrific long weekend at Temora. The weather challenged us at times but only resulted in minor delays and some extreme wind conditions on the final day of flying.

I flew across to Temora on the Thursday for some final practice prior to the comp starting. On Friday morning I arrived at the hangar to find a flat tyre, I've never had one before and now it happens at the comp...anyway, that mostly ruined my practice day, I eventually got it fixed thanks to great support from the locals at Temora (mainly Grant Booth aka Captain Kaos).

The Qualifying flight for Advanced on the Saturday morning could have gone better but at least I qualified! The first actual competition flight, the "Free" sequence was later that day. My first attempt was an air abort due to cloud in the box. After about an hour it was OK and I launched again with only minor cloud in my way. The flight felt very good and scored the same. This resulted in me winning that flight and giving me a good lead over the next competitor, Russell Bell (from New Zealand). The next day we flew the "First Unknown", I thought I had flown it clean but one of my rollers got zeroed (to be honest it was a poorly flown roller). The rest of the flight scored very well but that zero gave Russ the win for that flight and left us about even going into the final flight, the "Second Unknown". This was the first time I had flown an "Advanced Second Unknown" which are known to be notoriously difficult. This one was reasonably challenging, plus we had over 30 knots of wind to deal with. My aim was to get through it without an error or a break and indeed I did, well I thought I did. Much to my dissapointment, I zeroed my inverted 3 turn roller (looking at the score sheets, I flew it outside instead of inside - that figure was 40K and proved to be a costly mistake), and a couple of my figures should have been flown better. So I again finished second to Russel and that gave me second overall for the weekend. Congratulations to Russell on a terrific win.

I was disappointed not to win but I was the new guy in Advanced, so all in all, I'm happy with the result.
This competition has highlighted the areas of my flying that need work, and work on them is exactly what I'll be doing in the coming weeks and months.

This was also the first comp with my family in attendance. It was a little strange having my wife, Angela, and our twin toddler girls out on the flight line but it was lovely to have them there. I also had Les and Pauline Day along for support - thanks guys. I made them all wear Allianz hats which they happily did!

A couple of times over the weekend my plane was referred to as the "Allianz Rebel 300", not bad considering the recency of our hook up with Allianz. Allianz continue to impress me with their professionalism and determination to establish themselves into the Aviation Insurance market. Give them a try, I'm sure you will find them helpful, aviation@allianz.com.au or (03) 9224 3044 .

After flying finished on the Sunday, Paul Phelan of Australian Flying Magazine fame, asked me to do an aerial photos shoot with the Redbull Extra from Bankstown. Paul took photos from a Cessna (he looked very cold up there with the door open....) and these photos should accompany an upcoming story about Competition Aerobatics in Australian Flying Magazine. It will be great for our sport to get some more coverage. I think more people would be keen to try it if they knew more about it.

My thanks go to all involved with the NSW Champs for a smooth flowing and enjoyable weekend and a special thanks to those who have directly supported me over the past year. I feel I've learnt a lot but really we have only just begun...

Allianz Insurance supporting Aviation in Australia

www.allianz.com.au

I am proud to report that Allianz Insurance are further supporting General Aviation and Aerobatics through our Rebel 300. Allianz provides insurance to over 80 million people world-wide and expanded into theAustralian Aviation Insurance market in early 2008. It is a pleasure to be affiliated with such a notable sponsor.

You can contact Allianz Aviation Insurance via email aviation@allianz.com.au or call the office on (03) 9224 3044 .

Make sure you tell them that Tony Blair said to look after you!

Just over a week to the NSW Champs!!

It's getting close to the NSW Aerobatic Champs. In a weeks time we will head over to Temora and finalize our preparation for the event. The Sydney winter has been kind, allowing a good amount of training over the preceding months. It looks like there will be a reasonable field competing in Advanced, including Russell Bell who will make the trip over from New Zealand. Russell has been conducting an intensive training period over the past weeks, flying Richard Wiltshires Extra 300L.

In other news, we are currently negotiating our first sponsorship deal and should be able to announce the details in the coming days.

Hope to see you at Temora!

Training for Advanced

Not much going on lately. Flying as often as possible at the "Advanced" level in an attempt to be ready for the NSW Champs which will be held over the first weekend of October. It's a pretty big step up from Intermediate but I'm enjoying the challenge. The plane continues to impress, just need to keep working on the driver...

Wollongong Fly In

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Attended the RV/SAAA fly in at Woollongong. It was a pleasant flight on the way down. I met up with brother in law, Les Day. Also, Mark McNicol and partner, RoseMarrie came down in their Yak52, which has just been sold. Mark and I flew back in formation through pretty miserable weather but it was fun. With all the aerobatics training, I haven't done many trips like this lately - must fix this, it was a great little trip! Thats Les and I on the right.

F1 Rocket Purchase

"Stu the Nav" has purchased an F1 Rocket aircraft kit! ( an example is in the pic above)

This will keep him busy for the next few years! Congratulations Stu, Happy building.

Training Day Washed Out!

Well we did have a training day and mini-comp arranged but the Sydney weather turned on us today....didn't even get off the ground! We will try again soon. The Mudgee Airshow is on next Saturday with Grant Piper flying his first Airshow performance.

Advertising opportunity

If you would like to know more, please contact Tony Blair on 02 473 77310,

0433 070099 or email blairclan@gmail.com

A tribute to Bryscen!

In the week leading to the Aust Champs, a well respected and valued member to the club, Bryscen Teape-Davis, was tragically killed in a Pitts Special. On the first day of the Comp we flew a "missing man formation" as a mark of respect. I feel honoured to be part of that formation and pass my sympathies to his wife and family.

Australian Aerobatic Championships

Just a few weeks after the Vic Champs the Australian Championships were held at Parkes over the Easter period. What a fantastic week...I was fortunate to get more coaching from Allen Kilpatrick in the weeks leading up to the comp, and once again it paid off. Again Stu the Nav and I made the trip across together, it's becoming routine now, we met overhead his house on the edge of the Blue Mountains and then made the transit to the west. The weather was great the entire time, a bit windy at times but nothing too serious. This was my second comp in Intermediate.

After winning the Vic Champs, I had high expectations which only puts you under more pressure.

I flew the first flight reasonably well but got down around the bottom of the box in the middle of the sequence. Half the judges "lowed" me which resulted in a 100 point penalty. That took me from leading to almost last! Ouch! I wasn't convinced that it should have carried, the rules are not crystal clear in that area when Chief Judge scores are included - so I protested and won. So now I was leading and got my $75 protest fee back - I was very happy going to bed that night! Unfortunately the other competitors, lead by John Sharpe who would have otherwise been winning, put their heads together when they found out the next morning and put in a counter protest. They won too, go figure! So the 100 point penalty was re-applied to my score. This meant I would need to fly very well to win the event overall but I wasn't giving up just yet.

John Sharpe was flying very nicely and no wonder, he is a competent Advanced pilot.

Luckily, I won the next 2 flights by enough to claw back the penalty and give me a win overall. That was a very good feeling to say the least!

John is trying to sell his plane, so this may have been his last comp in this plane. On some level I felt it would have been nice for him to win but I was there to win too - sorry John!

The presentation dinner was huge, actually it got quite ugly later on. There were no injuries and plenty of good stories the next morning, so all is well that ends well!

The next day saw a huge change to the weather. We couldn't fly home, so we hitched a ride and drove home to Sydney. Stu and I came back a couple of days later to get the planes and had a very pleasant flight back to Sydney in formation.

It was a great weekend and I congratulate all involved, especially the officials and volunteers, on a well run and enjoyable event.

Victorian Aerobatic Championships

In February, the 2008 Vic Champs were conducted at Tocumwal. I understand this was the first comp held at Toc and it was a great success. Other than some cloud in the box on Saturday, the weather was great and the hospitality fantastic.

In the months leading up to the comp, Allen Kilpatrich spent a lot of time in the paddock to coach me. Al has great passion for the sport and is always keen to pass on his experience. When Al, wasn't available Rich Wiltshire helped me too. I can blame Rich for my involvement in this sport - his enthusiasm is intoxicating. Thanks guys!

I competed in Intermediate at this comp. Really it was my first serious comp, I did fly at the NSW Champs late last year but only had the plane flying a matter of days before the event, so it was more practice than competition.

I was surprised how nervous I became here at Toc. I'm not sure why, perhaps it's the constant attention required to not make a silly mistake. My flying seemed to be OK. I won the Known, the Free and the Unknown to win Overall. A very pleasing result to say the least! John Lee was never too far behind in his One Design and that kept the pressure on for the entire weekend.

Stu Hutchison (who quickly became known as "Stu the Nav" as he's an RAAF Navigator) and I flew down in formation. Stu lead the way, as a Navigator should, in a Rockwell Commander and I hung with him in the Rebel. Stu was great support during the weekend - thanks mate!

The trip home was a 3 ship with Allen Kilpatrich and Stu in the lead plane with Rich Wiltshire and myself on the wing - it was entertaining for so many reasons...

To see some pictures of the comp check out the photo album.

Thanks to the Vic chapter for a great weekend.

New Blog Page

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