NATS '78: CL Aerobatics
Wynn Paul
Overview
Last year we all traveled to Riverside, California to watch the Irving kids, Rabe and Gieseke, one-two the Nats in Precision Acrobatics. This year we took our water jugs, swimsuits, and suntan lotion to hot and humid Lake Charles to see long-time Californian competitors Bob Whitely and Ted Fancher battle down to the wire. Whitely eventually won just about everything in sight, including the first-place Open Stunt trophy, the Walker Cup, his third Half-A stunt championship, and a tie for top honors in the airplane appearance points with Ron Harding and Bill Werwage at 19 points.
It was not a particularly smooth week for Whitely. He had fuel problems early in the week until Bill Werwage helped out. An overrun on qualifications day almost kept him out of the magic Top 20; this was followed by a very lean run on the last flight of qualifications day. Last year Whitely finished sixth on the Friday finals and missed Saturday's "Final-Finals." His previous highest finish was fourth in 1973 at Oshkosh with his Miss Kell powered by a .35 engine; this was followed by 13th in '74, 8th in '75, 15th in '76 and 6th in '77.
Runner-up in Open Stunt was the fast-improving Ted Fancher. A tie for third in last year's Nats and an 8th at the '77 FAI trials were Ted's best efforts to date. He flew last year's Concours D'Elegance winner, The Citation — an I-beam wing beauty that looks very good in the air. Ted had a special Super Tigre 46 prepared with a Dykes ring by Vic Garner.
Nats week started out as usual with pilots griping about the tie-down holes and poor circles allotted for Stunt. Probably the only way stunt pilots would ever be satisfied would be with 12 circles all perfectly flat with ice-smooth concrete surfaces and the closest trees at least 500 yards away. Event director Arlie Preszler and assistant Lanny Shorts spent a great deal of time trying to make things right.
Bill Howe took second place in the Cox Half-A Championship.
Senior and Junior Stunt
In what is getting to be the David Fitzgerald day at the Nats, Tuesday saw him win Senior Stunt for the second year in a row, giving him three Nats wins straight, including Junior in 1976. Senior Stunt had only six entries (down two from '77) and Junior Stunt had eight (up two from '77).
Dave was challenged by the Senior division pride of the Garden State Circle Burners, Kevin Capitanelli; both pilots flew 35-size airplanes with OS Max engines. Dave used his three-year-old modified Sig Chipmunk with Monokote on the wing and tail. Kevin flew a year-old modified Genesis 35 (with a stretched fuselage) and flew very slowly with excellent corners. I watched both of their last flights; both could be qualifiers in the Open division. David had very good intersections, square maneuvers and an outstanding four-leaf clover. Kevin had a very good first half of the flight—wingover, round figures, inside and outside squares, triangles—but his second half was not as strong.
Senior Randy Kauk had an eventful Nats. His plane was lost for a day along with Bob Baron's. Then, on his first official flight, the built-up wing folded in flight and he hurried off to the Belitz trailer to repair it. He came back to earn third place in the Senior event.
The Circle Burners cheered their junior entry in Stunt, Andy Harisiadis. Andy won the Junior Stunt title, fighting off a challenge by an improved Dan McClellan, 445.00 to 417.33. Andy flew a 62-inch-span Genie foam-wing plane weighing 58 oz., pulled by a Supertigre 46. He has been flying the pattern for only two years but impressed many Open fliers with some two-foot pullouts in practice. Dan McClellan flew a Super Chipmunk kit, powered by a Max .35, weighing 42 oz. with Monokote and K&B Epoxy paint.
The Bauer family was out in full force. Paula, 17, finished sixth in Senior Stunt as she was plagued with tank troubles. Matthew and Peter Bauer, flying prototypes of the new Top Flite Tutor (as was sister Paula), finished 7th and 8th respectively. Mark Bauer, 21, had a first edition of the new Top Flite Gieseke Nobler but, having only a few flights on the plane, struggled with trim.
For the past couple of years I've seen the name Tom Fluker on the Stunt scoreboard in the junior division but never remembered actually seeing him. This year I cornered him and his dad. No wonder he's hard to find; he flies Stunt, Goodyear, Fast and Slow Combat, Scale, Rat Race and Slow Rat Race at the Nats every year! He won Slow Combat on Monday and finished third in Junior Stunt. This was their fifth Nats; dad is his pit man.
Half-A Stunt
Half-A stunt moved up to Tuesday afternoon this year to keep Saturday open for the Walker Cup flyoff. As usual the breeze waited until just before Half-A to come up above 10–15 mph. Unfortunately, Half-A entries were way down: five in Open, one in Senior and only three in Junior. Even though PAMPA President Keith Trostle has attempted to minimize rules-making for the event to keep it a "fun event," all five Open entries were full-scale replicas of the "big stunt ships," as was the Senior entrant. Only the Juniors saw a couple of profile Half-A's.
As usual, Bob Whitely and David Fitzgerald won their respective divisions with Dan McClellan also winning again. At least this year Bill Howe was only nine points behind Whitely, which gave Bob a little scare. Tom Gaither and I, each with about five total practice flights apiece in preparation, showed there is still some spontaneity left in the event.
While all this was going on, the Garden State Circle Burners contingent of ten contestants finally located a traffic jam to remind them of home while the Open fliers headed out on the expanse of runways to practice for Open qualification. Everything was tried: different props, fuel changes, nose weight and tip weight. One favorite remark: "I think I need a different color shirt, this one clashes with my plane's color scheme."
Glen Meadors and equipment notes
- Glen Meadors' foam-wing, ST46-powered Eagle finished with Sig and Pactra paints. Stabilizer and elevator were also foam.
- Duct tape and patching compound were applied to smooth out the four circles.
Open Qualifications
Tuesday night saw the Preszler and Shorts nightclub act as the 50 or so stunt planes were placed on the floor of the gymnasium, with the top appearance points airplanes at the front and the rest in rows as the points diminished. Top appearance points of 19 went to:
- Ron Harding's P-40
- Bill Werwage's classic-type Juno (one year old)
- Bob Whitely's new Derringer
These three planes were also finalists for the second annual PAMPA Concours D'Elegance Most Beautiful Stunt Plane balloting by participating pilots. Most agreed that the overall group of planes this year was one of the most fantastic lineups of stunt planes ever at a Nats. Bill Werwage, who has been attending the Nats since 1955, said he couldn't remember a more beautiful group of planes. The appearance judging took a total of 2 1/2 hours, which included the pilots' meeting.
Two days of open qualifying followed with four circles in action. Five lucky fliers were picked from each circle using the sum of the best score from each of two flights each day. For once, the wind allowed two representative flights each day.
- Circle One: Ted Fancher way out in front. A close battle for fifth and sixth with Ron Harding and Glen Meador; Ron won out by 4.5 points.
- Circle Two: Norm Whittle ("Stormin' Norman") led with 1019.5 over the writer at 981.50. Former Senior champ Doug Stout missed the top five on the first day due to running short on fuel but made it on the second.
- Circle Three: Bob Baron had over 1000 points with a much improved Gary McClellan in second. Dick Mathis, with his mono-wheel retract stunt system, was third. A tight battle for the last two spots involved Lee Uberbacher, Gene Martine, Mike Rogers, and Dennis Harkai; Lee and Gene edged out the others.
- Circle Four: Bill Werwage dominated. Fourth, fifth and sixth places were decided by 1.5 points, with Roger Barrett coming out sixth, only half a point behind Paul Walker.
I got the general impression most fliers now like two days of open qualifications after trying it for two years. At least a pilot who travels 2,500 miles to the Nats gets more than one flight of eight minutes duration.
There were mutterings that the California 500 Stunt Club was going to challenge the Circle Burners to a "winner-take-all demolition derby" using Whitely's Cadillac versus Glen Meador's van, but cooler heads prevailed. We all headed for the swimming pool and then went for some Louisiana spaghetti at Papania's restaurant.
Finals and Walker Cup
Friday's finals in Open Stunt had good weather and the battle was on to see who the top five would be to advance to Saturday's "Final-Finals." With Rabe, Gieseke, McDonald, and Hunt in Europe for the World Championships, it looked like a wide-open contest. Six qualifiers were in the finals for the first time and made creditable performances:
- Stan Powell (tie for 8th)
- Doug Stout (12th)
- Gene Martine (15th)
- Lee Uberbacher (16th)
- Ron Harding (18th)
- Jim Casale (18th)
After the first round on Friday, Werwage and Fancher looked like shoo-ins for the Saturday finals. Whitely, Whittle, Paul, Baron, and Cooper all had a good chance. Gary McClellan and Stan Powell made very good second-round flights but just missed the magic five. Bob Baron's 503.5 in the second round was just short of my 508.0 from the first round to get the Pampawagon in at the fifth spot for the second year in a row. Unfortunately, Dick Mathis had some bad pizza (or something) the night before and was unable to fly on Friday, so we did not get to see his mono-wheel retract plane in the finals.
Veterans Dave Hemstrought and Bill Simons just missed the top ten, while Jim Armour moved up to 10th from last year's 12th. Neal Thompson, from Mansfield, Mass., was back for the first time since 1975 and placed a good 14th flying a Stiletto kit.
Saturday's Walker finals started with Norm Whittle's HP-40-powered Playboy setting the pace at 497.83, flying tight with good corners. Willie Werwage moved into first with a 512.83 with his midnight-blue Juno. The second round saw Whitely's score jump to a high of 523.33, but Ted Fancher moved into first place with a combined score of 1029.84 to Werwage's 1028.90. Norm Whittle let out his hourglass on the second flight, which probably cost him a place.
Fancher led off the last round with the highest single score of 529.50, but Whitely followed with a 527.50 to make his best-two-scores total 1050.83 to Fancher's 1048.17. Final placings:
- Bob Whitely — 1050.83 (Winner)
- Ted Fancher — 1048.17 (Runner-up)
- Bill Werwage
- Norm Whittle
- Paul (again)
As usual, Whitely showed his emotion in winning by clearing his ever-present sunglasses, putting his shirt back on for pictures, and smiling.
Equipment and results
Bob's winning plane is the 1978 version of the Derringer with a J & K 55-inch foam wing and a Super Tigre 46 engine prepared with a double ring setup by Tom Lay. The plane weighs 55 oz., the paint is Aero Gloss, and the prop is a Zinger 12x6 cut to 11.75 inches.
In the top five finishers there were four Super Tigre 46s and one HP-40. Foam wings finished 1st, 4th and 5th. In the top 20 planes there were:
- 11 Super Tigre 46s
- 3 Max .35s
- 1 ST 60
- 1 K&B .40
- 1 Fox .35
- 1 Max .40
- 1 HP-40
- 1 Max .45
Thirteen foam wings were used in the top 20 airplanes. Props were nearly evenly distributed between Rev-Up, Top-Flite, and Zinger.
Judges, scorers, and workers
Judges for this year's Nationals included:
- Chuck DeLano
- Bill Fitzgerald
- Bill Howe
- Tom Johnson
- Don Jorda
- John Laws
- Lee Lorio
- Gross Scruggs
- Dan McClellan
- Bill Simons
Tally director Sharen Fancher, recorders Joyce Shorts and Margie Preszler, and pit bosses Ron Merrill and Bob Adair spent a long week keeping up with scores, tally sheets, protests, wind-scattered sheets of paper, and heat-prostrated workers.
PAMPA banquet and awards
At the PAMPA banquet held Saturday night, the long-awaited Concours D'Elegance Most Beautiful Stunt Plane award was announced. The winner of the beautiful 48-inch replica Spad propeller was Ron Harding for his outstanding P-40 semi-scale plane.
Stan Powell was presented with the Roger Barrett "Highest Placing Rookie Award" for finishing in a tie for eighth place in his first Nats. Although the actual Walker Trophy and case were lost in transit from Dallas, Smilin' Bob Whitely was presented with the first-place Open trophy and the keys to the trophy case containing the Walker Trophy.
Transcribed from original scans by AI. Minor OCR errors may remain.
