Spot landing contest

[jrh]

I helped organize a spot landing contest and BBQ at the local airport last Sunday. We promoted it to the flight students at my college, as well as other colleges and EAA chapters in the area. Unfortunately, the weather wasn't the best, so the turnout wasn't very high, but we still had a great time. 23 contestants total. About 5 or 6 were local EAA members and the rest were pilots from my college.

Here are a few pics from the afternoon.

[HH-60CC]

Nice pics! There aero club where I'm at is trying to organize a similar contest. PPL vs PPL, student vs student.

[Champcar]

Looks like they need to mow the runway.

[FlyingNole]

(For all the ATP guys)

I challenged Rich Tillery to a spot landing contest about 3 months ago when he was talking down to my CFI class. I said something to the affect of "Of course you're a better pilot, you've been flying before I was even born and you saw combat....So if you're so good, then you should have no problem having a spot landing competition with me."

He refused.....

[SoFlo]

You guys should have gone for pink slips. JK.

[jrh]

Originally Posted by Champcar

Looks like they need to mow the runway.

Haha, you're right. It's got a lot of weeds coming up through the cracks. They all die off as soon as the summer comes though. This is the worst time of year right now, when the weeds grow the strongest.

Ironically, there's a fairly nice 2500x50 grass runway parallel to the paved runway at this airport. You can see it behind us in the second picture.

[sorrygottarunway]

Originally Posted by FlyingNole

(For all the ATP guys)

I challenged Rich Tillery to a spot landing contest about 3 months ago when he was talking down to my CFI class. I said something to the affect of "Of course you're a better pilot, you've been flying before I was even born and you saw combat....So if you're so good, then you should have no problem having a spot landing competition with me."

He refused.....

I did the same thing with him but with Chandelles! He didn't even want to touch that one. Man, I wonder if he even remembers who I am.

[FlyingNole]

I asked him why not, he wouldnt answer...So I basically said "You may beat me 9 times out of 10, but that 1 time I'll get ya, and you will never live it down" and he agreed, so its obvious that he needs that "one up" over the ATP newbies. Dont get me wrong, I like listening to his stories and stuff, but the man is just a flight instructor...and thats it.

[sargeanb]

Gotta love spot landings competitions...3 of my students are on our flight team...they gave a good showing at nationals this year...maybe we'll do better next year


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBeqf...=flight%20team

-Brock Sargeant
MEII

[sargeanb]

That vid I just posted is causing all kinds of mayhem over at FI...hehe.

[jrh]

Originally Posted by sargeanb

That vid I just posted is causing all kinds of mayhem over at FI...hehe.

Like what?

I'm not a member over there.

[sargeanb]

"Courage, Integrity, and the will to win? You have got to be kidding me? Do you ERAU guys really believe this crap? I must be getting old as these kids are all just a bunch of young pups."

122 posts in the thread so far...

Yeah, they charge for membership now

[Chris_Ford]

You have to admit, that video is pretty self-serving and... dare I say... stupid.

[SoFlo]

The Eagles Flight Team challenged the Riddle instructor pilots to a competition and the results proved the Daytona based Flight Team is the finest in the country. ... (more)

Ummm......

[jrh]

Originally Posted by sargeanb

122 posts in the thread so far...

Well, I wasn't exactly blown away by the talent demonstrated in the video...but I certainly wouldn't waste time reading or writing 122 posts about it, either.

[CaptainChris87]

great pictures dude, did you get to fly? Im an officer as well as chapter coordinator up here at UND 1342, Ill bring this up with the pres, seems like a fun time.

[jrh]

Originally Posted by CaptainChris87

great pictures dude, did you get to fly? Im an officer as well as chapter coordinator up here at UND 1342, Ill bring this up with the pres, seems like a fun time.

Get to fly? Of course...and I won! Now I'm just bragging though...

But seriously, it was well worth the time it took to organize it. Things like this have a way of breaking up the monotony (sp?) of training and remind people why flying is so fun. It motivates people to be better pilots for the real world of flying, not just to pass a checkride. You should definitely put a contest together if you can.

Oh, and get some old geezers involved too! They make things even more entertaining.

[CaptainChris87]

lol our "old geezers" up here at UND are highly experienced one of the used to fly wild wiesel in Vietnam, and many have thousands of hours. I however do wanna see the cocky Stage instructors get all mad and competitive against each other haha.

[jrh]

Originally Posted by CaptainChris87

lol our "old geezers" up here at UND are highly experienced one of the used to fly wild wiesel in Vietnam, and many have thousands of hours. I however do wanna see the cocky Stage instructors get all mad and competitive against each other haha.

Thousands of hours don't mean much in a spot landing contest. We had a retired American Airlines captain compete (20,000+ hours), as well as some guys that had years (10+) of flight instructing and/or general aviation flying under their belts. They did well, but nothing a sharp student couldn't beat.

It's all about recent experience and being very comfortable in the make and model of aircraft you're flying.

[MikeOH58]

With all due respect....Thank God I never went to Embry Riddle...I dont mean to be an ass but doing a contest like that with baby pilots, your gonna end up getting some kid who gets it in his head he has to win and impress everyone with the perfect greaser, which will result in a prop strike or the poor fool making a hard landing and bouncing off the runway into a building...

---corny---

[TFaudree_ERAU]

Originally Posted by MikeOH58

With all due respect....Thank God I never went to Embry Riddle...I dont mean to be an ass but doing a contest like that with baby pilots, your gonna end up getting some kid who gets it in his head he has to win and impress everyone with the perfect greaser, which will result in a prop strike or the poor fool making a hard landing and bouncing off the runway into a building...

---corny---

Why does it have to be an Embry-Riddle student that acts like that? I love the sterotypes that are commonly associated with ERAU. I worked with a German flight instructor that got all of his ratings at the FBO where we worked and he had a bigger ego than ANYONE I ever met at Embry-Riddle. He wanted to organize a spot landing contest...

[jrh]

Originally Posted by MikeOH58

With all due respect....Thank God I never went to Embry Riddle...I dont mean to be an ass but doing a contest like that with baby pilots, your gonna end up getting some kid who gets it in his head he has to win and impress everyone with the perfect greaser, which will result in a prop strike or the poor fool making a hard landing and bouncing off the runway into a building...

Baby pilots? Hahaha...come on...what does it take to become a full-grown pilot? 100 hours? 500 hours? 7000 hours?

I'll admit, I thought about the same thing, but we set up a few rules to prevent anything too wild from happening. Everyone had to land in a nose-high attitude, couldn't retract the flaps until after landing, no "jamming" the plane on to the runway, etc. Basically, it had to look like a normal, decent landing in order to count.

We had 30 hour student pilots competing with no problem.