LSF

How much fun is F3L? The pilots couldn’t say how much they loved the past two days enough. My buddy from Massachusetts thanked me for talking him into flying the contest. Newbies at the contest were just beaming, and the pros say this is their favorite contest.

The 2025 AMA F3K Nats was finally on a weekend, after being held during the week for many years. The lineup this year reminded people of the Team Selects in Florida a few months ago.

It is just a beautiful day to fly 2-meter (2M) wooden sailplanes! The sun is out, there’s a light breeze of about 6 mph, and you have 30 pilots divided into seven teams shooting little wooden RES sailplanes into the sky on FAI regulation highstarts.

I am sitting and writing this synopsis, enjoying a beautiful sunset from Site 5 overlooking the AMA headquarters building at the conclusion of day 2 of the 2025 AMA/LSF F5J Nationals.

It was a calm and quiet morning. The birds were chirping and leaves rustled outside of Casa Muncie. I lay in bed (cot) for a few minutes before I realized it wasn’t raining! That means the F5J soaring competition will start on time and everyone will be joyous and happy! There might even be singing… probably not.

Cloudy and overcast skies with threatening thunderstorms later in the day didn't deter a single pilot from cruising the skies over Muncie…searching, hoping to embrace and become one with that ever elusive rising air. Spotty lift for the first few rounds opened up into nice conditions until…

Saturday morning (7/19/25) begins the first day of the two-day Altitude Limited Electric Soaring (ALES) contest at the AMA’s International Aeromodeling Center in Muncie, Indiana. CD Norman Poti will manage the festivities.

Day three of the Cross Country (XC) portion of the 2025 Soaring Nats began just as the first two did…rain! It went away around 11AM. We began our day setting up the winch and starting festivities under heavily overcast skies. The ceiling was somewhere around 1500 feet and the air was buoyant with some really good lift in spots.

The day began much like yesterday, waiting for the ominous weather to pass us by, and it did! Launching the Pike Perfect on the winch is a nice stress-free experience, straight up and smooth.

The Cross Country portion of the Nats got off to a rainy start at Monroe Central High School in beautiful Parker City, Indiana, postponing our day for a few hours. We, of course, sat under the pavilion telling tall tales as the moisture fell.