2024 (Dec) North Island AkroFest – Review

Success! A North Island Akro Fest that actually occurred on the planned date—it feels like we never get it right with the weather. Could it be that we are based in North Waikato, famous for morning fog and/or wet northerlies? This time, we had few problems, although some persistent cloud that kept re-forming over Mercer Airport at 2000’ did slow things down for a few hours on Sunday.

The field was in great condition, and we had the impressive facilities of Mercer Airport to ourselves (thanks, as always, to Neil, Dee, and the Mercer team).

The regular Ardmore-based pilots (David, Brent, John) were joined by the Tauranga contingent (Steve and newbies Andrew and Dane), Chris from Whakatane and Pierre from Fielding. Sadly, there were no North Shore Aero Club pilots to contest ‘their’ event – the Langley Marshall Trophy – but we did get visitors from North Shore (Brent in his Yak 52 and Rob in his Lancair 360) to watch and help.

Speaking of helpers, we had more judges and helpers than competitors – in some respects not a bad problem! – so a big thanks to Clive, Andrew P, Trish, Gavin, Anton, and Brent H. And to judges Terry, Mike and Grant. Finally, the box marker team consisted of Clive, Andrew P, David, and Grant. For the first time in a while we had the complete set of box markers out, the extent of which were fully explored…and then some!

Day 1 started with the Knowns, and Brent kicking off action flying Intermediate in G202 NUT. By the lunch break, all competitors had completed their Known sequences, with judging sheets handed out and scores posted:

Being a competition where the highest overall percentage score wins, regardless of class, it is worth noting the far-right column. At this point, David was in form and scoring an average of 8.9/10 for his figures – very impressive. Steve, Pierre and Brent were close too, but Chris? Chris, Chris, Chris. Zeros hurt!

After lunch, the Free/Free Known sequences were flown, with a changing of positions and another surprising slide for Chris. Last year’s Champ, Pierre (flying the Super Decathlon) had now re-found his form and moved up to 1^st overall, closely followed by mover-and-shaker Steve, by now fully current in the Yak 52. David took a drop to 3^rd, but the scores remained high, and close too:

With the planes put to bed, Kelly hosted a fabulous ‘Äerobatic Dinz’ for many of the competitors and helpers. Delicious – thanks Kelz.

A bit of a sleep-in and things kicked off again Sunday morning…eventually! It was early afternoon before the cloud lifted sufficiently to commence, with Pierre leading the way in Sports.

As always, experience counts in the Unknowns, but maybe not currency, as Steve continued his charge up the leader board and into the 1st at the final count-up:

And there you have it – 2024 Langley Marshall Trophy winner, Steve Geard in the mighty Yak 52.

It was very close between the top three pilots, and it could have gone to any of them. But the shape of the loops, lines and placement of rolls made Steve’s flying just that little bit better overall – and NO ZEROS.

Next year, we look forward to seeing Steve competing in higher categories again, in his new Technoavia SP55.

Of note, the battle of the 70s (scores, not ages!) as Brent, John and Chris battled it out for 4th-6^th. Brent had a solid and reliable day in NUT, finally. John stayed within the Box, mostly and continues to improve. But Chris? Normally so consistent but maybe distracted with another plane build?! Watch out next year, everybody.

Andrew competes in Flying NZ events, and this was his first time at an NZAC event – welcome. And welcome too to first-time competitor Dane flying the Tauranga-based CT4. Solid flying, that will surely improve once he gets some coaching from Murray, especially in how to get the CT4 into a spin. We hope to see you again, Zane and Andrew.

Trish deserves mention here, for her regularly generosity in letting others use her RV6 to compete. Thanks Trish, and thanks for your help on the judge line too (sorry about the jokes!).

The same big thanks go to all the generous owners who allow others to fly and compete at our events – the ’renters’ would be lost without you, and the club would be a much smaller group without your selflessness.

Bring-on the 2025 Nationals.

In-depth results are available by clicking HERE