Clover Creek 2016

This year, the Clover Creek Invitational had a separate freestyle contest that allowed pilots that were not flying IMAC to compete. It was my first time at Clover Creek and I was amazed to say the least. The field is absolutely perfect. There was a total of 21 invited freestyle pilots from all over the US and from other countries such as Puerto Rico, Australia, and Italy. There was a total of 7 rounds flown. The first 5 rounds were preliminaries and there was 14 who moved on to the semi finals in round 6.
Once they got to the finals they kept the top 7 pilots after the semi finals. The contest was restarted with a clean slate for the top 7. We left a week before the contest and our first stop was in Southern Indiana to do some practice at a field we were able to get access to for the entire weekend before the contest. We then left for Clover Creek Aerodrome in Toone, Tennessee. We started practicing at our home field about a month before the contest and we had plenty of time to get the routines the way we wanted. The total drive time from our house to Clover Creek was about 11-12 hours. We were able to get about 5 good practice flights at the field before the contest started on Friday. The weather was perfect all weekend with no rain. All of our equipment held up great and The Lord blessed us with a great result at the end. Huge thanks to my parents for all of their help with everything and thanks to all of my sponsors for their help throughout the preparation of this contest. All glory goes to God!
The airplane that I was flying in Clover Creek is the prototype 100″ Slick 580 which is a brand new 120cc freestyle design from Extreme Flight RC. I have worked very closely with Chris and Ben from EF for the past 10 months and were able to come up with what in my opinion is the next level airframe for XA freestyle competition. We took what we have learned from all previous 35% releases from EF and 3DHS and we put together the best all around airplane that I have flown. Anywhere from slow floaty and stable 3D to high speed extreme aerobatics with aggressive tumbles and blinding fast roll rate. We are also showcasing the new printed ultracote which EF has offered since last year. I believe that the scheme we used shows this off quite well with complex faded patterns and several different blending techniques. It is powered by the DA-120 spinning a Falcon 27×11 prop which has plenty of power for this airframe which is only a 100″ wingspan and 99″ fuse length. I am running the MKS high voltage brushless 380 servos which are extremely reliable, strong, and high quality. I prefer the Pulse 2S RX batteries and Spektrum radio equipment. I am very excited to see this airframe in production as I believe it will elevate everyone’s flying and be the next top choice for freestyle competition.