Practice flying? I always seem to prepare for a contest by building!

The most important part of ANY flight is where you finish. If you are not a few feet up in position to land, keep on working. This means you need to practice all the events planned, and get a feel how to keep the plane "in range".

In that regard, I find Double Modified Dixie Death (3 rolls, 3 loops, touch, repeat), 5 roops (roll-loop x 5) and split roops (3 roops, touch, repeat) to all be good events to learn how to stay close (hint: throttle mgmnt during rolls). I find loop T&G's teach you to trust or to build. You learn a lot about your plane as you expliore the envelope during T&G's.

Go for it! Make sure your practice plane does not get too heavy, or it will fly real different from the contest bird. When it gets heavy, trash it (or give it to a kid), demote teh contest bird, and make a new Minus.

Chuck