Use a 6 volt NiMh 1100mah battery for more torque and speed. Futaba 3010 or HT 635 are good all around. Glue short pieces of brass tubing on the wing hold down wood dowels. Make sure everything is assembled straight.

I hope you are one of those quick-learning, advanced beginning pilots. That ARF is a handfull with it's huge control surfaces. It's only bad habit that most of them have is that it will snap right on you when you pull a lot of up elevator. Be carefull and stay high until you get the hang of it. If you keep the rates low, and the CG forward, it should be ok. You might want to reinforce the landing gear block area by CA'ing some light ply on the floor of the nose right in front of the gear block (where that area of thin balsa is). Butt the two edges together and glue them really well there (thick CA). Use plenty of thick CA, it's light.