It's cyclical. Here in Scotland the pattern scene is alive and kicking (yes, of course we fly pattern in Scotland!)
but if you want to be competitive, your still gonna need a fairly decent plane
Fairly decent doesn't mean expensive. Try a Flair (now CM Pro) Swallow with OS 91 two stroke and standard servos. Great plane and all in it costs less than a 160. My younger brother does a great job of flying P-07 with it. It's how you move the sticks, not what plane you fly.
Pattern does not have to be expensive.
Start adding more visually appealing maneuvers to the existing patterns? F3Ai/F3P is already incorporating some of these maneuvers. The last maneuver in the F3Ai sequence is a single torque roll. Perhaps add different attitude flight maneuvers. At current the more difficult patterns...most of it is just changed from up right maneuvers to inverted maneuvers, and adding points into the rolls. What about KE. A simple KE pass in the sportsman class would improve the WOW factor, and dont kid yourself. Most of the sportsman class flyers could pull it off. At current, we dont see KE flight till the Masters class. WHY? There's lots of WOW in KE flight. Im sorry, but by the time you get to masters, you should be able to do a KE pass, with a negative snap in the middle back to KE. Do this at your field, and watch jaws drop. What happened to rolling circles? Ive seen kids with foamies doing rolling circles in the backyard, yet we dont see this maneuver in any of the AMA classes. Of course you still have to fly these with precision, but I think adding maneuvers that push the skills, will just end up making is better pilots in the long run
I agree. Watching P-07, unless it's truly a world level flyer is dull as hell, but so are other types of flying. Just look at 3D done averagely, absolutely horrible to watch. However, watching F-07 and unknowns is great. Flying them is also much more fun than just P-07 as well
Perhaps if they made the schedules shorter (as they are thinking of doing) it would be a bit less dull and speed up contests a bit. They should also bring back the mighty Figure M with 3/4 rolls. A superb manoeuvre.
A