Yep here too. Do you know what happened?

No it wasn't turn around, although how many times have you heard that?

It was a simple case of dilution. There are only so many people in any given group that are going to be a competetive pilot. Back in the day, there were far fewer choices if you wanted something a little more demanding.

Now we have IMAC, jets, 3D, helicopters that WORK, and of course...modern AMA pattern and SPA pattern.

Hence my point of why exclusion is not a great idea. It's my opinion, it has no tone. There is really no us and them. There's us and more us. But somehow that always gets lost in these threads.

And in truth there is really only one logical conclusion that was reached some time ago: We (being outsiders) have been told VERY clearly that we should not even attempt to change SPA or it's rules. That is just ice cold fact. But here's where everything gets blurred: we don't care!!!!! SPA can do whatever SPA wants. We ARE BPA, so we can do whatever WE want as well....and that means a very tolerant airframe and rule set. ALL SPA members are welcome to fly thier SPA planes, or they can jump up and break out the Aurora. Whatever floats your boat.

But that doesn't mean we condemn SPA, we simply don't agree. It's totally irrelavent too. I want to fly my Aurora from hell, in a pattern contest, and not have to worry about anything except the geometry of my manuever....period. No politics, no red tape, no stringent rules that I simply don't agree with. I want the freedom to fly what I want to fly in the general spirit of the event. I do the EXACT same thing in AMA pattern. Have you looked at my site? Do you know how much grief I got when I first entered into the 2 meter fray...in the modern era...competing against NOTHING but zillion dollar overseas composite jobs? With my self built self designed pile of sticks???? It's my thing. It's what drives me. If I couldn't be creative and free to experiment, I'd take up golf instead. It's a lot cheaper.

I certainly don't see that as complaining, or having "tone" to it. Perhaps the blunt straight forward approach comes off as "tone". Nope, I just hate wasting time and beating around the bush, I like to come straight to the point, and there it is. Life's too short to mince words.

Generally speaking, that is

-M