RE: I would never enter a contest because......
The "fly what you brung" types of events are good to get club members involved and eliminates the excuse of having to have a specialized design to enter. The funny thing is (and one of the reasons I started this thread), If everyone in my club (close to 200 members) that owned an IMAC legal airplane entered our IMAC contest there would be at least 100 entries I believe! We have typically had close to 20 or less. Certainly not enough to close the field for 2 days. I personally believe that 2 day events should be avoided unless there is a large number of entries pre-registered.