Reno 1984 Nats: Nats Overview/Convention
UNDERSTANDING what the 1984 Nats was like requires looking at it from a lot of viewpoints. All kinds of descriptions apply, more or less: great, lousy, terrific, terrible, happy, sad, marvelous, awful. A lot depended upon what event and what weather was involved. Whatever the particular situation for any individual, the fact is that over 700 awards were made in the total of 76 competition events (the most ever). The weather was both excellent and terrible. Free Flight enjoyed four practically perfect days of light breezes, but RC Scale suffered with windy and dusty weather. RC Pattern and Pylon had both great and lousy weather, the latter with winds across instead of along the runway. In general the weather was a mixed bag of good and bad.
AMA Nats 1983: Nats Overview/Convention
A GREAT ONE. Some said it was the greatest Nats ever. Many said it was their best Nats. It wasn't the biggest, but it was bigger than many. It was obviously a happy one-a constant comment heard during the week had to do with how much people were enjoying themselves. A big fact was the closeness of all events. Everything was within a 5-mi. radius of Nats HQ. Once again, as in 1981, Free Flight was on the same airfield with Control Line and RC events, and so, once again, Free Flight was largely a happy event. Especially enjoyed was a good Indoor site on the same airfield-a rare and happy situation which added considerably to the feeling of togetherness.
Nats Overview
THE QUIET NATS. Many referred to it as "smooth." To others it was "lonely." The entry numbers were down, with `only' about seven hundred registered (actually 698-compared with about one hundred more in 1979, the last time the Nationals were held in Lincoln). But the '82 Nats were still the world's biggest model meet of the year and for many the numbers were not small. The Radio Control events were big with Aerobatics (173 entries!), Pylon Racing (105) and Soaring (136) having good turnouts. The "lonely" areas were Free Flight, both Indoor (48) and Outdoor (107)-if entries in these areas had been normal, the total numbers would have been over a thousand.
'81 AMA Texas Nats: Nats 81
IT STARTED with a letter about three years ago. Charles Parish of the San Antonio model club-the Alamo RC Society-wrote to AMA HQ and suggested that his area might have what it takes to put on a National Model Airplane Championships. Specifically, he noted that Brooks Aero Medical Center was available as the keystone of a package of facilities which could be used for a Nats. Investigation by AMA's Nats Executive Committee indicated that while Brooks was not suitable for the holding of enough events, the intended separate site for Free Flight would be. In fact, the latter site-Randolph Auxiliary Air Field, about 35 miles away at Seguin, TX-appeared to be ideal for accommodating most RC events and all of Control Line, in addition to the Free Flight events.
