Tag Archives: Rally Flying
RAND AIRPORT CHALLENGE 30 JAN 2021
The 17th Rand Airport Challenge was scheduled to take place at Rand Airport on Saturday 30th Jan 2021. However, the weather gods were not playing ball this time, and with “Eloise” blanketing almost the entire country in clouds and rain, we had to revert to PLAN B.
With the 22nd World Rally Flying Championships postponed to November 2021, the pressure is on to train and select the best Air Rally Team to represent South Africa at this prestigious event. With most of the “old guard” still in place and planning to take part, the opportunity, however, exists to bring some new fresh blood into the South African Rally Flying Team. 
The sport of Rally Flying is not an easy sport. It requires an exceptionally strong “2-man” team of both Pilot and Navigator. Unlike most of the other Air Sporting disciplines which are flyable at competition level, as long as one member of the team is well trained, in Rally Flying a strong pilot without a strong navigator and vice versa is as good as having no team at all.
For this reason, Jonty Esser, who himself is a well-seasoned Protea Rally Flying Pilot (as well as a local aerobatic pilot) has been selected to coach the 2021 South African Flying Team to victory, as soon as they have been selected which should be post the National Championships in April 2021. Now for the official team to be selected, this team has to be sufficiently trained in order to fly to the required standard criteria as laid down by the world organisation.
The past decade (plus) of Fun Rally Programs, introduced by Frank Eckard and Mary de Klerk, and the more recent program of Speed Rallies introduced by Jonty Esser and Rob Jonkers, has produced a remarkably high standard of potential Protea Pilots and Navigators that now need to be put through the Rally Flying Grinder Training modules.
There was no better opportunity to start the 2021 training program than the cancelled Rand Airport Challenge on Saturday 30th Jan 2021. No less than 25 exceptionally keen potential Team members arrived for the “On the Ground” training Modules. The Pilots were herded off into a separate venue and were taught some intricacies of rally flying in terms of fine tuning their approaches and timing overturn points etc by Jonty. The navigators were put through their paces by 30-year rally veteran, Mary, who spent the best part of a 4 hour period unpacking the plotting procedures, tools required and methodologies with the teams. She was adequately assisted by the other Protea Rally veterans, Frank & Cally Eckard, Hans Schwebel, Ron Stirk, Rob Jonkers, Martin Meyer, and Sandi Goddard. It is interesting to note that even though the “old guard” have between them, thousands of hours of local, national and international experience, they still managed to find time to drive through to Rand in the rain in order to sharpen their own skills and assist with all the newbies. Hats off to you guys!
Also, in attendance was the Aviation Legend Chester Chandler who, in his eighties now, still dedicated his day to visit and monitor the training session with great interest. He also stayed for the SAPFA AGM which was held at 14h00 and chaired by none other than Rob Jonkers with his dedicated SAPFA Committee members. We all welcomed Ian and Taryn Myburgh as new members onto the committee.
Rally Flying is a well renowned international sport recognised by the FAI. To represent one’s country at an international event is a supreme achievement. I applaud everyone who is taking the sport seriously in order to up weight their own personal skills and achieve what many others would only dream to achieve. However, nothing comes easy – it all requires many hours of hard work and input in order to succeed. Training training training ……
Watch this space to monitor all the upcoming training sessions and who the final SOUTH AFRICAN RALLY FLYING TEAM to represent our beloved country and the World Championships this year will consist of.
The 2020 Brakpan Airport Navigation Rally
With the National Rally Flying Championships only two weeks away, most of the existing Protea rally team members took part in the Class 1, or “Open” category of the sport at Brakpan Airport. It was also encouraging to see that after all the training sessions held by Mary de Klerk, Rob Jonkers and Jonty Esser, many of the previous “Fun Rallyers” stepped up to Class 1 as well.
Disappointingly, few of the local Brakpan pilots supported this event, even though one of the training sessions was held at the club recently. Hopefully more of them will be inspired to put their flying and navigational skills to the tests, especially as this sport improves general flying safety.
Organisers Frank and Cally Eckard kept the route fairly simple, so as not to discourage the first-timers. They all managed to complete the task sheet quite easily, except for one navigator who plotted the Start point from the wrong Brakpan Airport, which found his pilot heading off to start at the Finish point, and was surprised to find another aircraft flying directly towards him.
The “follow-the-feature” (a railway line) was easily managed by most of the teams, except for one who followed the wrong railway line. Frank did not include arcs in the route, as these require more skills, and will be incorporated into the next event.
The weather cleared in time for the scheduled take-off, and the winds were light, with just a very slight cross-wind over the run-way. It was decided to judge the landings after the rally, and the results showed that a lot of practise is required before the National Champs. For the first time in a SAPFA event, a helicopter set the record by winning the landing stage of the rally.
Apart from the Robbie 66, another aircraft of interest was the Mushak, which is featured in the latest Pilot’s Post.
The route took them to a Start Point near Ergo Slimes Dam, then South towards Heidelberg, to a point along the N3, then East towards Leandra, then back North along the railway line to Delmas, and home via Selcourt.
Although the results were far from what is required from a National standard, the selectors trust that the skills the entrants will pick up at Nationals will enable them to put together five “A” team and five “B” team partnerships to give SA the best chance of a good team result.
The full results are:
Landing Competition:
| Pilot | Navigator | Aircraft | Score | |
| 1 | Apie Kotze | Frederick Kotze | R 66 | 0 |
| 2 | Andre Kluytz | Don Lucas | C 172 | 10 |
| 3 | Antony Russell | Pamela Russell | C 172 | 20 |
| 4 | Jonty Esser | Sandi Goddard | C 150 | 30 |
| 5 | Von Hammon | Andy Gouws | C150 | 40 |
Class 3 (The Fun Rally section):
| Pilot | Navigator | Aircraft | Points | |
| 1 | Von Hammon | Andy Gouws | C150 | 974 |
| 2 | Hilton Wolf | Rob Osner | Mushak | 1374 |
| 3 | Roydon Gillies | Justin Dorrington | PA 28-140 | 1781 |
| 4 | Clarrissa de Costa | Kerry Mathysen | C152 | 1989 |
Class 2 (The Intermediate Section):
| Pilot | Navigator | Aircraft | Points | |
| 1 | Thys van der Merwe | Sally Shaw | C172 | 594 |
Class 1 (The Unlimited or Open Section):
| Pilot | Navigator | Aircraft | Points | |
| 1 | Jonty Esser | Sandi Goddard | C150 | 435 |
| 2 | Antony Russell | Pamela Russell | C172 | 539 |
| 3 | Rob Jonkers | Martin Meyer | C182 | 709 |
| 4 | Hans Schwebel | Ron Stirk | C150 | 741 |
| 5 | Andre Kluyts | Don Lucas | C172 | 1085 |
| 6 | Apie Kotze | Frederick Kotze | R66 | 1210 |
| 7 | Hendrik Loots | Jandre Loots | Sling | 1214 |
| 8 | Derek Bird | Quentin Taylor | Super Decathlon | 1586 |
| 9 | Milan Daniz | Caroline Koll | TC07 | 1856 |
| 10 | Piet Meyer | Adrienne Visser | Jabiru J400 | 1956 |
| 11 | Fanie Scholtz | Herman Haasbroek | Sling 2 | 2800 |
A score less than 2000 indicates that with the training and discipline the pilots experience at Nationals, they should be able to be selected to represent South Africa in Stellenbosch in November.
Nationals take place from Thursday 2 – 4 April, with training at your own discretion. Look out also for our very exciting Speed Rallies. Please see our website sapfa.org.co.za for our events calendar.
By Cally Eckard
Pilot Insure 7th Speed Rally-Season 2 Springs 23 November 2019
Season 2 of the Pilots Insure Speed Rally in already upon us for the second edition of the growing flying sport which is becoming an exciting aviation event around South Africa, with 2020 close it was decided for the first of the speed rally proceedings to start earlier then usual.
The last Speed Rally held at Secunda on the 10th August was the finale of the 2018/19 season, and the 6th in the series, where it had returned to the birth of the Speed Rally concept in 2018. This new Season as Season 2 should prove to elevate this event to the next level, and since the completion of the 1st Season an extensive Season debrief was held with the officials and a number of competitors to review the rules and workings of the Speed Rally concept to look at improvements and changes, a number of which have been brought into the competition. One of the major changes was to extend the overall distance from 125 nm to 150 nm, to make the legs a little longer to accommodate the faster aircraft, most of the other
changes facilitating the crew with better cockpit paperwork.
Furthermore a GPS category was brought into play, which would allow novices to be introduced to the event without the stress of knowing or not knowing where to go, with the intent to get themselves
upgraded to Championship status after having gained sufficient experience.
Entries were already open after Season 1, and many already confirmed their entries which quickly went over 40, with an eventual count at 40 on Friday, with 3 withdrawing on the day. This event is attracting
many father & son teams, and many more of the younger generation. It was decided for this event that the Mach 1 Flight School would be the hosts on the airfield, they have as a school been involved from the first
rally and have increased their participation with their instructors, and seeing from the results over time they have become more experienced and moving up in the placings.
With a view of bringing in more excitement to this event, a shortened course of 60 nm with 3 laps in the
style of a Grand Prix circuit was also designed by Race Master Jonty Esser for a small field as a try out
event.
This event is one that is flown at full speed under handicap conditions, the course is now around 150 nm long, has 11 or so turning points, with each turning point identified with a correct photograph. This is also
an event where no GPS aids are allowed in the Championship league, these are all sealed up, and courtesy of Century Avionics on-board devices are also covered up, although not disabled. In the GPS league, competitors can utilize any technology, although it seems that this did not help much, a number of the GPS enabled competitors also went walk about…
The route was mostly to the east of the airfield, not in the most scenic part of the country, which is mostly dotted with power stations and coal mines, but then the competitors would have been more concerned
about keeping track than looking at scenery.
The weather on Friday started out real well, the forecast giving late afternoon thundershowers which were lurking towards the west. Test flights commenced with many new entries requiring test flights and some
old entries wanting to retest to re-confirm their handicaps. The EAA came in to help with this, with Sean Cronin & Karl Jensen supporting SAPFA’s test flight designate Mark Clulow, and got through all the test
flights just after 3 PM. Mary de Klerk also breezed in to provide the newbies with some dedicated training.
Thereafter at 18h30, Jonty Esser as the Race Master introduced Rob Jonkers who took to the stage and provided a briefing on what to expect for the next day in terms of the planned route, how many turn points,
distance, departure and arrivals protocol, and also how the scoring system worked in terms of penalties as well as the expected weather conditions, which looked like some early cloud, then a clear day expected
with late afternoon thundershowers.
All the competitors were then treated to a briefing on Steroids with Race Master Jonty Esser having set up a show for the teams, with a real life lights, camera, action sequence, where each team were introduced
with their team theme song, handed their race numbers, thereafter everybody was treated to a buffet meal before retiring for the evening.
Saturday morning dawned with perfect flying conditions, a clear day with virtually no wind, with the briefing
starting a little earlier at 7.30 am as the intent was to finish the rally at 11.30 to be able to fit in the Grand Prix in the early afternoon.
The briefing was shorter than the previous evening, and focused on the procedures for scrutineering, the handing out of papers, starting line, and finish protocol. The aircraft were to be parked in order of slowest
to fastest, with a 15 second gap as a minimum between them, with the idea to have all the aircraft cross the finish line as close to 11h30 as possible, given that everybody needs to achieve a perfect route around
the course. There was a plan to also to live track the event under the events section of Livetrack 24, and for this purpose a number of live trackers were loaned and set up, although this proved to be very finicky,
it had marginal success, although
Scrutineers Chareen, Lizelle, Karen, Conrad, Johan and Alex were on hand to seal up all portable GPS capable devices, and also handing out papers at the allotted time, and also checking the fuel tanks were
full. To assist the teams at getting their take-off roll accurate, a starting colour panel was used, which was set up next to the start line on the runway by Chief Marshal Jacques Jacobs and Mark Clulow, who would
release them at their allotted time slot.
Each team then received their envelopes with their loggers at their 20 minutes prior take-off time, and then taxi to the starting line within 10 minutes of take-off time. 1st take-off was at 09h40 for the slowest aircraft
and last take-off at 10h40, with planned arrival at 11h30. This was the first time two helicopters also tookpart, one an Alouette 2 and the other a Robinson R66, the Alouette 2 being the slowest and was the first
to depart.
With all the competitors off towards the east, the route had a mix of easy and challenging turn points. In general the competitors found the course a little more difficult than the last one, especially around
turn point 4, where is seems the rail and road crossing was difficult to spot, attesting to the increased difficulty that there were only 13 clear round aircraft, out of 40. Just before 11h30 the first aircraft over the
line was a Cessna 172 ZS-OET, follow by a Sling 4 ZU-IOK, and closely after that the R66 ZS-HRS, and from there within the next 2 minutes or so 20 aircraft with stragglers coming up the rear. The landing
sequence was fairly easy to do with everybody joining crosswind, then downwind onto 03 with good spacing.
After all teams having returned and safe on the ground, the scoring team got to work to analyse the results, with the tracks for a number being quite accurate, although some had wobbles, but a few got a bit
lost, the Alouette 2 flying at full speed being very thirsty in fuel consumption decided to carry out a precautionary landing in Nigel to refuel before resuming the course.
The results were completed by around 14h30, and prize giving was schedule for 15h30, and first up on the prize giving programme was to show some of the interesting tracks, some excellent and some not so good getting the audience in fits of laughter. Jonty first handed over the GPS league competitor trophies, and then the host club trophy went to the Mach 1 Flight Training School owner Lee Petersen, and then the placings for the best handicap speed and thereafter the most accurate / shortest route flown. Winners of the GPS league were the team of Ray Wilford and Bernard Jansen in a Sabre ZU-DIY.
The overall winners in the best handicap speed were the team of Munaf Sayyed & Ricardo Baruffa in a C172 ZS-OET, in second place was Joshua & Mark Dethian in their PA28-180 ZS-ELL, and in third place Apie & Frederick Kotzee in their R66 ZS-HRS.
The most accurate / shortest route flown winners were the team of David Ross & James Braid in a Sling 2 ZU-JAR, in second place was Hendrik & Jandre Loots in their Sling ZU-IHK, and in third place was Quinten Kruger & Johan Whiteman in their PA28-235 ZS-FVV.
Many thanks to the Mach 1 Flight School for hosting this fantastic event, the SAPFA team of Jacques Jacobs with the ground marshals, Nigel Musgrave as the Safety Officer, Dirk and Louna de Vos and Mark
Clulow doing the scoring, Chester Chandler assisting with the handicapping on Friday, David le Roux from Pilot Insure at the registration desk, Marc Robinson with his team from Century Avionics for Scrutineering,
Chareen Shillaw, Lizelle Kruger handing out competition papers to the crews as well as Scrutineering with their team, Jonty & Lizelle & Sandy for putting together an awesome Friday evening launch event. Thanks
also extended to Santjie White of the ARCC who always watches over us, and the ATNS team for managing the ATC for the weekend.
Also to the sponsors Pilot Insure, who was the main sponsor of the event, Flightline Weekly for sponsoring
the race numbers, team sponsors Excel E&I – Leon Bouttell and Martin Meyer, The Airplane Factory –
David Ross and James Braid, Pilots Post – Nigel Hopkins and Mary De Klerk, Fast Flame Laser Cutting –Oops – We went to Nigel instead
Hendrik & Jandre Loots, Beegle Micro Trackers – Quintin Kruger and Johan Whiteman, Prompt Roofing –
Leon Joubert and Sandi Goddard.
Our next Speed Rally event will be in Witbank in the 1 st of February 2020.
Rand Airport Challenge 2019
A typical summer morning at Rand Airport where most pilots like to take to the skies over Johannesburg and enjoy the beautfual scenary
around the Gauteng Province.
This past weekend we attended the first fun Rally for the year and no better place to have it at a busy airport,with the Harvard Cafe
along side the terminal building, pilots and navigators stocked up on a filling breakfast and coffee, they made their way to the airports terminal building for a sharp briefing at 8.30am.A quick photo of every participant in front of what could be a oasis of palm trees shading Rand Airport Tower!
Once the briefing was over the team memebers made their way to their aircraft making sure all routes and refrences marked out so that the best man or women wins.
The SAPFA Committee, particularly Rob Jonkers and Mary de Klerk, who organised a very thorough workshop recently on Rally Flying, saw their efforts bear fruit at the annual Rand Airport Challenge, when a record 8 teams took part in the Intermediate form of the sport. In previous years most participants preferred to stick to the simplest and easiest form which is Fun Rally, but this year pilots and navigators were encouraged to enter the more difficult category. The reason for this, is to elevate their skills levels, so that they can participate at national level, thereby building up a new breed of South African champion rally pilots and navigators.
The navigators and pilots in the Intermediate category had one hour to plot the entire route, and had to do so in the cockpit, which was a first for most of them. They also had far more photo targets to identify, and these were mixed up instead of being sequential and only one per leg. The pilots had only a 5 second window to get through each turn-point, instead of 15 seconds for Fun.
Organisers Frank and Cally Eckard gave them the task of flying an arc, which is a curved track between two turn-points, and a follow-the-feature, where they have to fly along a road, river or railway line. Every pilot flew the arc perfectly, and really enjoyed the challenge.
The route took them south from Rand Airport, around Suikerbosrand to Heidelberg, then down to two turnpoints on the banks of the Vaal Dam, and back again near Vereeniging to the Finish Point at Klipriviersberg Nature Reserve.
Rand Airport, who sponsor the Rand Airport Challenge Trophy, also waived landing fees on the days for the participants. The trophy was won by the defending team of Shane Brits and Karen Stroud, who have been putting a lot of effort into their sport.
The full results are:
The Fun Rally section:
| Pilot | Navigator | Points | |
| 1 | RC Shillaw | CJ Shillaw | 319 |
| 2 | Thys van der Merwe | Gerda | 870 |
| 3 | Kim Pratley | Andrew Pratley | 1231 |
| 4 | Piet Meyer | Pieter Kriel | 1410 |
The Intermediate Section:
| Pilot | Navigator | Points | |
| 1 | Shane Britz | Karen Stroud | 750 |
| 2 | Jonty Esser | Jonathan Esser | 967 |
| 3 | Adrian Pilling | Adam Pilling | 982 |
| 4 | Don Lucas | Andre Kluyts | 1488 |
| 5 | Leon Bouttell | Karyn Purchase | 1955 |
| 6 | Mark Clulow | Renee Clulow | 2170 |
Unfortunately the two teams consisting of Phil Wakely and Mary de Klerk, and Jakes Jacobs and Franz Smit did not complete the course due to mechanical problems.
The Unlimited Section:
| Pilot | Navigator | Points | |
| 1 | Rob Jonkers | Martin Meyer | 409 |
| 2 | Hans Schwebel | Ron Stirk | 766 |
| 3 | Antony Russell | Pamela Russell | 1344 |
Everyone thoroughly enjoyed the challenge of this sport, and are all very motivated to take part in the next events:
- 1-2 Feb – Cape Speed Rally, Morning Star
- 16 Feb – Training Day in Brits, with the focus on the role of the pilot, and cockpit-management
- 23 March – Virginia Rally, Durban (with a training course on 22 March)
- 4 – 6 April – Rally Nationals, Stellenbosch
Please enter online at http://Sapfa.org.za
