The Third Annual Holkham Bay for the Holidays Dash

[RedGreen]

It's that exciting time of the year again. It's not just because of the food you consumed during Thanksgiving, or the presents you'll be getting (if you've been good...) at Christmas. One of Flight Simulation's greatest traditions is coming up. Soon February will be here, and the 2011 Flight Simulator Around the World Race will be upon us.

Now, flightsimmers have another tradition to look forward to during the year. One inspired by the infamous Cannonball Run road races that took place in the 1970s, capturing the outlaw spirit of those races and applying them to aircraft.

And so, I'd like to announce....

The Third Annual Holkham Bay for the Holidays Dash

This is an individual event. In previous years, this was a Team Flightsim-exclusive race. This year, I've decided to invite all pilots who have an interest in participating in the 2011 RTW Race to compete in this event. This race will begin at Yelizovo Airport in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, Russia (UHPP); and conclude at Flightsim.com Multi-Player Adventures World Headquarters in Holkham Bay, Alaska (PAHB), a distance of over 2000 nautical miles. Competitors will run their legs at their convenience anytime between 12:00 AM (Eastern Standard Time) Friday, December 17th, 2010 and 12:00 AM Sunday, January 16th, 2011.

As usual, the RTW Duenna will be our tracking and scoring system. It's avaliable at:

http://johannesmueller.com/fs/web/duenna/

The Holkham Bay scenery is avaliable here at Flightsim.com as "pahb_v1.zip". Glacier Bay scenery and Runway 12 objects are also required for the scenery (and also avaliable here at Flightsim.) Team Flightsim members will receive our usual luxurious accomodations, while there will be plenty of cots on the porch for members of other teams.

All settings used for the RTW (Crash Detection, Weather, Realism, etc.) must be used for this event, except that the FS time settings may be altered so your legs can be flown in daylight. Only the time spent in flight on the Duenna will count towards the competitor's overall time. If a competitor crashes on takeoff or en-route, the leg must be reflown. If the competitor crashes on landing, a 1 hour penalty will be assessed and the competitor may continue from his intended destination airport.

This year, there will be two classes of aircraft run, a normal RTW Race Aircraft class and a Subsonic Jet class. Pilots may participate in both classes.

All aircraft used for the RTW Race Aircraft Class must meet normal RTW Regulations.

1) Must be Piston Fixed Wing, Two Engine or Less Turboprop Fixed Wing, or a Rotorcraft type.
2) Must have had at least 10 real-world examples produced.
3) Must have realistic performance.

All aircraft in the Subsonic Jet Class must meet the latter two requirements of the above list. In addition, only Subsonic Jets designed for civillian use may participate in this class. The only military aircraft allowed are ones that have a direct civillian counterpart. (For instance, a Boeing KC-135 would be legal as it has a civillian counterpart in the Boeing 707, whereas the North American F-86 or the Saab J-29 do not.)

The same aircraft must be used for the entire race from Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky to Holkham Bay.

And of course, you are heavily encouraged to write some reports on your progress and provide screenshots of your adventure.

Those are the rules, in their entirety. There are no other rules. Competitors may fly to Holkham Bay using any route, in as many or as few legs as they wish, at any altitude they desire. Competitors may stop at any and all airports along the way, and fly any amount of distance on a single leg. The Pilot who arrives at Holkham Bay with least amount of time spent in flight from Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky will be declared the winner. The bar at Holkham will be well stocked, and the atmosphere will be festive for the Christmas and New Years Holidays, so make your travel arrangements now!

[PRB]

This looks like fun. Sign me up!

[Spookster67]

Hi RedGreen,

This is a great event, and it's good to see that you're inviting everyone with an interest in RTW 2011 to come over. I'll certainly be joining in myself, and I'll go and spread the news to my fellow race pilots at iFlyOnline.com.

See you in the bar at Holkham...

Regards, Martin.

p.s. subsonic jets too! Since I can't find any civilian alternatives to my favourite Avro Vulcan, maybe I'll come in modern luxury. It's a good excuse to find out how fast my A380 can go

[salt_air]

Nice goin' Red!,


Right on time, and the first two shout-outs came from good friends from other websites. I love it!

I feel the need to mention here that the excellent Holkham Bay scenery is a fictitious airport and won't be recognized in the RTW as a valid destination, so make sure you de-activated it after this event and re-activate it, if you wish after the RTW.

The Glacier Bay scenery and the RWY 12 files should be "staples" in everyone's addon folder and are fine for the both events.



If you don't have a lot of time logged flying in and around PAHB, I suggest a low and slow tour to gain some familiarity with the treacherous terrain issues on every approach especially in "Heavies".

I don't have memory of clear conditions there ... ever ... and a lot of memories of zero vis right to the runway.



Seldom is good exersize and fun mentioned in the same breath, but this gets a checkmark on both categories.

Thanks Red!

[Dangerousdave26]

Looks like a good place to test out my FSX System for the fun of it.

Nothing like an Aleutian run in the almost winter.

[buzzbee]

Sounds like a lot of fun. Thanks for the invite

Buzz Bee
Team AVSIM

[salt_air]

Looks like a good place to test out my FSX System for the fun of it.

Nothing like an Aleutian run in the almost winter.

Hey Dave,

Great idea, might jump on that, been toying with using FSX for the RTW now for a couple of years and just can't get that "warm fuzzy" feeling with it for some reason ... unstable I guess and just enough of the keyboard commands different to NOT help at all.

The PAHB scenery is a little bit sparse in FSX as compared to FS9.

[teson1]

Red, I trust you've already signed up the whole flightsim team, so no registration required.
But just for the books -I'm in.

Perfect test run - if we can get through the Aleutian weather allright, we'll make it anywhere.

I remember checking the weather of that region for the SOH pacific rim ramble - perfect VFR everywhere around, except a pocket of marginal IFR hanging on the western aleutians - for weeks (and also remember circling around in the fog looking for Attu airfield).

Gunter

[salt_air]

I thinking we should change your "stage" name just a little bit Gunter ....



Say let's add one letter ... the letter "a" and see what happens .....



Hmmm .... how's teason1 (tease) sound to ya?

[WombatOne]

Not to be nit picky, but haven't those dates already passed?

I assume we don't necessarily have to be on the server, but do we need to set the duenna up for online tracking for this event?