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FPV racing in Kherson UADR Challenge 2018 Stage 1 FABRIKA Rotor Fest

9 Май 2018, 11:12
FPV racing in Kherson UADR Challenge 2018 Stage 1 FABRIKA Rotor Fest

Over the past few years, Ukrainian drone racing has rapidly grown from small gatherings of enthusiasts to full-fledged championships with prizes and wide press coverage. At the same time, drone racing continues to gain popularity, attracting more and more attention as a real sport discipline.

The year 2017 became especially important for Ukrainian FPV pilots. Serious struggle between different organizations for holding Ukrainian drone racing competitions gave a serious impetus to improve the quality and increase the number of events. During 2017 about 10 different competitions were held in different parts of Ukraine, from Uzhgorod to Zaporozhye, from Chernigov to Kropivnitsky.

One of the main championships in Ukraine were 5 stages of UADR Challenge 2017 organized by the Ukrainian Drone Racing Association. The championship was successfully completed in Kropivnitsky, the winner of which became pilot Nikolay Podakov (Air's Crew). FPV community was looking forward to the new season in 2018.

The new Ukrainian Drone Racing Championship UADR Challenge 2018 opened on May 5 in Kherson. The date was not accidental, as every year on the first Saturday of May is celebrated the International Day of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, which was the reason for organizing the FABRIKA Rotor Fest. As you can see from the name, the festival was held in the shopping mall "Fabrika", and the FPV competition stage was located in the parking area near the mall.

In the not so distant past Fabrika shopping mall was the Kherson Cotton and Paper Mill, founded in 1954 and gradually falling into disrepair. Despite the protests of local residents, by 2013 one of the largest light industry enterprises in Europe was completely liquidated. Partially the memory of the mill was preserved in the interior elements of the shopping mall, as well as in one of the halls a museum was opened, the exhibits of which reveal the history of the largest weaving production in Ukraine.

To participate in the first stage of UADR Challenge 2018 an unprecedented number of participants was registered - 52 pilots and about a dozen teams. But this fact did not affect the schedule of the competition, which was held according to the announced timing. At 9:30 a.m. qualification started, and already at 19.00 the competition ended with the awarding of winners. At the same time there was enough time for breaks, in which the pilots and spectators of the festival were shown Drift & Stunt show, with the participation of stuntmen and PRO-drivers.

For the first time at the UADR stage there was an online broadcast. Everyone could watch the competition and be aware of what was happening, thanks to the comments of the Ukrainian commentator of Formula 1 Max Podzigun.

It is worth mentioning that UADR Challenge 2018 will again consist of 5 stages in 5 cities of Ukraine, and at the end of the championship pilots who received the highest number of points will have a chance to compete in the international drone racing championship in Korea.

The scoring system in individual and team scoring has been changed. Now pilots who took the first 15 places get points for the stage, as well as the gap between the first place and the other places has been reduced. If before the difference between the first and second place was 7 points, now it is only 5. Points in the team standings will not be calculated from all pilots of the team who received points, but only from the three with the best result.

The track of the first stage was quite simple and small. At the starting positions were installed special bollards for easy takeoff of quadrocopters. Thanks to the large starting gates, there were almost no early collisions. The course consisted of standard maneuvers near the flags, powerloop gates, and the only difficult element was a corridor of two gates located at a height of 4 meters. The sharp height difference made the pilots slow down, but in general this element had little influence on the results of the qualification, as on average the track was completed in 16 seconds.

In qualifying each pilot was given 3 attempts to show the best lap time. But the main innovation of the qualification was the possibility to fly around the track for 3 minutes in each attempt, thus it was possible to fly around the track about 20 times in one attempt.

The small size of the track and 3-minute circling led to the fact that it was difficult for the judges to control the pilots' compliance with the rules of the track all the time. On the broadcast it can be seen that a sufficient number of pilots skipped some elements of the track, thereby improving their qualification results. In this case, when there was a serious struggle for passage in the top 32 and the difference in time between the pilots was a fraction of a second, such a system of qualification showed itself not the best way.

In the competition itself because of the speed of the track and high speeds, the judges often could not keep track of the participants and accurately determine how many laps flew this or that pilot. However, any disputable situations were considered and successfully resolved.

With each stage UADR is getting closer and closer to the ideal race organization. It is already difficult to remember the first competitions of 2017 in Chernigov, when in a matter of minutes you had to find your transponder, frantically hook it on the quadr so that the serif saw it and have time to run to the starting position, and then pass the transponder to the next pilot. Now the race is as comfortable and calm as possible. Even despite the fact that the event took only one day, there was no feeling of lack of time.