Here's a brief account of the days events: Round 4 is now over and the team positions are finalised. At the time of writing it hasn't been confirmed to me (although Julie says its so!), but I believe the team placings are unchanged from yesterday, with the UK team hanging on to 4th place.
This is the best result we have ever achieved at an f3c world champs, so hats off to the boys!
Round 4 was won by Hashimoto, with Curtis taking second place. Third place was tied between Wayne Mann (USA) and Johann Hoenle (Germany). The weather has been excellent, all day.
Mark Christy had a good round, placing 9th with a normalised score of 931.34. This gave him a narrow victory over Scott Gray of Canada. Scott and Mark have each taken 2 rounds off each other, but Scott retains a higher position due to a better points difference - 8 in 2700!!! Mark will be in the fly-off, having taken 11th place overall in the preliminary rounds. Well done Mark!
Mark Tilbury put in a good round, but missed being in the flyoff by 21 points in 2500. His final placing is 17th (15 go through to the fly-offs). Dave Wilshere put in a better round, but it has left him languishing at 30th overall.

Top 15 after 4 rounds are:
1 Hashimoto (WC) 1000
2 Youngblood (USA) 996.45
3 Mann (USA) 985.73
4 Hoenle (Ger) 980.59
5 Sensui (Jap) 979.63
6 Kunii (Jap) 969.52
7 Feil (Ger) 957.73
8 Shilling (USA) 941.03
9 Kobayashi (Jap) 937.09
10 Gray, Scott (Can) 906.87
11 Christy (UK) 904.2
12 Lien (Taipei) 886.97
13 Roessner (Ger) 878.37
14 Kastiel (Isr) 871.01
15 Lombard (Fra) 863.83

Surprises are the relatively poor showing of the Japanese team, so far, and the excellent performance of the German team! There was no indication of THAT in Vienna last year!
Mark Tilbury is lying 17th with 856.83, and Dave Wilshere is 30th with 805.74.

There have been some requests for info on the French team. Laurent Lombard has made it to the fly-off, though he is worried about lack of experience at the "B" schedule! Pascal Brianchon is in 22nd place with 847.18. Alain Leblay is in 38th place with 751.74.

The draw has been held for the fly-offs, and Mark Christy has drawn the short straw - he is first away in the first round! A demo round will be flown for the judges by Daniele Graber (16th). One round will be flown on Thursday, and two more on Friday. After this the contest will be over.

Aviv Levy (picture upper right) started flying helicopters after watching the European Champs in Vienna last year. He said he wanted to fly like Rudiger Feil (European Champ!) He has finished in 63rd place (out of 74 pilots) with a score of 633.42. Not bad for someone flying less than 1 year!

The Australian team, pictured middle right, features: Mike Reynell, Miek Farnan & Rich Mailath.