=== Let's Drone Out — Episode 431 ===
Title: LDO 431 - BIRD Is The Word
Recorded: 2023-11-30
Hosts: Andrew "Frank" Hyams, Wayne "CurryKitten" Andrews, Jack "Brightontillifly" Nash
Guest(s): Cerberus "Cerb" Velvet, Matt "minirollsrule" Snell
Total audience: 1,062
Platforms: YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1nDO7YAr3fQ); SoundCloud (http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/feeds.soundcloud.com/stream/1679606097-letsdroneout-ldo-431-bird-is-the-word.mp3)
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https://matthewsnell.co.uk/bird2024/
@FPVRacingSolutions

#LetsDroneOut #Fpv #BirminghamTinyWhoopers

[0.0] Jack: Hello and you're listening to let's drone out and special
[4.2] Jack: thank you to our lovely patrons that help donate so that we can
[8.36] Jack: pay the editor to remove the swear words and silly things we
[11.6] Jack: say massive thank you to Carlos campos art folk now Sam
[18.56] Curry: Dharma on with the show.
[51.77] Frank: Good evening and welcome to let's drone out episode 431.
[58.53] Frank: This evening, we are joined by everyone's favorite curry
[62.09] Frank: kitten. Hello, Mr. Chairman server's velvet.
[68.21] Frank: You know, and the band we have all come here today to hear
[72.05] Frank: about it is Matt Snell.
[75.01] Frank: Oh,
[76.93] Frank: yes, I really wanted to get on on Matt because he was talking
[81.37] Frank: about we've been mentioning everywhere the bird event.
[86.45] Matt: I have been spamming the internet widely.
[89.65] Frank: I feel we should get in on the spam. Well, it's fresh spam.
[96.41] Frank: The the bird event, which is obviously a great, great name
[99.81] Frank: for an event already. Yeah. But then it actually stands for
[105.25] Frank: something which is even better.
[107.29] Matt: Yeah, so as as I think it was one of Elon Musk's crew said, if
[112.69] Matt: you aim for the stars, you'll hit the moon. So I was like,
[115.53] Matt: right, first event is going to be called the International
[117.61] Matt: Race Days event. So the IRD. And if later I need to turn that to
[122.57] Matt: Birmingham, and that's also easy to do.
[127.89] Frank: Yeah, so we should say straight off the bat, this is an event
[133.17] Frank: that is happening at the end of January in Birmingham. So if
[139.97] Frank: people get enticed by this, and what's come on fly their
[144.05] Frank: weeps round, they should go to your website, which will be in
[147.77] Frank: the notes any second now.
[152.65] Frank: Matthew snow.
[154.61] Matt: Matthew snow.co.uk forward slash bi rd 2024. I believe. Yeah,
[161.21] Matt: they're not good at UK forward slash bi rd 2024. That is where
[166.17] Matt: you go to get all the information about it. It is on
[169.57] Matt: the 27th and 28th of January 2024. And it is a international
[176.37] Matt: tiny whoop event where we have pilots from literally across
[180.93] Matt: Europe. So we've got, obviously people from the UK, we've got
[185.01] Matt: the Italians are coming in, we've got Germans coming over,
[188.93] Matt: all of a sudden, I was contacted by some Latvians a couple of
[192.09] Matt: weeks ago, we've got five Latvians coming, we have an
[195.21] Matt: American coming. Liz to Ghana, who everyone in the tiny land
[200.69] Matt: should know from I go. So that's very exciting.
[203.65] Frank: International game of roots, right?
[206.53] Matt: Yes, that's right. So they're gracing us with their presence,
[211.09] Matt: which is very exciting.
[212.49] Frank: Definitely had some people in the chat get involved with with
[215.45] Frank: I go into the game of roots. And on the discord as well, you know,
[219.33] Frank: the discord, that's been mentioned a lot. So people do
[221.49] Frank: follow that. And there you go. It's a good name drop.
[224.81] Matt: Yes, exactly. So yeah, so literally, it's a, it's an
[229.65] Matt: international whoop race, where we put it's a fun first FPV
[237.29] Matt: whoop race. So we're here to have a good laugh, and then fly
[241.05] Matt: some whoops, and eventually see who's the fastest. And yeah,
[245.09] Matt: that's basically that's basically the plan. So for two
[246.97] Matt: days this year, in previous years, it's just been one day,
[249.65] Matt: but we've stretched out given people more flying, it's
[253.09] Matt: growing. Literally every year, the number of pilots is like,
[257.25] Matt: well, not doubling this year, but the, let's say the finances
[261.45] Matt: are doubling this year.
[265.45] Matt: Yeah, whoo, the flight factor is doubled.
[269.21] Matt: Yeah, the the old fuck don't get it wrong. It's doubling this
[274.53] Matt: year.
[276.73] Frank: How many tickets are still available?
[279.29] Matt: There are four race tickets remaining.
[281.61] Matt: There you go. Not many for there are 48 pilot spaces. Most
[286.13] Matt: of them are sold, there are four left. So at the beginning of
[288.41] Matt: the stream, if you want to run off and get them, I guess that
[290.41] Matt: will count against our numbers, but four security tickets left.
[295.93] Matt: And then there are four standby tickets, too. So every now and
[300.41] Matt: again, someone will get ill, or they can't turn up or whatever.
[302.21] Matt: So standby tickets are a bit cheaper. And we still bring all
[305.77] Matt: your FPV gear as if you were going to race. And if someone
[308.29] Matt: doesn't show up on the day or ill or whatever happens, then you
[311.17] Matt: can step into their place. But as a minimum, if you come as a
[315.37] Matt: standby ticket, then you will get to fly the track in the
[317.97] Matt: brakes. So you will get to do some flying.
[322.05] Frank: And the other thing is like, sort of slightly unusually, I
[326.17] Frank: mean, we've got a service, so not as unusual, but you're
[329.61] Frank: pushing like it to be quite spectator focused as well,
[332.45] Frank: right? There's a lot of spectators.
[334.33] Matt: Yeah. Yeah. So one of the interesting things with FPV is
[338.97] Matt: that obviously we are all super involved in the actual racing.
[342.97] Matt: We want to see through the goggles, because that's what
[344.93] Matt: we're used to seeing. We enjoy sitting behind the sticks and
[348.33] Matt: seeing what's going on. But for people new to the hobby, they've
[351.97] Matt: no idea what these kinds of fuzzy images are, and who's
[355.25] Matt: going to be in first and how to look at four screens at once and
[357.97] Matt: see who's who's winning. So we're going to try and make it
[362.57] Matt: as wife friendly as possible, if you like. So and I both
[370.33] Matt: agree on this is why we kind of work well together is that it
[372.57] Matt: needs to be like newbie friendly. So you can turn it on, you can
[377.01] Matt: go, right, what am I looking at? What's going on? And it's like,
[380.09] Matt: right, this is a drone race. This person's in the lead. This
[383.05] Matt: is where we're at in the thing. And this is why they're
[384.89] Matt: competing for it and some information to like, get people
[388.29] Matt: invested into who it is and why they're doing it. And enjoy
[394.89] Cerb: that's something that I've banged on about talking to you
[397.41] Cerb: guys before. The infamous wife test, which is it's fine to sit
[403.13] Cerb: there watching YouTube on your laptop. Can you put it on on the
[406.21] Cerb: smart TV in the living room? Will you get away with it? You
[410.17] Cerb: have to present it so that it's interesting and involving and a
[414.69] Cerb: bit like top gear made it okay to watch our programs. Yeah.
[424.81] Matt: Yeah, so that's that's the plan. So there's last year was the
[428.53] Matt: first year. It went live stream or well proper live stream.
[432.89] Matt: There's a bit of a ghetto live stream going on. It's previous
[436.21] Matt: but properly well put together organized live stream by serve,
[440.09] Matt: which is why we teamed up properly put together as a
[445.09] Matt: I don't know. We were let down by the bandwidth. But other than
[448.89] Matt: that, it was it was a good stream. We were very happy with
[451.69] Curry: it. So how to make it past a wife test? Is it a case of
[456.01] Curry: having some screens up and having commentary about like
[458.65] Curry: what's going on? So the average viewer can just come in and just
[462.33] Cerb: know you can't just put like we are now four panels on the
[466.85] Cerb: screen or four FPV feeds. So some of the things we do that we
[470.93] Cerb: insist all the pilots give us a headshot and give us their little
[474.49] Cerb: square avatar so that we can, before the races start, here's
[478.25] Cerb: the four pilots, you know, and start talking about it. It's
[482.49] Cerb: about selling personal stories, you know, talking about people.
[486.53] Cerb: And it's that thing of the drama. Where's the drama? Where
[492.29] Cerb: you're looking at? Oh, you know, this guy's got to get second
[495.17] Cerb: place this time or it's all over for him and start talking about
[499.21] Cerb: them and get the pilots in and interview them. And, you know,
[503.29] Cerb: if you just put up four FPV feeds, very boring. Just talk
[506.97] Cerb: about the people behind it. That's a bit more engaging. And
[511.69] Cerb: also, you know, get the chat going. Matt's got all sorts of
[515.65] Cerb: interesting things going on on the day that we will be able to
[519.57] Cerb: talk about. So yeah, hopefully we can make it engaging. That's
[523.41] Cerb: the trick, right?
[524.29] Matt: Yeah. And not only engaging for like the people watching the
[527.97] Matt: live stream as well. But like I say, we've got lots of other
[530.73] Matt: stuff going on. So it has always just been right get
[534.61] Matt: together and have a race. And it's the goal for the event is
[538.41] Matt: to become the you at least the UK like whoop event so that you
[545.61] Matt: can come along, not only just pilots, but also mums, dads and
[549.97] Matt: kids from the local area can come along and say, Oh, you
[551.73] Matt: want to go see a drone race? Well, this is on and you can
[554.29] Matt: come and watch it. You can see the drones flying around. They're
[556.77] Matt: going to be covered in LEDs because that's part of what we're
[559.77] Matt: mandating. You must have LEDs on it. So you can very easily
[563.17] Matt: see them fly around, you can very easily understand the
[565.29] Matt: track, you'll be able to give it a go yourself, because we're
[568.21] Matt: going to have simulators there. So the BMFA coming along with a
[573.09] Matt: stand, they're going to put on some simulators so you can give
[575.65] Matt: it a go. I'm talking with a couple of FPV shops. So there's
[580.73] Matt: going to be like spares and whoops that you can buy. I'm
[583.89] Matt: hoping maybe in years to come like this is a growing thing.
[587.69] Matt: This is the first time we've actually been able to have like
[589.49] Matt: additional like stands and things. But eventually, I want
[592.45] Matt: it to become a micro indoor drone flight sort of two day
[597.29] Matt: festival where you can come along, give it a go learn about
[599.45] Matt: drone flying in a safe environment, with all the
[602.57] Matt: correct information and some jazzy lights and some funny
[606.57] Matt: dress up and just generally have a good laugh. That's the
[609.97] Matt: plan.
[611.33] Curry: Yeah, yeah, talking of that, just I was just having a quick
[614.17] Curry: look through sort of the prizes. And there are not one, but three
[617.93] Curry: prizes based on onesies. What's that all about?
[623.69] Matt: So we're very much fun first FPV. So if you're not having a good
[629.17] Matt: time, there's no point, right? The coolest, the best pilots are
[632.05] Matt: the one having the most fun, right? We all know that. And
[636.17] Matt: because racers get very involved in wanting to come first, which
[640.49] Matt: you know, it's a race, you're going to want to do that.
[642.77] Matt: Sometimes the adrenaline can overwhelm politeness across a
[648.41] Matt: pit ever.
[652.29] Matt: So yeah, so the idea of the onesies was firstly to make it
[655.45] Matt: more colorful and more entertaining. And everyone just
[657.49] Matt: had a bit of a laugh. But also, if there are any sort of
[660.97] Matt: disagreements, you end up with like, dinosaurs arguing with
[664.93] Matt: Batman, and there's only so serious, you can take that, you
[667.53] Matt: know. So that's the idea. It's kind of to diffuse the situation
[674.97] Matt: before it gets too heated, basically. Yeah, so perfect
[679.05] Matt: example, the these are the actually the Italian guys, they
[681.85] Matt: came across from Italy when they had run their league over there.
[686.57] Matt: This is team blue eyes. And Mateo's from speedy pizza. They
[692.17] Matt: came over with their group, and they all dressed up as various
[694.65] Matt: birds and stuff in their onesies. And they had a great
[696.93] Matt: time. It was really good to see those guys all getting involved.
[699.29] Matt: It was amazing. But yeah, so that's the idea is just to have
[703.09] Matt: fun and be colorful and enjoy it. This year, we're not
[706.69] Matt: mandating that the onesies are needed for racing, because we
[711.09] Matt: understand that some seasons, these are some serious top
[714.13] Matt: pilots come in over to race here. And we're aware that some
[718.45] Matt: of the top pilots have sponsors. And part of their sponsorship is
[720.89] Matt: they've got to have to wear like the sponsors colors. So if we
[723.05] Matt: say, right, you got to wear a onesie, you're not going to be
[725.13] Matt: able to have your sponsors on, it's not going to impress the
[727.81] Matt: sponsors very much. And as much as we'd like to, you know, do
[732.09] Matt: everything for free and nothing, unfortunately, sponsors are
[734.53] Matt: needed to pay for a lot of this stuff. So we have to do what we
[738.37] Matt: can to keep them happy.
[739.85] Cerb: I was genuinely surprised by the onesie thing. Because when I was
[742.93] Cerb: asked to come and race straight for bird last year, I'm not
[746.93] Cerb: wearing onesie is not happening. I'm an old man and grandchildren.
[752.13] Cerb: And I'm not wandering around in onesie. And then I got told him
[755.65] Cerb: to buy one, you don't have to wear it. Okay, got my small acts
[760.81] Cerb: onesie and it's like it's in the bag. I'm not wearing it. You
[764.09] Cerb: know what, 10 minutes of being there with everybody running
[766.93] Cerb: around in onesies having a good time. I was like, you know what,
[769.29] Cerb: screw it. I'm putting the onesie on. It was a good life.
[773.17] Matt: So much fun. Yeah, it was so much fun. We had we had Jesse P
[776.69] Matt: come over last year, which was, which was great fun. And he had
[781.57] Matt: a Mario onesie, which was wicked. And we had the other. He
[787.73] Matt: had no he had Luigi onesie. And then when one of the Germans
[790.61] Matt: came over with Mario, that was, was that Idrisil? I think Michael
[796.37] Matt: Ruber. I think his name was. Yeah, so you can see Jesse P
[799.97] Matt: there. His onesie on. I'm in Batman and it's got his small
[804.05] Matt: act. That photo is actually Phobos, the winner of last year.
[809.53] Matt: You might have seen Phobos on many. I think he did Daigao as
[813.37] Matt: well and Race Gao. And was one of the top one of the fastest
[819.05] Matt: tiny book pilots in the world, obviously, because he won last
[822.33] Matt: year. And there's him holding up the trophy. So yeah, so everyone
[828.89] Matt: just got involved. It was really good fun.
[830.25] Frank: Nice. Nice. I mean, so on the kind of more serious that then
[838.73] Frank: you've got lots of things going on for spectators for races, the
[841.53] Frank: hardcore races who you obviously have there. Yeah. What, what is
[845.93] Frank: the the racing that's going on? What's what's the format? And
[848.97] Frank: what what's what's how is it all going to work?
[853.13] Matt: Okay, well, the race is split into two days. So the first day
[857.29] Matt: on Saturday is qualifying. So all of the 48 races will be split
[861.77] Matt: into four groups of 12 pilots. And then we will run through
[867.69] Matt: races with four pilots into three races, right? And we'll
[871.21] Matt: just bang through those in a group. So your batteries are
[873.69] Matt: very close together. So you'll get a bit of like rhythm going.
[877.53] Matt: And you'll be going for your fastest two consecutive laps
[880.17] Matt: around the truck. Okay, that will that will be timed and then
[885.05] Matt: you'll be seeded fastest, slowest, based on your qualifying
[889.85] Matt: time. That's, that's Saturday. That's what we do on that day.
[895.61] Matt: Then the next day, Sunday will be the finals day. The 48 pilots
[900.65] Matt: list will be split into three tiers will have hobbyist tier,
[904.57] Matt: which is like the lowest tier, advanced tier in the middle and
[907.21] Matt: elite tier at the top. And the 16 pilots in each will be racing
[912.97] Matt: for first, second and third in each of those tiers. Basically,
[918.17] Matt: the way we're doing the finals is set up so that every single
[922.73] Matt: race counts. Okay, so I don't have a graphic for it. Maybe
[929.13] Matt: servers can dig out his graphic.
[933.61] Matt: I thought I had that prepared, but I don't.
[935.61] Matt: But basically, each pilots will be split, there'll be four
[943.13] Matt: races to start with. And of your race, the first and second
[948.33] Matt: place will work up the tree. And the third and fourth
[952.01] Matt: place will work down the tree. So you need to be in the first
[954.65] Matt: and second on every single one of your races to work your way
[957.45] Matt: out to try and get first in your tier. If you're not in the
[960.89] Matt: first and second, then you will be limited and how high you can
[964.09] Matt: how high a place you can win. So every single race will count.
[967.93] Matt: And that's different to how some other tiny whip races are run.
[972.17] Matt: But it's important that we do it this way so that it's easy for
[977.37] Matt: spectators to understand. And so there's a level of pressure on
[980.17] Matt: every single race because, okay, I messed that race up. Well,
[983.29] Matt: I've got, you know, two out of three more to go, I'll get them
[986.09] Matt: on the next time. It's like, well, that's fine. But you need
[989.05] Matt: to work on the day formula one races don't get to have another
[991.53] Matt: race, you know, the next day, they need to make it work on the
[994.65] Matt: day. And that's the that's what we're going for. It's I guess
[999.38] Frank: that means it's sort of more, more even pressure throughout
[1002.66] Frank: the day. Yeah, it means it means every single one of your
[1006.26] Matt: races could have an effect on your final position. So all the
[1009.38] Matt: way through qualifying, you'll be trying to push as hard as you
[1011.54] Matt: can to make sure you're in as high tier as possible. So that
[1014.74] Matt: you have the chance to win the best prizes and take home the
[1016.74] Matt: most glory. And then on finals day, every single race will
[1020.42] Matt: count towards your final position. So it is, it will be
[1023.86] Matt: important to race your best at all times. And then you want
[1028.02] Matt: that coming up. Oh, there's a graphic. Let's show you a
[1030.74] Cerb: graphic. I was out for quick work. Good job. Thank you. It's
[1035.94] Cerb: missing the name. But if you imagine four names in the heat
[1039.06] Cerb: one box and four names in the heat two box. Yeah. So positions
[1043.86] Cerb: one or two go through to the upper and three and four go
[1046.9] Cerb: through to the lower. So follow the colorful lines.
[1050.9] Matt: Yeah, so if you start on the left and work your way right,
[1053.22] Matt: so the first and second pilot from heat one will go along the
[1057.14] Matt: green line to the upper semi. And then if you're in the upper
[1061.54] Matt: semi, first and second will go through to the one to four
[1065.06] Matt: position final. And if you're in third and fourth place, you'll
[1068.58] Matt: go, you'll follow the red and the pink line to the other
[1072.26] Matt: finals. So that will be one of the tiers. So for example, that
[1074.9] Matt: will be hobbyist here, and then we'll do it. And we'll run
[1078.42] Matt: through all of those races. And then we'll do advanced here, run
[1081.3] Matt: through all of those races, and then finally elite tier and run
[1083.78] Matt: through all those races. So by the end of it, we'll have
[1086.82] Matt: positions from first place in elites down to 16th place in
[1092.9] Matt: hobbyist and everyone have a position that they came across
[1095.78] Matt: the whole competition. Cool. That's the plan. What's what's
[1102.02] Frank: the rules on what you can fly? Because I know that different
[1104.98] Frank: week races have different definitions of what a whoop is
[1107.86] Matt: basically. Yeah, yeah, fair enough. So we are very typical
[1114.18] Matt: whoop. So 65 mil. So 65 mil frame whoop as what you want to
[1125.34] Matt: be flying. The 65 mil is measured motor post to motor
[1129.42] Matt: post. You can run 35 mil props, or 31 mil props. Don't mind
[1135.1] Matt: that. But it's 65 mil frame. Okay. And again, that's the
[1141.1] Frank: rules. That's what to go for. Those are rules. Those are the
[1144.22] Matt: rules. And the most typically people will run a beach FPV
[1152.46] Matt: meteor frame, or their new airframe is a bit lighter. So
[1156.06] Matt: that's really good. Or a happy model 65 frame. Flight
[1162.22] Matt: controllers can be all in one board. Or sometimes people
[1167.34] Matt: Yeah, those ones. That's the path model one, isn't it? Have you
[1170.46] Matt: seen the new beach FPV air from spoil? I have not feature FPV
[1175.42] Matt: sent in a care package of products for the event. So I'll
[1179.34] Matt: just grab one out and just see. So there is the very thin, it's
[1187.74] Matt: got a lot thinner sort of ducts. And if you can sort of see a lot
[1191.1] Matt: thinner ducts, it's got hollowed out parts on the bottom.
[1197.42] Matt: It's a really, really good, lightweight frame. And as far
[1203.82] Matt: as I've been able to I've been racing them, I went over to
[1206.94] Matt: Italy with some of the guys and headphone jack came up, went
[1213.42] Matt: over to Italy a couple weeks ago to fly with Dan Carpy and
[1219.26] Matt: jaggers and flew the airframe over there and it makes your
[1224.86] Matt: noticeably lighter, which is good. Because light is fast. So
[1231.02] Matt: so yeah, it's a really good thing. So yeah, so that's,
[1235.26] Matt: so that's basically what people are flying. Either all in one
[1238.54] Matt: boards or external VTX is they tend to be a bit better for
[1241.74] Matt: video external VTX is a bit more stable. And also you can get
[1246.62] Matt: better antenna for them as well. The kind of width wire antennas
[1250.78] Matt: are a bit rubbish. And then your preference for props, and
[1259.98] Matt: motors and cameras and things, we don't mandate that. The only
[1263.26] Matt: other thing that's mandated is the LEDs. So this, this feeds
[1267.74] Matt: into the kind of wife test bit, if you just see like a gray blur
[1271.74] Matt: going past, you're not going to know what it is. So we're
[1275.42] Matt: mandating you have a minimum of two LEDs. And they must be
[1279.26] Matt: opposing directions. So up, down, left, right, forwards and
[1281.82] Matt: backwards. I don't care, but they must be in two different
[1283.98] Matt: directions. They must be visible basically from all the way
[1287.98] Cerb: around the the whoop. And it just seems nicer for a
[1292.62] Cerb: commentator as well to be able to say no who's who would be would
[1299.66] Cerb: be a wild having half a chance. Yeah, my my ideal would be to
[1307.18] Matt: have whoops like this where they've got a cob LED all the
[1311.26] Matt: way around.
[1313.74] Frank: It looks like that's radioactive.
[1316.78] Frank: Genuinely, it's hard.
[1322.22] Frank: So is there any requirement on the colors? Because I know at
[1324.7] Frank: some events, you've got to like change colors or have certain
[1329.22] Matt: if you really want to get into Serbia's best book, then you
[1333.62] Matt: will have BTX BTX colors will be TX assigned colors on your
[1339.74] Matt: programmable LEDs that will make Serbia so happy. Yeah. So there
[1343.94] Cerb: is a standard set in beta flight. If you set your LEDs as
[1347.46] Cerb: BTX control, then the channel that you're on sets the color.
[1351.62] Cerb: And because that's the beta flight standard, you always know
[1354.94] Cerb: that. Dammit, I can't think of it off the top of my head. On
[1359.14] Cerb: the spot on the spot.
[1360.7] Cerb: It's always read. It's not I can't but I can't remember which
[1363.54] Cerb: one is read.
[1366.06] Cerb: I want to read but trying to get addressable LEDs onto a whoop
[1371.26] Cerb: that will be VTS controlled. It's yeah, we're not quite
[1375.9] Cerb: there.
[1377.54] Matt: Some of the pads on the on the flight controllers are super
[1381.06] Cerb: small. So they take a little bit of a little bit of good
[1384.7] Matt: eyesight to get them.
[1387.46] Cerb: I want you to add three centimeters more wire onto all
[1390.7] Cerb: no too heavy can do that.
[1394.66] Matt: We have a solution to that though. If I try and dig that
[1397.3] Matt: out, you're gonna see me rummaging around in my bits
[1399.1] Matt: box. But what? Pardon, demonetized. Yeah. No, no, one
[1407.38] Matt: of our one of our pilots, RC Maniac, who works very closely
[1412.1] Matt: was on the live stream and on the DVR. He cheers, bro. He has
[1420.18] Matt: produced his own addressable LED strips that are lighter than a
[1424.9] Matt: gnat's fart. Seriously, these things are so light. They are.
[1429.26] Matt: And the best bit is is when he's made these like, principal LED,
[1433.62] Matt: these surface mount LED like strips, he's then hand placed
[1437.78] Matt: all of the surface mount LEDs onto them and produce loads. So
[1443.7] Matt: those are going to be those are going to be going up for sale on
[1445.94] Matt: the bird event website in the merch section. And they are
[1451.66] Matt: incredible bits of electronics that just deserve a bit of a
[1455.22] Matt: shout out because they're so impressive and so light.
[1459.58] Frank: I've just seen a couple of questions from Jack in the
[1462.74] Frank: first one. Well, the second one first, can you run radium instead
[1467.58] Frank: of LEDs?
[1469.82] Matt: If you're willing to have it in your pocket at all times, next
[1473.7] Matt: to your gentleman's jewels, then yes.
[1478.58] Frank: And it is slightly more sensible question is the FPV flying
[1482.78] Frank: analog or digital or both or how's that working?
[1487.34] Matt: So we're doing both. Up until this point, we've run analog only
[1491.9] Matt: because obviously digital gives an advantage to like, being able
[1496.7] Matt: to see in a lot more detail. But we're running both because it's
[1500.94] Matt: going to be quite a long track. So we'll talk about the track in
[1504.74] Matt: a bit. But it's going to be a long track and the weight
[1508.42] Matt: disadvantage that digital gives you kind of balances out the
[1513.42] Matt: advantage of the video. So it's up to the racers to decide
[1518.06] Matt: whether they want to have a slightly heavier quad on a long
[1521.14] Matt: track, or if they want to have a lightweight quad, but with a
[1524.3] Matt: bit worse video maybe. And the video, it's going to be a harsh
[1528.82] Matt: environment for video, we recommend bringing your best
[1531.26] Matt: kit. We did a test race there, which maybe we can stick up some
[1534.94] Matt: photos of the test race, we had a full house of Woot pilots with
[1539.62] Matt: all sorts of different kit, we had multiple loads of different
[1542.1] Matt: receivers, digital, analog net running next to each other, we
[1546.18] Matt: had stock beta meteor 65s against like the most bespoke
[1554.34] Matt: lightweight racing whoops you've seen. And goggles that were like
[1560.18] Matt: rapid fire fusion, all the way down to EV 800 D box goggles with
[1567.3] Matt: just one dipole antenna sticking out the top and everyone was able
[1570.98] Matt: to race at their race pace. So if you should be fine with
[1575.34] Matt: whatever gear you bring, but I would recommend bringing the best
[1577.82] Matt: environment, best gear you've got, because it will, you know,
[1580.7] Matt: there's going to be a lot of RF in the air, and there's a lot of
[1583.5] Matt: concrete and metal. So you want to make sure you're going to get
[1585.38] Matt: a good video on the day. But yeah, we had a lot of different
[1588.34] Matt: people there and the video was really good.
[1590.5] Cerb: The funniest thing about our test event was the pilot with the
[1593.62] Matt: worst VTX there was my Yeah, yeah, ironically, I was waiting
[1599.58] Matt: on some new. I was waiting on a shipment of diamond boards to
[1603.58] Matt: come in, ready for this race in Italy, and they just hadn't
[1606.82] Matt: arrived. So I was using my old, my old banged up ones that only
[1610.34] Matt: get used around the house. It doesn't matter if I bleed over
[1612.46] Matt: anyone else, because no one else here, it's just me chasing the
[1614.46] Matt: dogs. But yeah, dodgy dodgy, we would try to like resold her on
[1619.34] Matt: the day and like stick in and leave it on a shelf and pretend
[1623.38] Matt: to buy it. But we got we got a good a good set of testing done.
[1628.46] Frank: So I want to know if they're going to keep the Christmas
[1630.34] Frank: decorations up from those photos.
[1632.42] Matt: I have asked them, I have asked them if they're going to keep
[1635.5] Matt: the light, the string lights up for us because they look wicked.
[1638.54] Matt: The Christmas tree, they said will probably be down by then.
[1642.02] Matt: They are they are genuinely looking at keeping up the string
[1644.54] Matt: lights and be wicked. But um, but yeah, so if you bring up
[1647.54] Matt: the photo of the event space again, and nobody knows Millennium
[1652.98] Matt: Point is a charity that is all around the stem subjects. They
[1660.06] Matt: like to promote technology, engineering, S-T-E-M, science,
[1666.1] Matt: technology, engineering and maths, that's the one. And they
[1669.58] Matt: were the cool millennials in the now they can design something
[1675.3] Matt: cool. It doesn't matter. And they they have this massive venue
[1680.02] Matt: in the center of Birmingham. And they have, they have a space
[1684.58] Matt: there with the Think Tank, which is the Science Museum in
[1686.82] Matt: Birmingham. And they're all about promoting science. So when I
[1689.3] Matt: came to them with this event, they're like, yes, we're
[1690.82] Matt: definitely on board. And I was like, wicked, can we fly in this
[1694.26] Matt: massive space? And they said, yes, yes, you can. And so after
[1699.3] Matt: a lot of like, a lot of risk assessment and tune and throwing
[1702.82] Matt: and bribing people with hot knobs.
[1704.98] Matt: Been a lot of paperwork to pull that one off.
[1708.22] Matt: Yeah, it has. But we get to fly in this amazing space. So for
[1713.18] Matt: those of you that are watching YouTube, you can see there's
[1715.46] Matt: this big sort of arse of the enterprise shape part of the
[1720.86] Matt: building.
[1723.58] Matt: Sorry.
[1724.18] Matt: Yeah, sorry. Millennium Falcon. That's what I was going for.
[1726.46] Matt: Why did I say enterprise? Well, it's sort of enterprise-y
[1728.58] Matt: shaped as well. Millennium Falcon's butt has reversed into
[1733.54] Matt: Millennium Point. And we're going to be flying, most of the
[1737.22] Matt: track is going to be under there. If you look like as it goes
[1740.66] Matt: down, you can see under there, most of the track will be under
[1742.74] Matt: there, but we will also be flying out into this space. And
[1745.3] Matt: there will be some quite long, fast sections out in this
[1747.74] Matt: space. So it will be quite spectacular to be able to fly
[1751.94] Matt: around here. And the spectators will be able to see this from
[1755.9] Matt: down down below.
[1757.66] Frank: That is the nice thing about it being whoops, right? Is you can
[1760.34] Frank: have people wherever you like.
[1762.3] Matt: Yeah, well, yes, you say this. Like I said, there was a lot of
[1765.66] Matt: risk assessment going on to get this, to be able to fly like
[1768.54] Matt: this. So there are some restrictions. But it is, we are
[1771.3] Matt: going to be able to fly in this big space. And so thankful for
[1775.1] Matt: the Millennium, Millennium Point.
[1778.3] Curry: It's an incredible space. So are you able to use parts of that
[1782.54] Curry: space as some of your track instead of just like having like
[1785.34] Curry: a bunch of gates around? Oh, nice.
[1787.1] Matt: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So our aim is to have some sort of dive gate
[1792.02] Matt: and a couple of gates hanging in free space right now in the
[1794.9] Matt: middle of that, right out in the middle of that atrium area.
[1800.66] Frank: And then we should do four floors worth of height there.
[1804.34] Matt: Yeah, it's a good old space, isn't it? That's what I mean. So
[1806.78] Matt: there's it's going to be a fast track in this area. So the weight
[1810.7] Matt: disadvantage of HD will kind of out or will weigh up against the
[1816.34] Matt: advantage of good video, or you know, HD video. So yeah, there's
[1820.78] Matt: a bit of like tactics there to consider.
[1823.38] Frank: Really like the idea of there being like a quad racing track
[1827.06] Frank: that is more vertical than it is horizontal.
[1830.42] Frank: Yeah, it feels to me quite a lot.
[1833.26] Matt: Yeah, because obviously, when when you set it up at home, you
[1835.38] Matt: basically get a load of hoops on the ground. And you're basically
[1837.94] Matt: trying to avoid hitting into the carpet at all times. So having
[1841.78] Matt: some altitude to play with is really good fun. It also means
[1844.1] Matt: you you've got a lot more chance to just absolutely balls nail it
[1846.86] Matt: go 100% throttle for a good amount of time.
[1850.82] Cerb: And the area that we've got underneath the Millennium
[1853.94] Cerb: Falcon's bum, there is also a stairwell there as well going
[1857.66] Cerb: up. Yes, which is hopefully those lights are there because
[1860.98] Cerb: it's beautifully lit. So we've got a real nice opportunity for
[1864.38] Cerb: a proper three dimensional track. Yeah, that should be really
[1868.02] Matt: good. Yeah, which is quite rare in whoops. And we say normally
[1872.42] Matt: on the carpet or in like a hall where there's not too much
[1874.74] Matt: height. So we're we're really looking forward to a bit more.
[1878.94] Cerb: Yeah, altitude, we're gonna fill it with gates and and send them
[1883.26] Cerb: out over the balcony into the free air, which is going to be
[1885.86] Matt: amazing. Yeah, it's gonna work. We're very excited. It's we had
[1891.26] Matt: a good track last year. And everyone I was very shocked. I
[1895.54] Matt: was very humbled when people came up to me and said the track
[1897.98] Matt: was good last year. But this year we're going to go a whole
[1900.86] Frank: another level.
[1904.18] Frank: This episode was recorded in front of a live online audience
[1907.3] Frank: downloaded and edited to make sense when it played audio only
[1910.78] Frank: censored to please the iTunes people hosted on the internet
[1913.74] Frank: forwarded through to your podcast provider downloaded
[1916.34] Frank: playing on your device and is now playing in your ears. All
[1919.66] Frank: thanks to our patrons. Consider joining them and you'll also get
[1923.38] Frank: other online benefits. Find out more at patreon.com forward
[1927.42] Frank: slash let's drone out.
[1930.1] Frank: Maybe now's a good time to talk about sort of your your
[1933.74] Frank: backstory of how kind of you've got to this point where you've
[1936.26] Frank: got this enormous space with all these international pilots
[1940.3] Frank: coming and all these sponsors and everything are like it seems
[1943.42] Frank: a pretty, pretty mature event at this point.
[1947.34] Matt: Yeah, so this is this will be the fourth, fourth event, fourth
[1952.42] Matt: venue international race day event that we've done. And it
[1957.42] Matt: all started because, well, I got to go get involved with FPV
[1963.62] Matt: whoops, from watching DRL and then started googling what you
[1967.78] Matt: can do and blah, blah, blah. And I was like, Bloody hell, five
[1970.22] Matt: inch racing is really expensive. I wonder if there's something
[1973.06] Matt: smaller than there was. So I was like, right, that's for me. And
[1977.94] Matt: you can do it at home. And I got to chase my dog around with a
[1980.14] Matt: little whoop. So that was really good fun. And because I didn't
[1984.58] Matt: know anybody in the space, I set up Birmingham tiny whoopers,
[1989.06] Matt: where I just found a pub in the center of Birmingham that would
[1991.82] Matt: let us come and fly around and met some really cool people and
[1996.26] Matt: learn a lot about FPV and whoop racing. Unbeknownst to me, Serb
[2001.1] Matt: was doing a very similar thing with the killer quads group in
[2004.82] Matt: Birmingham. A lot of a lot of five inch stuff, but he also had
[2009.42] Matt: the winter whoops going as well each year. And so eventually we
[2015.1] Matt: kind of got our heads together and like, right, we need to need
[2016.78] Matt: to join this because there's no point having two in Birmingham
[2019.42] Matt: we'll just all go all work together. So we've just
[2024.06] Matt: amalgamated this last year, and decided to run things all
[2027.66] Matt: together. And it's a really good group of people. But the
[2031.42] Matt: event Birmingham International Race Day came because a German
[2037.42] Matt: a set of German pilots came to me and said, right, we've beaten
[2040.98] Matt: everyone in Germany, we want to come to the UK and see what you're
[2043.42] Matt: made of. And I was like, right, come on, then we can do this.
[2046.66] Matt: Why not? So that was Spezzy Lover initiated the contact of
[2052.26] Matt: that. He came over, we put on an event in cons, which is a
[2058.34] Matt: Birmingham nightclub doesn't exist anymore. Unfortunately,
[2061.26] Matt: COVID killed that one off, but it was a really cool, a really
[2064.86] Matt: cool venue. And they just they were very cool to let us fly
[2068.54] Matt: around with their normal patrons there, you know, pretty chill
[2072.14] Matt: with the whole risk assessment, don't fly into anyone and
[2074.3] Matt: everything's cool kind of attitude, which was good. And we
[2078.26] Matt: had the first race there. And of course, Spezzy Lover is wicked
[2080.94] Matt: fast. So he won. And we had Rory Arce, who some pilots might
[2086.94] Matt: know is also or is majoritively a plane, line of sight plane
[2091.06] Matt: pilot. But he also flew whoops. Then and he came in second, which
[2095.62] Matt: we were great, because we're like, yes, at least one UK.
[2101.18] Matt: Stefan was in third and Wigman another UK pilot was in fourth.
[2105.5] Matt: So we had kind of Germany, UK, Germany, UK. So we're right up
[2108.46] Matt: there. But yes, Germany did take first place, which was which was
[2111.5] Matt: very good. So he showed what he could do, which was cool. We
[2115.82] Matt: also had a really good contingent that year from Wales
[2119.18] Matt: come over the team wooly sheep. But I think three or four of
[2122.58] Matt: their blokes came over. So I was super happy to see them because
[2124.9] Matt: they traveled a long way to come to Birmingham. So I was very
[2127.46] Matt: happy. And like a boy don by that because people are willing
[2131.78] Matt: to travel a little bit of distance to come to these
[2133.58] Matt: events, which is exciting. And so yes, that was the first that
[2137.58] Matt: was the first one. And from there, people were asking me
[2141.18] Matt: what you're going to do next year. And we were all in
[2143.1] Matt: lockdown because of COVID silliness. So one year went by
[2148.5] Matt: and then we had we were back in 2022. And this was in Birmingham
[2153.78] Matt: Open Media. It's like a another sort of stem art gallery sort
[2158.46] Matt: of place. So they kind of mix science and technology with art
[2162.62] Matt: to try and inspire people to get more involved in that, which is
[2165.58] Matt: a really cool way of doing it. So I did sort of a drone demo
[2170.7] Matt: for them for one of their events. And then they let us
[2172.98] Matt: use their space quid pro quo to host our race. That year we had
[2179.46] Matt: a full UK whitewash we had Dan Carpean first anti hyphen second
[2183.94] Matt: carbon third and Martian McFly and fourth, which was really,
[2187.5] Matt: really exciting. So we're very happy with that. And then last
[2191.62] Matt: year, like I say, so that those two first races were cheers
[2196.66] Matt: Martian. Those first two races was literally me. And I had a
[2202.22] Matt: lot of help from Jagger's worth showing out to Jagger's because
[2204.98] Matt: he helped me a lot on this. It was literally me and a
[2208.14] Matt: spreadsheet and a little RF puck timer. Just kind of hashing it
[2215.54] Matt: together and making it work. A bit rough and ready, but it
[2218.54] Matt: worked. And it got the job done. And we had some really good
[2222.46] Matt: events. And then I was like, right, if this is growing at
[2225.26] Matt: this pace, and we're going to need a bit more professional
[2227.62] Matt: help to make this a growth. So I was like, right, I know, I know
[2232.02] Matt: just the guy serve is going to be the man for the hour. So he
[2235.38] Matt: came on and helped us do last year's event January 2023. That
[2240.22] Matt: was at a venue called drop shop in Digboth, which is a ping pong
[2247.5] Matt: hall, I guess you call it very cool venue. Lots of like
[2251.94] Matt: graffiti style stuff ping pong tables everywhere loads of
[2254.54] Matt: space quite a bit height as well. So we had a bit of a height
[2258.3] Matt: change, which was good fun. But the venue was not ideal. For
[2265.74] Matt: other reasons that the attendees will know about. But we did have
[2272.94] Matt: just come along. We had the Italian weekly guys came along.
[2278.58] Matt: We had lots of people travel from all over Europe, Germany,
[2282.42] Matt: like a lot and had a really great event.
[2285.74] Matt: The pizza was good. The pizza was really quite nice.
[2289.02] Matt: The pizza was good. That was part of the reason I wanted
[2291.58] Matt: that venue. It was really it was a really good, like basis for a
[2295.5] Matt: venue.
[2297.98] Frank: But yeah, I feel like there's, there's a story there. I don't
[2301.26] Frank: know whether to push push on that to find out if you want to
[2306.1] Frank: tell us
[2311.62] Matt: Okay, without putting two finer points on it, the loose were
[2315.42] Matt: non operational. And then they escaped
[2319.98] Cerb: onto the track.
[2326.34] Cerb: In commentary trying to just not mention the who NATO that was
[2330.46] Cerb: coming up. Yeah, the entire time, but since there's only
[2336.74] Cerb: you two guys here, we can tell you. Yeah, keep it under your
[2340.54] Matt: house. But yeah, there was a small water water feature on
[2346.06] Matt: track for a short period of time. And don't land in the water.
[2350.66] Cerb: No. Yeah. And if you do, then check your, check your logs.
[2355.74] Cerb: Yeah.
[2359.18] Matt: So yeah, so that was that was the event space last year. And it
[2362.82] Matt: was, it was brilliant. We had a really good event. It was so much
[2366.74] Matt: fun. But could have done without that. That was that was like,
[2371.3] Matt: stress levels are right up here. But this year, the venue, I've
[2376.86] Matt: been reassured the plumbing is in excellent condition. And
[2380.54] Cerb: if you can do an event, and in my, in my really humble opinion,
[2388.86] Cerb: if you can do an event that well, with a poo NATO in the
[2391.62] Cerb: corner, you know, that gives you the, you know, the thought that
[2395.42] Cerb: hey, we can do even better next year. Because if we pulled that
[2397.74] Cerb: off, easy peasy,
[2401.54] Matt: many important is a proper venue. It's not even like I'm
[2404.38] Matt: convincing a pub to let me have a corner of their room is as a
[2407.14] Matt: proper venue with certified plumbing and electric some stacks
[2412.62] Matt: of risk assessments and yeah, lots of paperwork. Yes. And that
[2417.66] Matt: has been a bit of a challenge. That's probably the biggest
[2419.26] Matt: challenge with this event is the paperwork. And the cost of the
[2423.14] Matt: venue is significantly more because it is such an amazing
[2425.54] Matt: venue to fly there. They have obviously staff costs and there
[2428.62] Matt: is it's an expensive venue. So that's the biggest that's the
[2433.9] Matt: biggest challenge. The venue, the whole event, I've never I
[2439.86] Matt: don't want to make money off of this. That is not the plan. The
[2442.26] Matt: event is run at cost. And then in if you know, if everyone has a
[2448.18] Matt: good time, that is the payment. That's all I want really is
[2450.42] Matt: basically just everyone have a good time. We put on a cool
[2452.18] Matt: event, we have lots of fun, we have dress up lights everywhere.
[2455.78] Matt: Whoops flying around all day like that is what we want. It is
[2459.26] Matt: not run for profit, which is why we've got lots of sponsors on
[2462.38] Matt: board. They've been super supportive bringing in loads of
[2464.74] Matt: like prizes, helping with the costs, everything, helping
[2468.9] Matt: promote it as well, which is amazing. But it's all run
[2472.54] Matt: absolutely at cost. And then if you want to donate some beer
[2476.34] Matt: money to the organizers, which is me serve and some friends and
[2479.58] Matt: family, just to, you know, say thanks for putting on an event,
[2482.9] Matt: then that would be very much appreciated. But it's not, you
[2485.02] Matt: know, it's not required. We just want to have a really cool event.
[2489.5] Cerb: If I leave this event with my voice intact, I will be
[2492.82] Matt: disappointed. Yeah, exactly. We want to get to the end of it and
[2497.54] Matt: just have like cheek muscles that are like Arnold Schwarzenegger's
[2502.14] Cerb: abs.
[2504.5] Cerb: Like one of my personal highlights from last year's bird
[2507.82] Cerb: was decamping all the stuff, throwing it in the car and then
[2513.1] Cerb: the pub next door. Just like, oh my god, we've done it. It was
[2517.54] Cerb: amazing. You know, a couple of points and voice was gone.
[2522.42] Cerb: Absolutely. We were just absolutely hanging we were we
[2525.9] Cerb: were we were ruined. But it was so nice to be on the other side
[2529.62] Cerb: of it and be so happy. And just riding on that wave of already
[2533.54] Cerb: having such a good time. That's where you get paid when you do
[2536.54] Matt: this stuff. Yeah, it was wicked people come up and just go, you
[2539.74] Matt: know, it was a wicked track. It was, it was fun. It was, you
[2543.34] Matt: know, and they traveled a long way as well. We had people like
[2545.66] Matt: say from Poland, Italy, Germany, the top of the UK, like all over
[2551.06] Matt: the place, bottom corner of the UK, like literally they travel
[2553.7] Matt: thousands of miles to come and then everyone seemed to go away
[2556.38] Matt: pretty, pretty happy with us just the coolest thing. So the
[2561.02] Curry: question here just popped up, which which leads me to ask,
[2564.46] Curry: what is a revolving gate? Someone's asked any revolving
[2567.86] Curry: gates like the first year. So I'm thinking is what is some sort
[2572.5] Curry: of literally something that spins around, you got to get
[2575.1] Matt: through it somehow? Basically, yeah, yeah. So I'm gonna drop a
[2578.02] Matt: load of YouTube videos in to the comment and to the description
[2584.22] Matt: somewhere. And there are videos from each year, you know, people
[2587.62] Matt: have made little videos and you'll see in was it 2022. We
[2594.62] Matt: had a disco ball motor basically with a long pole, and then two
[2601.14] Matt: gates hanging on the outside and the whole thing went round like
[2603.18] Matt: this. So you had to choose whether you're going to go that
[2605.78] Matt: one first and then that one or that one first and then that one.
[2608.34] Matt: And it changed each time you went around the track. So it was
[2610.9] Matt: somewhat popular because it looked cool and somewhat
[2613.78] Matt: unpopular because the track changed each time you went
[2615.66] Matt: around. I suspect this year, we will not be doing a moving gate,
[2623.3] Matt: but there will be definitely be some very interesting tracks.
[2625.42] Matt: We can do a moving gate. Well, we're gonna have so many like
[2631.98] Matt: interesting features. Yeah, we want to tease the venue, show
[2637.74] Matt: you what's possible.
[2639.54] Frank: We serve involved as well. And I've seen a couple of questions
[2641.74] Frank: in the chat as well about whether there will be a joker
[2643.74] Frank: gate or joker lane.
[2647.54] Cerb: Maybe. I give you a solid maybe on that one. There are technical
[2654.7] Cerb: challenges to VTX lap timing inside a massive Faraday cage.
[2661.26] Cerb: Yeah, you have to put the start finish gate way away from the
[2664.74] Cerb: track. And yeah, if we can get another timer out there to at
[2669.78] Cerb: least do split times, that would be nice. Whether we'd get the
[2673.82] Cerb: clarity of signal to get away with a joker lap. I don't know.
[2678.66] Cerb: So for anyone that's not familiar, sorry, over the
[2682.26] Cerb: summer, some of the outdoor races are five inch stuff, we
[2685.58] Cerb: introduced a joker lap, which is where there was a second route
[2689.5] Cerb: around the track that was shorter for that one lap. And
[2692.5] Cerb: you could play one joker in each heat. So it would be a full lap
[2696.7] Cerb: race, but one of your four laps, you choose which one, you can
[2699.74] Cerb: take a shortcut. And that was your joker lane. But just
[2704.62] Cerb: introduced a little bit more interest and jeopardy into the
[2708.38] Cerb: thing because we're all about jeopardy. When you're
[2712.94] Cerb: commentating, that's the thing that sells it is the jeopardy.
[2716.42] Cerb: I'd love to do it with whips. I'm not sure we could pull it
[2718.58] Cerb: off. But we'll have a look when we're there.
[2720.7] Cerb: That might be that might be an evolution. Maybe for next year.
[2724.82] Cerb: We can see I mean, we've got we've got quite a lot of tech
[2728.22] Cerb: because you know what I'm like. Yeah. And I've got a really good
[2731.22] Cerb: team with me now at FPV Racing Solutions. RC Maniac, who we
[2735.5] Cerb: mentioned, who will be there. He'll bring the hyper tunnel,
[2738.46] Cerb: hopefully, so that will be interesting. And he's also our
[2741.94] Cerb: VAR judge, our video assisted referee. So he has a full feed
[2746.42] Cerb: of the event going into his box, each race is recorded,
[2749.7] Cerb: gives us instant replays for the fans. And if someone says, you
[2754.34] Cerb: know, I don't think he went through that gate, or I don't,
[2757.46] Cerb: you know, I don't think it carried my lap, we can we can
[2760.18] Cerb: check it all, which is such a weight off your mind when you're
[2763.46] Cerb: a race director to have someone just doing that for you and
[2766.82] Cerb: sorting it out, you can just concentrate on keeping that race
[2769.1] Cerb: going, keeping it interesting. And RC Maniac is a tech nerd
[2774.9] Cerb: like me. So he comes with all the field cameras and all the
[2780.14] Cerb: audio visual stuff to help me out. I'm making a really
[2783.94] Cerb: amazing presentation. So it should be I'm sort of slightly
[2789.66] Cerb: petrified. Last year was great. I had four track cams to deal
[2793.02] Cerb: with and pilot feeds and I can do individual feeds. So if I've
[2798.18] Cerb: got a pilot chasing another pilot, I can just go to his
[2801.22] Cerb: feed. Or if you do head to head cams and yeah, and it's going
[2805.86] Cerb: to be even more this year, it's going to be even more cameras.
[2810.02] Matt: Like I say, we start we started with just a spreadsheet and a
[2812.98] Matt: lap timer and me like punching in like numbers on my phone into
[2816.18] Matt: like a little spreadsheet, which works. And now we're up to like
[2819.66] Matt: full video production, live stream equipment, multiple
[2823.06] Matt: cameras dotted all over the place interviews, like there's
[2825.82] Matt: going to be a whole lot more going on than just off or pilot
[2828.98] Matt: feeds, looking at fuzzy video.
[2831.5] Frank: So what channel should people subscribe to so that they get
[2835.5] Frank: the reminders to watch this when it's happening?
[2838.82] Matt: FPV Racing Solutions is the YouTube channel you want. So
[2844.62] Matt: search on YouTube, find FPV Racing Solutions and give it a
[2848.06] Matt: like and subscribe, guys.
[2853.86] Matt: Ding serves bell. Yeah. He's also got he's also got a Facebook
[2857.74] Matt: group, which is wicked, and they'll get posted up on there,
[2860.3] Matt: you'll get reminders and things. And if you've been seeing all my
[2863.94] Matt: adverts for bird, you will no doubt get spammed with the
[2866.66] Matt: live, the live feed links as well.
[2871.7] Matt: And don't watch the live stream. Come, come along, come on,
[2874.54] Matt: watch it. Come on, it's in person, it's going to be
[2877.26] Matt: incredible. And like, you can come along for you can come
[2880.58] Matt: along for free and what and like walk amongst the like stands and
[2883.3] Matt: stuff we're going to have there. And you'll see a little bit of
[2884.86] Matt: the track because it comes out into that atrium. And if you
[2887.94] Matt: want to come in and get up close and personal meet the pilot,
[2890.82] Matt: see, you know, see the live stream and all the video feeds
[2894.9] Matt: and see the racing up close and personal, then there's a small
[2898.14] Matt: entry fee, like I say, it just goes to cover costs, hopefully
[2902.22] Matt: pay for the venue by the end of it. So yeah, so that's the
[2906.58] Matt: that's what we like basically just bring bring family on to
[2909.1] Matt: have a look and oh, I forgot to mention actually, not only can
[2912.62] Matt: you like, just like see stuff going on, you'll be able to do
[2916.82] Matt: stuff as well. So I mentioned the simulators, the think tank
[2921.58] Matt: museum are also going to be doing like a workshop where you
[2923.78] Matt: can build little paper gliders and paper helicopter things
[2928.66] Matt: which you can chuck off the balcony. So you'll be able to
[2931.54] Matt: get involved and learn some bit about flight. And yeah, track
[2935.06] Frank: obstacles though.
[2937.82] Matt: Yeah, so everyone when the leaders are coming around the
[2940.34] Matt: track, they're just going to get bombarded with paper.
[2942.86] Cerb: You wouldn't believe how much red tape it was. We're doing
[2948.7] Cerb: fine when we said Chuck gliders and I know. Yeah, that's great.
[2952.5] Cerb: That's very nice. And we said, I will throw them off the
[2954.14] Cerb: balcony. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
[2958.5] Cerb: that's another two pages of red tape for that one.
[2962.78] Cerb: They've been brilliant. They've been really good.
[2964.62] Frank: I'm sure everyone will appreciate the effort.
[2966.86] Matt: Yeah, yeah. So it should be it should be good. So like I said,
[2970.02] Matt: the shoot the stars get to the moon, we want to get to a point
[2973.54] Matt: where it's going to be like a little indoor FPV festival sort
[2976.86] Matt: of thing. And hopefully it will grow into that. And hopefully,
[2980.98] Matt: like now, hopefully this year will go well a millennium point
[2983.74] Matt: like us and they want us to come back and this event space is
[2987.02] Matt: massive. So we will be able to grow and make this a big, a
[2991.46] Matt: bigger and bigger event each year. So I'm very excited about
[2994.22] Matt: that. And particularly because we get such good pilots coming
[2998.14] Matt: every year as well. Like they really are some pilots come in
[3003.38] Matt: to race whoops, which are, you know, they're teeny tiny little
[3007.66] Matt: like toys. These are toys guys like serious bits of kit as
[3013.66] Cerb: well. You know, if you go and find the FPV Racing Solutions
[3018.18] Cerb: YouTube channel, look for the live from last year. And if you
[3022.06] Cerb: only watch the finals, yeah, yeah, I was blown away as a
[3026.78] Cerb: predominantly I'm a five inch racer. And I was like, what
[3031.14] Cerb: these are whoops, why are they going fast? And why are they
[3034.9] Cerb: this controllable? And what's going on? Yeah, amazing what
[3038.9] Cerb: these really quick boys can do with the word. Yeah, yeah. Is
[3043.3] Frank: there anyone that you can name drop who's who's coming for
[3046.5] Frank: this event?
[3047.62] Matt: Yeah, I mean, last year, we had Cordastrophe who came in third
[3053.22] Matt: he's coming back this year. He's from Germany, Dominic Sazer.
[3056.98] Matt: He's super technical like flying star like he just doesn't crash
[3062.62] Matt: it seems like he's just on rails the whole way around. And he
[3067.02] Matt: came in third. So he's super quick as well. So it's really
[3070.38] Matt: good. We've got a copy uses the UK champion in 2022. He came in
[3077.22] Matt: fourth in last year's been 22 came first he's unwell, I say
[3081.86] Matt: undoubtedly the fastest UK pilot, but I'm sure a few people
[3085.38] Matt: would would want to put his muscles in the test. He's super
[3090.34] Matt: quick with whoops is you'll have seen him on iGOW. He absolutely
[3094.42] Matt: nails like iGOW tricks and stuff. But he's also a super
[3097.42] Matt: quick pilot. And I saw him race in Italy recently. And he just
[3100.9] Matt: turns it up, man like he can just be so quick. He sometimes
[3106.7] Matt: has a bit of bad luck with gear though. So we'll see what
[3109.74] Matt: happens. And the final race in last year, which is why I came
[3114.26] Matt: forth, he was leading for the whole race. And then he had a
[3117.38] Matt: random fail safe for some reason, and dropped out this guy
[3120.58] Matt: from the top of the ladder, which is the last thing he won
[3123.3] Matt: in a finals race.
[3126.38] Matt: A common taster. I loved it.
[3128.78] Matt: It was it was dramatic. Yeah. So copies one to watch
[3134.46] Matt: catastrophes one to watch. We've got a couple other UK guys are
[3137.42] Matt: really, really worth watching out for. So anti height. Everyone
[3144.14] Matt: knows anti height in the five inch world in tiny whoops as
[3146.54] Matt: well ridiculously fast and he flies a spectrum radio like, you
[3150.06] Matt: know, he's going old school carb third in 2022. He's been
[3154.98] Matt: training a lot recently. We're in his very, very fast. He's
[3159.46] Matt: been training with King Joshi Joshi Stevens, who went to the
[3162.9] Matt: FIA World Drone Racing Championship in Korea. He's
[3168.26] Matt: lightning quick, man. Like you see them racing, you see the
[3171.06] Matt: videos they put up on Instagram and YouTube and whatnot, bring
[3173.9] Matt: down and where and they are absolutely hooning around rate
[3177.42] Matt: whoop track. So I'm very excited to see those two go
[3180.22] Matt: head to head and give anti hyphen copy a room for money
[3184.1] Matt: too. And then rich from down in down in Cornwall, the DRC boys.
[3190.62] Matt: He's not only is he like super quick racer, he's on a lot of the
[3194.5] Matt: sim racing and comes to a lot of whoop racing as well. But he's
[3198.7] Matt: also a real like, techie guy, he's done a whole load of like,
[3203.74] Matt: timing, timing programming for their system down there. And
[3207.5] Matt: they've got a really swish system. They've got something
[3209.98] Matt: called the whoop coops. Which serves you know, we've we're
[3214.06] Matt: doing our own thing. But they have their own like little whoop
[3215.82] Matt: coops, which are like little boxes. And you put your whoop in
[3219.18] Matt: the coop. And then when it's ready, and the timer goes, the
[3222.34] Matt: little flats drop down and then your whoops jump out of the
[3224.42] Matt: whoop coop and they're off racing. So there's no jumping
[3226.82] Matt: on the start line because you're going to hit a wall to be
[3228.66] Cerb: big. So that pretty cool. So my my car's already full and I
[3233.66] Cerb: do an event.
[3236.66] Frank: I see there's a comment from Richard Warwick in the chat, but
[3238.74] Frank: there was a kid at drone fest, drone best, his first time
[3242.46] Frank: flying routes with anyone else and he destroyed the best time
[3245.02] Frank: on the route track. So you know, there's still room, you know,
[3248.66] Frank: you've got your four tickets, they can still be somebody buys
[3251.5] Frank: all those tickets, who ends up
[3255.18] Matt: to the I'm going to go to the ticket admin and just keep an eye
[3257.66] Matt: on it. See if anybody's got tickets in the cart. See if
[3260.22] Matt: anyone's got ticket in the cart.
[3263.86] Cerb: Do you know which countries we've got?
[3265.3] Matt: Oh, no, there's three left. There's three left. Someone
[3268.14] Matt: bought one. Yes, it was
[3271.66] Cerb: coming. We've not met the Latvians yet, have we?
[3273.94] Matt: No, no, that's it. So a couple weeks ago, some Latvians got
[3276.7] Matt: in touch and say, Yeah, we're going to come over. I'm like,
[3278.54] Matt: brilliant. Super excited. That's really exciting. Because the
[3281.94] Matt: whole idea is just to bring everyone together and, and get
[3285.62] Matt: everyone kind of like cross communicating and use the use
[3288.98] Matt: the FPV community to just kind of bring everyone together and
[3292.38] Matt: travel and see what each other do and how they race and who's
[3296.06] Matt: up. So yeah, we've got Latvians coming. We've got Italians
[3300.14] Matt: coming. We've got the Germans coming. We've got the guys from
[3305.38] Matt: Cornwall, which are basically French. They're coming. We've
[3310.46] Matt: got I don't know if any of the Welsh guys are coming. I hope
[3314.7] Matt: they do because they're really good fun. Who else have we got?
[3320.58] Cerb: Quite intimidating actually is if you if you stop and think
[3324.42] Cerb: about it too much. It's quite scary. So for me, it's, you
[3329.06] Cerb: know, it's a bunch of logging kit around and it's like half an
[3333.14] Cerb: hour across town. You know, and I would go and rest direct and
[3337.22] Cerb: commentate for a couple of days and happy days. And if you stop
[3341.18] Cerb: and things like there are people across the planet right
[3344.86] Cerb: now booking flights and hotels and and organizing this like
[3350.78] Cerb: huge trip to something that the us to have got to make sure
[3355.62] Cerb: works. Yeah, on the day it must work. perspective that scares
[3361.18] Cerb: you. And you start thinking about and you watch the video
[3364.46] Cerb: logs afterwards like people were vlogging there was a contest
[3368.38] Cerb: for vlogs. And there's like, like people walking through
[3371.06] Cerb: airports, like looking forward to the bird and I'm like, Oh,
[3375.26] Cerb: my pressure then.
[3378.7] Matt: Yeah, the vlogs was really good. So we did a competition. That's
[3381.9] Matt: one of the prize pools available this year is for producing the
[3387.3] Matt: best vlog, which will be open to public voting. So if you want
[3392.18] Matt: to do, you know, vlog your way into bird, show us around, do
[3397.7] Matt: what you do. Put some DVR on there. And generally just put
[3401.62] Matt: something cool together, stick it out there on YouTube land,
[3404.34] Matt: people will be able to vote and say, Hey, yeah, that was really
[3406.7] Matt: cool. And maybe you'll get the coveted coveted prizes that are
[3412.58] Matt: there the prizes. Where's my list of prizes gone? Hang on.
[3418.06] Matt: Because the deal is is only knows what to do with. I say the
[3424.26] Matt: sponsors have been spectacular. They put up such good prizes
[3428.9] Matt: and everything that it just blows my mind. Like, we've got
[3432.66] Matt: actual cash prizes this year, which is amazing. Because
[3437.66] Matt: obviously, coming that distance, it does, it does cost. So being
[3441.9] Matt: able to offer, you know, some cash prizes to save you guys did
[3447.38] Matt: put in some proper effort, and we appreciate you coming all that
[3449.5] Matt: way. It's good. So yeah, so there's $100 team black sheet
[3455.3] Matt: voucher up for the best vlog winner. So it's decent, you know,
[3458.5] Matt: some decent prizes up there. You know, by fly whoop stores, reaper
[3463.82] Matt: Nanos, ELS receivers, pint glasses, loads and loads of
[3468.78] Matt: stuff, you know, empty or full, they will be engraved.
[3480.02] Matt: So yeah, so you know, there's decent prizes for the vlog. These
[3482.82] Matt: are the just like just the fun stuff. So you got the vlogs, the
[3486.38] Matt: best ones the competition. Again, it was open for public
[3489.98] Matt: voting on the day. So this is another sort of like, wife
[3492.86] Matt: friendly thing. So your wife at home sitting there is like, oh,
[3494.98] Matt: that one's good. Yeah, you can you can vote online. And you'll
[3498.5] Matt: see who wins that. And, you know, there's another 100 pounds
[3502.3] Matt: worth of vouchers and things there as well. And also a derpy
[3507.06] Matt: who's custom limited edition Lego minifigure, that will be
[3511.1] Matt: made to look like your onesie. So these things, these are rare,
[3515.78] Matt: like anybody who knows derpy who's and the minifigures in
[3518.82] Matt: the FPV world, these are rad is like 30 in the whole world. And
[3522.86] Matt: they go for like, they only go out to the big competition. So
[3525.94] Matt: I'm kind of honored that she's offered to do one for our
[3529.74] Matt: competition, because it means that you know, some people take
[3532.98] Matt: it seriously. I mean, we don't take seriously, but
[3536.14] Cerb: I have to say one of my most prized possessions, I am
[3539.74] Cerb: actually lucky enough to have a minifigure myself, which derpy
[3544.42] Cerb: did is frickin amazing. It's really cool.
[3547.7] Matt: Yeah, no, we're good.
[3550.58] Frank: So now we've convinced at least three people to they should go
[3555.14] Frank: and find the tickets. Where do they find the tickets again?
[3557.7] Frank: Let's remind them.
[3558.82] Matt: Cool. So you want to go to Matthew snow.co.uk forward
[3563.26] Matt: slash bi rd 2024. So Matthew snow. Matthew snow.co.uk bird
[3571.46] Matt: 2024. And you can follow the links from there through to our
[3575.1] Matt: ticket website and get the tickets there. So there are
[3580.14] Matt: check again, there are three, three race tickets left and four
[3584.26] Matt: standby tickets left. And then obviously, if you want to just
[3586.86] Matt: come and watch we would love to have you along.
[3589.98] Cerb: When they've gone, come spectate, come join us on the
[3592.5] Cerb: day. It's going to be a party.
[3595.3] Matt: It's going to work good. We've got so much going on. So I'm
[3597.82] Matt: very excited about that. Oh, the people that are coming over
[3600.86] Matt: actually, there's also the whoop house. So you can say in a
[3606.38] Matt: hotel, that's cool. We've got a whoop house going on. I'm not
[3609.3] Matt: organizing that this is jaggers. So if you want to get in touch
[3611.86] Matt: with jaggers, I'm sure we can link him somewhere. He's
[3617.54] Matt: organizing a whoop house. This is basically a big house
[3619.54] Matt: somewhere in the country, or relatively nearby, but a big
[3623.3] Matt: farmhouse, basically, where everyone sort of stays when I
[3627.26] Matt: have a lot of people stay. And a racetrack is set up, we do
[3631.7] Matt: like, we just order a big bunch of like, Chinese takeaway and
[3635.9] Matt: just have big communal meals, and basically spend the whole
[3638.7] Matt: time with our FPV goggles down, just hammering out whoops to
[3643.06] Matt: death. So it's just another opportunity to kind of meet and
[3647.02] Matt: chat and drink and party and fly whoops, basically.
[3651.06] Frank: So anyone that wants to come along on the day, do they need
[3654.58] Frank: to do anything in advance? Or do they just turn up at
[3657.3] Frank: Millennium Point on the 27th and 28th of January next year?
[3661.98] Matt: There is a bit of a discount for buying tickets in advance. So if
[3666.14] Matt: you want to buy tickets in advance, you'll get a bit of a
[3668.06] Matt: deal. You can just turn up on the day and buy on the door.
[3670.5] Matt: That's no problem. You can just turn up and have a look at what's
[3673.22] Matt: going on. There is there is stuff to see and do that is free.
[3676.94] Matt: So you don't have to, you know, come into the to the event, you
[3681.5] Matt: can visit the give it a go, do some think tank stuff and see the
[3687.02] Matt: whoops flying a bit from the general the general area. But
[3690.34] Matt: yes, come along on the 27th and 28th of January and check it out.
[3695.62] Frank: Nice. And anyone that wants to watch on the day, they can go to
[3699.34] Frank: YouTube and find FPV Racing Solutions.
[3702.14] Matt: That's it. That's the place. That is the word.
[3708.02] Frank: Well, thank you very much, guys, for coming along and talking
[3712.34] Frank: about your event. I hope it all goes very well. I'm sure it will
[3717.3] Frank: with the two of you there. And it sounds like you've got a great
[3719.98] Frank: community as well behind you, which always helps with these
[3723.14] Frank: kind of events.
[3724.26] Matt: Yeah, the community is great. Everyone kind of pitches in,
[3726.42] Matt: which is the best bit. So we always super appreciative of
[3730.86] Matt: everyone that kind of like spurs us on and gives us kind of a
[3734.06] Matt: confidence to do these things because it's an expensive thing.
[3738.02] Matt: We don't, you know, we just want to have a good time. But
[3741.58] Matt: obviously, we need the confidence to go out and do it.
[3743.3] Matt: So you guys giving us just a bit of enthusiasm and like
[3746.42] Matt: encouragement just helps us get out there and build these things
[3749.42] Matt: and make it happen. So we really appreciate that from the
[3752.1] Matt: community. So we'd love to see you guys there too, if you want.
[3756.02] Frank: I will definitely be checking my calendar after this. Yeah, it's
[3759.82] Frank: been great talking to you. Thank you very much. So this has been
[3762.94] Frank: let's draw now Episode 431. And tonight you have been joined by
[3767.66] Frank: everyone's favourite Kerry Kitten. Goodbye. You have been
[3771.54] Frank: joined by Matt.
[3773.82] Matt: Bye, guys. Thanks very much.
[3775.78] Matt: You've been joined by Serb.
[3777.54] Matt: Cheers, everyone.
[3778.98] Frank: And I have been Andrew slash Frank. Thank you very much. And
[3782.9] Frank: good night. See you next week. Goodbye.
[3785.86] Frank: Bye, guys.
[3787.5] UNKNOWN: Telemetry loss.