At their annual awards ceremony on 22nd February, Dunfermline and West Fife Sport Council presented Jim Arnott with the CENTENARY MASTERS AWARD sponsored by Dunfermline Carnegie Trust. This award is made to the outstanding male or female athlete aged 35 years or over, who has achieved significant results in their sport during the past year.

Model Flying has been recognised as a sport in the UK since 1993 and much longer internationally, for example top Soviet Bloc fliers were often designated Masters of Sport. The basis of this recognition can be seen by drawing analogies between various other sports and model flying disciplines, e.g. Control Line (CL) combat flying and fencing, Radio Control (RC) aerobatics and figure skating, Free-Flight (FF) and orienteering.

The Sports Council are commended for choosing a nominee from such a minority sport in the face of strong mainstream nominees from Athletics, Cycling and Bowling.

Jim has been a potent competitor in the UK FF scene for decades. so was nominated by Dunfermline Model Aero Club in recognition of his achievements in 2017. He won gold, silver, and bronze medals at the British National Free Flight Championship and, for the umpteenth time the Scottish Free Flight League championship. Unlike many of the top flight competitors nowadays Jim is “old school” in so far as he builds his own models from scratch.

Jim however is not only a competitor. He started aeromodelling in his teenage years and has been flying ever since. His first love has always been FF but has had much success with the CL discipline of the sport. He has recently obtained a RC glider to add to his RC trainer which comes out every few years!. As well as being a competitor Jim is the Scottish Aeromodellers Association (SAA) Contest Director for FF. He was made a Fellow of the SAA for this work many years ago. Jim is an active member of Dunfermline Model Aero Club and is currently working to encourage youngsters into the Sport as exemplified by his recent indoor flying demonstrations at Kings Road Primary School.

When not flying Jim is a dedicated family man providing support to family members with mental illness and Cerebral Palsy .