The two F-14 fighter jets that were preparing to land attracted the attention of many people in the training base.

As the fighter jets entered the field and landed, Long Yun's eyes followed and glanced at the two fighter jets. Seeing the half-buried hanger on the belly of the F-14 and the wings under the wings, the chubby Aim-54 "Immortal Bird" missiles, he guessed that this should be a pair of two-machine combinations coming to the Běi Jing Center to participate in the competition, or at least it was a performance match.

He kept watching the two full-body and huge f-14s landed on the ground and slid away until they were blocked by buildings not far away and left their sight. He turned around and exchanged a surprised expression with Liu Wei.

No matter what the purpose is, seeing f-14 here is completely unexpected for them.

Of course, Long Yun and the others' surprise made completely reasonable; but they didn't know at this time that they would sooner or later encounter this mysterious team on the competition journey of "Chenlong".

"Liu Wei, domestic teams are equipped with fighter jets like F-14?"

"I remember there, but it's really rare," Liu Wei looked back for a while without feeling satisfied and found that he could not see the two fighter planes. Then Liu Wei turned his attention back to the car. He fiddled with the tablet computer on his lap. "After all, as a domestic team, the mainstream of using domestic fighter planes is the main stream. But it is also true that the popularity of the Tomcat is very high. Although it cannot be used in the final stage of ift, it is good to attract popularity."

So, are there really air teams in China using this heavy fighter?

Long Yun is actually not unfamiliar with the F-14. This heavy fighter aircraft designed and put into production by Grumman and started to be equipped with the US Navy in 1974. It has a certain multi-target combat capability because of its AWG-9 radar and fire control system, combined with the AIM-54 "Immortal Bird" missile, and can intercept the powerful model of the coming Soviet supersonic bomber hundreds of kilometers away from the center of the aircraft carrier battle group. It has attracted much attention from the world because of its thick and mechanical appearance, outstanding performance parameters and remarkable practical records.

As the world's first third-generation fighter (of course some people have different opinions and think that the F-14 is the strongest second-generation fighter, which is a matter of opinion), the design concept, structural design and technical level of the F-14 are relatively not outstanding, and there is no advantage in comparison with a large number of late-generation third-generation models.

And it has to be said that the engine used by a very good fighter, the F-14 Tomcat, is very unreliable: whether it is the early TF30 or the later P414a, not only does the thrust output not match the F100 and F110 series engines used by the US Air Force F-15 and F-16 fighters, but also often suffers various failures due to insufficient design margins, causing many F-14s to crash, which greatly drags down the performance of the fighter. This situation was not changed until 1988 when the F-14d, which replaced the F110 engine, appeared, but the output of the D type was not much.

But even so, due to the variable swept wing design that takes into account both high and low-speed maneuverability, the emphasis on the fire control and firepower configuration of remote interception, and the abundant fuel capacity of the large body, the f-14 is still an excellent heavy-duty interceptor that can be compared with the mig-25.

At the same time, due to the excellent design of variable swept wings and aerodynamic control, its mobility and fighting ability are also outstanding. This is not comparable to that of G-25, who is good at fast interception but is afraid of close combat.

Since its in-service, the F-14 has performed well in the battlegrounds in the Libyan conflict and the Iran-Iraq War (acquired and used by Iran, and many enthusiasts intimately call it "Persian Cat"); of course, under the overall situation of the Cold War, as the original purpose of the "Tomcat" design, the situation of fighting against Soviet supersonic bombers has never happened.

Good performance and extremely high popularity make the F-14 a common aircraft model in the World Aviation Arena; even in the Eastern Alliance countries, some teams will choose to use this chubby-looking heavy fighter jet, which takes off to fight the sky with countless cheers.

Unfortunately, Grumman's F-14 production line no longer undertakes military fighter jet production tasks and no longer operates with full strength; now the company can only provide necessary exhausted parts and fighter jet maintenance.

To talk about the newly produced F-14, there are less than ten aircraft every year, and the price becomes quite expensive because it cannot meet the production quantity that matches the cost.

Therefore, the number of F-14 fighter jets in existence is limited, and one less one is dropped, which also makes the procurement and use of F-14 extremely large than the output. Until now, many third-generation aircraft are operating in the production line, which is particularly troublesome and difficult to handle.

Haha, but who can predict it?

A rare model like the f-14 actually makes people feel that things are rare and their popularity has become particularly high. This is probably what Grumman did not expect when he decided to restart the f-14 production line to provide spare parts support to hundreds of existing "Tomcats" around the world.

Using F-14 in the country, such a troublesome and expensive fighter jet is probably the kind that is rich and not short of money?

"Among the teams that register for the Ift qualifiers in China, there are also those who use F-14?"

"Let me see... there are really; but this is not surprising. There are hundreds of teams participating in the qualifiers nationwide. This is-" Liu Wei searched according to the model. After skipping a bunch of more niche and strange models, he found the teams using the F-14d. "There are two teams, 'Lian Zhen' and 'Zhu Bi'. Perhaps one of these two teams came today."

After hearing Liu Wei's introduction, Long Yun had no impression of these two teams. With his recent background knowledge of aviation competition, it seems that there is no trace of them in the North China competition area?

He asked Liu Wei and received a positive answer.

"Yes, these two teams are in East China and the other is in South China. But I don't know why they are in Běi now. Is it a friendly match? Oh, probably in East China, the qualifiers in South China have not yet started. Come and find a few strong teams to play test matches, and it is possible to communicate and contact."

Oh.-Is that true?

Long Yun thought about it and this means that they will not encounter opponents driving the F-14 in the qualifiers of the North China Division.

However, if we were to say that in that parallel world, we thought of Captain Samsonov who told him that the American aircraft carrier had already cruising in the Mediterranean to prepare for war; if he was flying the Su-27s, would he soon encounter such a heavy interceptor and break out in a heavy air duel?

If the Americans in the south, in addition to the F-15, also have this huge swept-wing model, then he should pay close attention to these "tomcats" when he looks back.

Before, whether as an aviation enthusiast or joining the May team to fight simulator, Long Yun did not pay much attention to this fighter; not only that, he probably did not know much about other models, except for domestic and Soviet fighters, as well as those opponents he encountered in the Central and European Sky.

Thinking of heavy fighter jets like the F-14 "Tommaster", which are not only strong opponents that may encounter on the Ift journey, but also key equipment models of the US Navy in parallel worlds, he feels it is necessary to pay attention to them; after all, based on his understanding, this heavy fighter jet with a take-off weight of more than 30 tons is like the F-15 "Eagle", which is a powerful opponent that he must face when flying the Su-27s.

Along the way, he discussed the situation of the fighter jets and competition with Liu Wei, and Long Yun also cared about the situation of their group.

Through the game record query, the two learned that the other teams F had another match today. The "Star Wars" between the two teams "Saturn" and "Uranus" ended with the victory of the former. After watching the game replay, "Saturn" with the double-player G-29 played pretty well, and finally defeated "Uranus" 2:1, and now it is also ranked first in the group as "Chenlong".

"The team of 'Saturn', do they use G-29?"

"Yes, this kind of choice is not too common, but it seems that their level is really good. - Oh! Our next opponent is this 'Saturn'. I need to pay attention to it later. I didn't have any impression of this team before."

In the next game arrangement, "Chenlong"'s opponent is "Saturn", which made Long Yun feel very coincidental.

I bid farewell to my mystery g-29 in a parallel world. I just don’t have the same appearance as Su-27s. I’m going to meet an opponent using this model? Not to mention anything else, I don’t have any pressure to control the performance of the MiG. I’m afraid I’m more skilled than the players of "Saturn"!

Such a coincidental battle situation suddenly gave Long Yun great confidence. Even if he used the J-7, he was sure to try his best to win the next victory.

As for other teams, "Uranus" and "Tianhe" both lost their first game, ranking third and fourth in the group with 1 point; and in Group F, which only has five participating teams, one team will be bye in each round of group stage. In addition to the four teams that have decided the winner, "Thunder" is bye in the first round, and temporarily ranked last in the group with 0 points.

Neither Long Yun nor Liu Wei have heard of the team that is temporarily ranked last in the group, so they don’t care much about it.

Of course they would not have expected that this group, which was notoriously known as the "Thunder", or one of the players in it, would become the strongest enemy of "Chenlong" in Group F and even the subsequent journey.
Chapter completed!