I do not know how it was before, but at the moment it's impossible to get gold in the competition.
I tried to change the control settings, I tried a simple and advanced flight model.
I pass the track at extremely available speeds. Perhaps in the game were changes their maximum speed. On all routes makes time for gold unattainable.
Likely in competitions it is possible to receive a victory if the helicopter had characteristics of speed of the prototype:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MD_Helicopters_MD_500
The maximum speed is 282 km / h
Cruising speed - 250 km / h
I tried to reach the cruising speed in the editor and get:
The maximum speed is 230 km / h
Cruising speed - 210 km / h
I suppose that the existing speed limit limits the results in the competition.
P.S.
The AFS type does not affect the receipt of the prize time.