I expected the X-35 to win several months before it was anounced. The reason is simply political. Unless the X-35 peformed poorly the President from an area close to where they now make the f-16 is not going to allow thousands of jobs go to another state.
Former Flight Control Technican - We keep'em flying
I think I remember this correctly, but just before the final decision, didn't the X-35 become the first a/c to fly level supersonic then land vertically in the same flight? Nice way to wrap up the competition, when the Boeing had to strip everything out to pass the vertical requirements.
I dont want to start another thread but is there any info how many AIM-120 X-32A could carry? On wiki I found six. Was there any dogfight tests of those two fighters? It would be interesting to see what tvc and more powerful F119 version could do.
X-32 had an internal layout that was similar to the F-35, ie one 1k bomb and one AAM per bay.
The purpose of the X-32/35 competition was a tech demonstration and not a "flyoff". As such, the X-35 did not even have a weapons bay as the X-35 needed to demo it's innovative lift fan and the X-32 needed to demo it's tilting bays.
"The early bird gets the worm but the second mouse gets the cheese."