What's The Prize For 1st?

Where is everyone and is there a prize for arriving 1st?  LOL
We made it to PSC today and look forward to seeing everyone in June!

Beautiful flight to PSC

See you in June!!!

Handicap Flight

After a sad morning of goodbyes,  we were off to Camden, ID to meet up Doug Kandle where he did our handicap flight.  Later we met Doug's wife, Sherry, who is also flying in the race.   With thunderstorms in the area to wait out we went to eat lunch with Doug and Sherry.  If the race is half as fun as our trip out here we should all have a fabulous time.

I have a picture of Sherry and Ruffus (the dog) on my I pad. I will add it soon.

Going To Logan To See Jack

We were at the airport bright and early.  The only leg we flew was over to Logan.  Jo Ann's daughter and family live there.  It was nice that our route took us this direction so they could visit.

Early Morning @ RWL

RWL-LGU

Jo Ann and Jack

Fog

Just as forecast the fog moved in overnight.  It was after noon before we were able to depart CYS.  So what did we do to pass the time? We SHOPPED!  On our way to the Wrangler store we met Kim.  What a fun girl!  We started telling her about the Air Race and she was so excited for us.  They have their own girl weekend of horseback riding and camping.  Maybe Jo Ann and I will try that next year!

 Fog in CYS

Kristy, Kim and Jo Ann

When we finally departed CYS our next stop was Rawlings, WY. (RWL)
Once again the winds were howling and the density altitude was close to 9000 ft at RWL.
Having to leave CYS late had let the winds and temp increase on us.  We spent most of the afternoon hanging out with Mike, Bob and Ozone (the dog).  Knowing we were only going to LGU to visit Jo Ann's daughter we decided to stay in RWL and get and early start in the morning.  I must say though it was nice to be an airport bum for the day!

Mike, Jo Ann, Kristy, Bob

Kristy and Ozone

Pasco Here We Come

This was our long day in our journey to PSC.  We left Tennessee early this morning with fuel stops in Missouri, Kansas, and Wyoming.  Cheyenne ended up being our overnight stop.  Although the winds were gusting over 30kts when we landed I'm glad we made it to Cheyenne.  Tomorrow mornings weather looks like we may be delayed out of here.

Kristy, Jo Ann and William (our Team mechanic) in TN

Jo Ann fueling in Clinton, Missouri

Kristy fueling in Norton, Kansas

We treated ourselves to steak dinners.

I mean we are in Cheyenne! 

MMI - UCY

Nathan, Cindy and Kristy

Today Nathan and his wife Cindy are flying me to Jo Ann's.  This is about a 2.5 hour flight across the great state of Tennessee.  Nathan is my right hand guy at Athens Air.  Since we are both out of pocket this leaves my Daddy in charge of MMI today!

Kristy and her Daddy (Jim)

Numbers are ON

This is Jo Ann's husband, Kerry, putting our race numbers on.

One more thing to mark off the checklist.

THANKS KERRY!

Delivering Airplane Soon

Well time is fast approaching for us to fly the race plane to PSC.  We are hoping to leave on the 23rd of 24th of May.  The airplane is waxed, numbers are on, chocks, gust locks, tie downs, GPS and I-Pads are all ready to go.  I will try to post along the way out west.  EAST is heading WEST!

Special Events at UCY and MMI

Evertt Stewart Regional Airport Expo

May 18th

Union City, TN

Swift National Fly-In 2013

June 5th - 8th

McMinn County Airport 

Athens, TN

Swifts at MMI

Lined up for Fuel

Fuel orders being called in.

May Vacation

Let me start by saying to all the pilots just starting an aviation career, especially with an airline, SENIORITY IS VERY IMPORTANT!  That being said I don't have the best seniority number but I do have one and for that I am thankful.  I was able to hold a May vacation and not June. Looks like we will be taking our race plane out a few weeks early.  This should be a fun relaxing flight since we will not be rushed to get to the start on time.

March Planning

March has been a busy month for Jo Ann and I, unfortunately not with Air Race Planning together.  We have how ever been preparing individually.  Jo Ann is in charge of forms, hotels and preparing the aircraft.  I am in charge of flight planning the race and the blogspot.  Things seem to progressing!

Jo Ann did have the opportunity to attend the Women in Aviation Conference in Nashville this month.  She was able to meet our "MaMa Bird".

My kitchen table preparing the flight plans.

We Meet in the Middle

Kristy's airplane in on the left and Jo Ann's on right.

Our January planning day was held at the Murfreesboro Municipal Airport in Murfreesboro, TN.  Murfreesboro is in Middle Tennessee and home to Middle Tennessee State University.  Which is also my alma mater. Go Blue Raiders!  Thank you so much to airport manager Chad Gehrke and his wonderful linemen, Phillip and Radar, who both made us feel right at home.  When we arrived Phillip took us to the classroom which they had reserved.

Jo Ann flew over from UCY and I from MMI.  It was a BEAUTIFUL day for flying.  This is about an hour flight for both of us.  I was about 10NM out when I heard Jo Ann radio in. It was 10:30 when we arrived in "The Boro"  and by then the winds were gusting to 20kts.  Which you can tell by our hair!! LOL

For the next few hours we discussed paperwork, fees, and organizing our flight plan book.  Then what seems to be the most important part of our planning day LUNCH.  We were able to have lunch with Steve Johnson who is our Eastern Aviation Fuels sales rep. (Both of our airports are Shell Branded.)  Eastern Aviation Fuels is one of our sponsors and Steve is just a fun person to be around.  He was even gracious enough to buy our lunch.  THANK YOU Steve and Eastern Aviation Fuels!!!!!

After lunch we studied, plotted, and marked all over our maps.  We did this for hours before we realized the day had gotten away from us.  It was now time for me to fly East and Jo Ann to fly West.  This was another fun day of flying and planning. 

Setting Sun as 52U flies East.

Paperwork Is In

Well we are now on the race list!

First Meeting

December 14th was our first planning meeting for the Air Race Classic 2013.  I flew over to Union City in my C-172 from Athens.  Jo Ann greeted me and like any good pilots we decided to go eat before we got started.  After a wonderful lunch at a local sandwich shop we headed back to UCY.

Jo Ann gave me a nice tour of her airport.  She has several great hangar construction projects going on.  State of Tennessee Aeronautics really helps us keep our general aviation airports growing.  She also took me to the hangar and showed me her C-172.  This will be our race plane.  Beautiful 1976 C-172! I am excited to fly it.

OK now it was time for us to get down to business.  We started by reviewing the forms we needed to send in.  Later had a conference call with Terry from team Mama Bird.  She was very helpful and answered a lot of our questions. Although I am sure we will have more.  Finally out come the maps.  Being two ladies born and raised east of the Mississippi River we really studied the first half of the race with all the mountainous terrain.  By this time we had a full day and called it a night.

Day 2 of our planning was back at the airport.  We spent a good portion of our morning plotting the course on our IPads, which we are both still learning.  Better to learn this stuff now however then during the race!  This was a good first planning trip but we still have a lot to do.

I departed UCY around 2:00 pm so I could arrive at MMI before dark.  With the sun at my back, smooth air, and a slight tailwind I hoped this would be the weather for our first race!