Timing Run

Can you imagine that our babybirds are one step ahead of us? Classis 28 - Ethel Bailey and Barbara Zeigler have completed their timing run and have their handicap - not that they disclosed what that was - but they have less to worry about now than Alison and I do. We would have tried to complete ours today also except that the airplane is still in annual. It is now less than 22 days, 14 hours and 22 minutes until the start of the race - we are really excited.!!!

Pennies a Pound

The annual Pennies a Pound event to raise funds for scholarships for the Eastern PA Chapter was scheduled for May 15 and 16 at Brandywine airport. May 15 dawned sunny but quite windy (gusting over 25 kt from the North), so we cancelled for that day. But Sunday was beautiful, and we had lots of planes ready to go at noon, including Mary in her Mooney and Alison in her Cherokee, not forgetting Bill Knepshield who was flying the race plane! There were lots of 99s and friends there as ground crew as well, including Nicole Graham, Linda Evans, MaryEllen Morris, Kate Macario, Adelle Bedrossian, Gayl Henze and many others. We had a lovely day and flew well over 200 passengers. Unfortunately there are no pictures of Mary below because she was so busy flying (7 flights). Alison only did 4 or 5, which is why she had time for photos. 

Alison with Bill and Herb

Alison with Gene

Plotting the Route

Pennies a pound was canceled on Saturday, so Alison and I used our new found free time to plot most of our race route. We only need a current Kansas City chart to have the whole race route

plotted.

Poker run!

This weekend Mary and I flew N29SP together, for the first time since the 2009 race, in a poker run to benefit the North Jersey Chapter of the 99s. A poker run is when you fly to five different airports in any order (in this case Doylestown PA DYL, Sky Manor NJ N40, Trenton-Robbinsville NJ N87, Greenwood Lake NJ 4N1 in any order, ending up at the terminus Blairstown NJ 1N7) and pick up a playing card at each one. Depending on the hand of cards you have at the end, you can win one of many prizes. It was a hot beautiful day, clear blue skies, no winds, and lots and lots of small plane traffic given that this was the first nice weekend of the year. Needless to say Mary and I didn't get a good hand or win anything - but flying to so many airports in one day was a great way for us to get proficient in the plane again. By the end of the morning, it had all come back to us!

Alison in front of the cockpit of the Lockheed Constellation at Greenwood Lake NJ

Mary checking the oil

Alison and Mary - team Adelle's Belles

Greenwood Lake from the air (above)

Mary and a North Jersey 99s volunteer (below)

Baby Birds

I have to add to Alison's last post and tell you that we are pleased to announce that we are proud Mama birds to Classic 28 also - our very own Eastern Pa. Chapter members Ethel Bailey and Barb Zeigler. Ethel and Barb were going to practice their teamwork by flying to New Garden airport for "lunch with the bunch" today but the 33 knot winds were a small deterrent. We did have a great time getting excited about their very first air race!!!

Our Baby Birds

Well, still nothing exciting to report. Mary is back from Florida but we still haven't flown together. After a very busy and exhausting week Alison went up in the plane with Linda last Friday night while Linda did her night currency - it was more fun sleeping in the passenger seat than sleeping on the couch at home! Mary and Alison made time last Sunday to fly but it was rainy, stormy and below minimums all day, so instead Mary, Arnie, Linda and Alison met for breakfast. We'll try again this weekend.

We did find out this week that we have been paired up as the Mother Birds for Barbara Para and Laurie Zaleski. This is when the Air Race pairs up seasoned racers (that would be us!!) with newcomers so we can provide advice and mentoring. Laurie and Mary recently met at Sun'n'Fun, the big air meet in Florida, and we already know Barbara through The Ninety-Nines, so we are delighted to be able to help them.

Final piece of news - a staggering 55 teams have now registered. This is going to be a big race!!

Spring approaches

Its been a long winter up here in PA, but it might finally be coming to a close. We had the snow, we had the floods, and now there are definite signs of Spring, with daffodils and snowdrops coming up. Alison did her biennial flight review last weekend, and her Cherokee is going in for its annual inspection this week. The race Arrow N29SP is still tucked away in its hangar, but Mary should be back from Florida by the end of April and we can start training in earnest. This week we wrote to Steve Graves of Higher Graphics (http://www.highergraphics.com/), our friendly race number decal number supplier for the past three years, and ordered our "9"s for the underside of the wings and side of the fuselage. A check of the ARC website reveals that 30 teams have already signed up, including several of our friends, suggesting that we could have quite a big field this year. We're so happy to be racing alongside fellow Eastern PA Ninety-Nines Ethel Bailey and Barb Zeigler, who are awesome and will be a great team. Alison's next job is to order the charts and plot out the race route - this is a fun job as soon as I can find a couple hours to focus on it. No more news for now!