The results are in!!

We had the awards banquet tonight, and here are the results, hot off the presses!

• There were 49 teams in the race this year.
• 44 of those teams finished - 5 did not finish, including two that had to make emergency landings due to engine problems (one of them in a field), and one that had a medical issues.
• The winning team was an Embry Riddle collegiate team, which was nice since we began and ended the race at the Embry Riddle campuses in Prescott and Daytona Beach.
• The top ranking team of our Eastern PA teams was Alicia and Heather (team 31), who placed ninth!!!! As top ten winners, they got medals and prizes, and we are absolutely delighted for them!!
• The other Eastern PA teams are Mary and Juliet - 24th; Alison and Linda - 25th; Barbara and Ethel - 40th. We couldn't be prouder to have four successful completed teams and one top ten team in our Chapter. It's a great day!
• Alison and Linda got awarded a leg prize (fourth on the second leg), for which we received a medallion and $20!
• There is one more interesting wrinkle to report.... Of the 44 finishing teams, 36 teams got one or more penalties, and only 8 got no penalties. We were one of those 8 teams, meaning that we ran a completely clean, penalty free race. As such, we and the other 7 teams were eligible for the Claude Glasson award, also known as the "Turtle Award", which is given to the slowest penalty free completer team. You guessed it - we won the Turtle Award!!!! For this we were given $100 and two little clay turtles, which we will treasure always!

Here are Alicia and Heather with their medals

The leg prize we won

Our big cash winnings

And, finally, our big award!!!

Race day 4 photos and some Saturday

Murfreesboro was a really lovely town

There was a nasty thunderstorm over night and some valley fog as we left Murfreesboro

Enjoying some Georgia peaches

Made it to Americus, Georgia

Scenes from Americus, just as we got in our plane, a gust of wind blew over the tent for the volunteers. Fortunately, there were only three team behind us

Enroute last leg

After the last flyby - Daytona Beach, here we come 

Scenes from the melt down party at Embry-Riddle

Looking from Embry-Riddle building top across ER fleet of planes. You can see the Daytona raceway in the background

Our baby birds Molly and Mary had a great race!

Alison and I will be fly in this next race

Sunset on the last day of the race - we can sleep in tomorrow!!

Waiting to see the judges Saturday morning

Entertaining ourselves while we wait

Made it!

Linda and I set off early this morning from Murfreesboro Tennessee, with Barbara and Ethel departing just in front of us. There was a large storm to the east of the airport, moving east, but it was far enough away that we had no problems taking off and doing the flyby in great conditions. The countryside was beautiful with low lying fog and mist filling up the hollows in the hills. It got hotter as we got close to our next-to-final stop, Americus Georgia. We did a quick refuel and turnaround, but not before enjoying the georgia peaches that were available there - delicious! Last leg crossed over into Florida, over the lakes around Leesburg, and our final flyby was over a very tiny airport called North Orlando air park. Fortunately due to some good planning and even better spotting, we found it and did the flyby perfectly. We had no issues today, other than the electronics overheating - the iPads have been spontaneously shutting down for the last couple days when they get too hot, and today the backup VFR GPS went into meltdown mode. This race is a real workout for the planes as well as the pilots, but as long as we keep the oil topped off at a higher than normal level and don't mind blowout along the cowling, and keep an eye on the oil and cylinder heat temperatures and don't let them overheat, the engine really seems to enjoy working that hard.

The actual terminus was 50 miles away at Daytona Beach airport, which is a very large and busy airport right by the speedway, so we flew over there and landed. When we arrived, Mary, Juliet, Barbara and Ethel were already there, and gave us a rousing welcome. It was also lovely to see Arnie Wunder, Carolyn Van Newkirk and other familiar faces there. There were a lot of smiling faces as the different finishing teams came into the terminal building. We finished!!! This is Linda's sixth race and my seventh, and we are proud to say that we have finished them all. Tonight we have the racer's meltdown party. We won't find out the results of the race until the banquet Sunday evening, after the timers have processed all the data, and the winning airplanes have been reviewed and re inspected. We'll keep you posted!

Race day 3 photos

Started the day flying over the Ozark mountains

Giant display of the racers tracking website at Warrensburg

When you are waiting for an alternator, what else do you do but braid hair

Some of the volunteers from Central Missouri, thanks, you had a great stop!

They had hotdogs and pancakes at Warrensburg

More Warrensburg

Barb and Ethel arrive n Warrensburg

We're switching planes for the rest of the race

Crossing the Mississippi again enroute to Champaig

Getting murky for the last leg of the day

Finally caught up with some other racers. Here we are with our awesome driver Joe

Ah ah, finally some other racers

We went to Longhorn steakhouse to celebrates Barb's 50th birthday

Happy birthday Barb!!!!!!

Nearly there!

End of day three, and we are writing this from Murfreesboro Tennessee! Yes, seven legs down and only two left to go before the race deadline which is 5pm local time tomorrow in Daytona Beach.

We left Arkadelphia this morning after a very pleasant stay, with wonderful volunteer helpers. There were only three planes there, everyone else having already moved on to later stops - Barbara and Ethel (team 7 in their C172), Teresa Camp and her two team mates in their Piper Archer (team 48), and us. We launched around 8am and made good time to our first stop of the day, Warrensburg Missouri. This was a beautiful stop with hot dogs, pancakes, and lots of wonderful and attentive helpers. We refueled and did the second leg to Champaign, with the flyby being conducted at the very tiny Tuscola airport. Fortunately, because we had checked it out on the way over, we were able to spot it and fly it well. At Champaign we were met with wonderful helpers and great food, and once we looked at the weather options we decided to continue on with the third leg of the day. We really have our team dynamic down now, and the flybys are going very well. Although we are back this side of the Mississippi, on the green side of the aviation maps, at lower altitudes, the flying is very hot and bumpy. We are drinking incredible amounts of water, and we are not a pretty sight when we end the day after seven plus hours of flying. However, other than the back end of a couple large cells east of us around Evansburg, this race has been pretty easy so far in terms of weather.

We arrived in Murfreesboro in time to be reunited with Barb and Ethel, and Mary and Juliet. So three quarters of the Eastern PA teams were together (Alicia and Heather were already one stop ahead), and we were able to go out for dinner to celebrate Barb's big birthday which was today!

End of day 2 - where in the world is Cool Beans?

Text by Alison, photos posted by Linda in the blog entry below.

After my morning post about the compass coming unglued from its windshield mount in the extreme heat, I'm happy to report that Bode Aviation mechanic Sean at Albuquerque Double Eagle finally found the right glue and stuck it right back up there. Hurray! Thanks to everyone at Double Eagle, including Stop Chairs Dave Wiesner and Michelle Boyko, and Joyce Woods, all of whom were so thoughtful and helpful. Unfortunately during the morning I again broke the motto on the back of our T shirts ("there's no crying in air racing!"), because I walked into the wing flaps while we were loading the plane, leaving a big dent in my head, and sending me crashing backwards onto the floor. It hurt a lot!

We finally took off from Double Eagle about 1030, circled back around for our departure flyby at Mid Valley, and climbed up to 9500 feet for our final mountain leg. Linda flew this leg, with Alison doing communication and navigation. The mountains were stark and bare, very dramatic and beautiful. Again, we were flying over terrain that is remote in the extreme, with few airports or any signs of human habitation. The elevation gradually decreased until we crossed into West Texas around Roswell (didn't see any alien spaceships), still a remote landscape apart from the vast oilfields that are dotted around. We did a flyby to continue at Midland Texas, and without stopping we continued on to our next stop, Waco.

At Waco we did a quick turnaround and set off on leg 4 for Arkadelphia Arkansas. This was a beautiful flight. East Texas and Arkansas looked from above like a big garden in the evening light, dotted with woods and lakes and rolling hills, and everything so green which was absolutely delightful after the deserts and mountains. We flew peacefully under a ceiling of little puffy white clouds. Our final flyby at Arkadelphia went smoothly, and we came around to land. The airport volunteers got us refueled, gave us water, and made sure we had a ride to the hotel. It was wonderful to see Camelia Smith, our air racing friend from back when we started in 2008. Exhausted now - we'll sleep well tonight!

Race day 2 photos

Our compass fell off the windshield

But Sean saved the day

Here it is all fixed

Team 7, our friends Barb and Ethel got off the ground before us with their new vacuum pump

Once we were airborne, the sights were spectacular.

We passed over quite a few oil wells (we think that's what they are anyway)

The second leg from Midland, TX to Waco, TX required snackage

Team 48 doing a departure fly by at Waco, TX

We eventually passed them enroute because they are a slower plane 

Nice to see seem green again

This is what three legs of flying looks like in consumed water bottles 

Two of the volunteers in Arkadelphia, thanks ladies!

I think this is Arkansas