We're In!

Sunday, June 22

Today was a little nerve-wracking with the Wonder Chariot needing her inspection. Though we had no reason to worry, our gastrointestinal tracts weren't convinced. We arrived at the airport early and taxied her over to the main hangar where "D.Q." Bob & Vern spent the next few hours going over her pretty self with a fine-tooth comb. After some initial trouble opening one of the cowling doors (finicky dzus screw) she put up a good fight each time Bob threatened (good-naturedly, of course) to disqualify us. In the end, not only did she pass with flying colors, Vern took Kelly aside and told her that she "has a really nice airplane". Yeah, and she's faster than hell, too.

After taxiing her back to the Impound Hangar for another night we joined Phil & Mo for lunch in town. We didn't have much time before our Mandatory First-Time Racers' Briefing, so we headed to our respective hotels for some rest. Actually, Phil & Mo headed out to visit the grizzly bears and we weary racers bedded down for a power nap. Unfortunately our sleep schedules are exactly opposite, and every time Kelly falls into a deep sleep, Erin is left listening to her snore for the ensuing hours. Once sleep finally overtakes Erin, Kelly's just up and at 'em! Today's nap was no exception. The two of us appear to be exactly in sync in all the other 2,194 ways but when it comes to getting some shut-eye we're as dissonant as two members of the same species could be....

This evening brought the Take-Off Banquet, an event that brought everyone together for socialization and a rather strange dinner. We had halibut stuffed with julienned carrots and coated in sugary pastry crust, topped with raspberry sauce. This weird entree was accompanied by rice and green beans. Though the fish was odd, both of us managed to down our veggies (Lezlee, that was for you!). After dinner each team was presented with a little charm commemorating this year's Race. There were a few speakers, some social interaction and then a group photo before we were turned loose for the night. Before we all parted company we learned of the rumors circulating: we're "the team that went AWOL" and "the team with the really shiny airplane", not to mention "the team with the really classy race numbers". Sweet....

About the only other item on the long day's agenda was to capture images of each stop's timing line and fly-by route. Kelly had the genius idea to take digital photos of each of the diagrams so that we could save ourselves the hassle of having to reinvent the wheel. Here's an example of what the timing line looks like:



And now a few words of thanks: some nasty-ass storms are making their way through Montana tonight and we're pleased to assure you that the W.C. is tucked safely away in her hangar. During the Take-Off Banquet we heard thunder echoing in the distance so we trotted on out to see the sights. To everyone's surprise hail was spewing forth from the skies -- knuckles (our trademark bonding moment, repeated hundreds of times daily) were offered up in thanks that our babies (Mo's Deb is in the hangar as well) are snoozing safely under the cover of steel.

Mo's Deb: The thrifty woman's hangar (before the threat of storms, of course)

It just occurred that we've neglected to mention the importance of our special visitors, Phil & Maureen. Mo, as she's affectionately called, was Erin's aviation mentor and second-mom when she first started learning to fly. Actually, Mo happens to be the reason that Erin's flying! Years ago she gave Erin her first flight in a general aviation airplane in 20 years, re-igniting a long passion for airplanes. That night Erin decided that she was going to learn to fly! Mo saw Erin through countless ratings, training snafus, written exams, checkrides, a cross-country move to train with an airline academy, her first jet type rating, her first commercial aviation job, her transition to the airline and every aviation milestone in between. Mo and Erin have spent hundreds of hours together in the Deb, and even attempted to become the first women-only crew to fly a single-engine general aviation airplane from the U.S. to Russia. So it was only fitting that Mo be here for the first air race! Phil and Mo flew their Deb over from Bellingham, WA (up north of Seattle on Puget Sound) to offer support, encouragement and words of wisdom (Mo and Phil have both been flying since Kelly and Erin were tykes!). It means the world to us that they're here -- their presence, along with the Deb in which Erin learned to fly, is an excellent omen!

We're AWOL: A Detour to Jellystone

Saturday, June 21





Okay, so first off let's just say that we haven't been disqualified yet. Today was a weird, weird day, but we're still on the good side of the Powers that Be.

The day started early. Erin was working on the blog late into the night (or early into the morning, depending upon the shift you work) while Captain Kelly snoozed comfortably in her bed. It wasn't long after Erin put down the computer and fell asleep that Kelly, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, awoke ready to start the day. Primed with coffee and scones we somehow both headed out to the airport for our credentials check and aircraft inspection. It was soon apparent that there was a long line for inspections, and while talking with one of the race organizers we were encouraged to head southeast to Yellowstone National Park for a sight-seeing tour since we were so far back in the inspection line.

We launched from BZN around 10:00 with Yelllowstone Lake plugged into our GPS. (For all of you non-competitors we actually had a few race strategies to work out, but we'll get to that some other time). After about a half hour of flying east we hung a right and steered directly to a whole host of touristy sights. We cruised up to 11,500 feet on our way over the mountain passes, through a valley (after a few fits and starts into the wrong pass, and the resulting squirts of adrenaline, yielding a sharp U-turn out of a dead-end valley), back out the valley, into the correct valley and finally out above the vast cobalt lake.

Enroute from BZN to WYS

Skimming the rather huge (and frigid) Yellowstone Lake.

Fighting hypoxia at 11,500 feet!

We flew back around the pass toward West Yellowstone Airport and at the last moment couldn't think of a reason not to land (the most compelling reason to return to terra firma was actually that Kelly was starving -- again!). And after all, landing is one of the best parts! Once we were on the ground at WYS (marshalled in by a nice woman named Mary, I might add), we were treated to some See's Candies behind the counter and pointed in the direction of the brand new restaurant at the airport. After filling our bellies with healthy veggies (see, Lezlee, we're trying!) from the salad bar we took a few minutes for a photo op with the lovely ladies of West Yellowstone Airport and headed back up to altitude.

On approach into WYS (West Yellowstone) Runway 01.

The women in WYS Rule: Gay, Mary and Sandy run the airport and treated us like queens!

By the time we left WYS the wind had picked up!

Fortified with food and well-wishes from the friendly crew at the airport, we made another trip around Yellowstone Lake in search of Old Faithful, which actually yielded an eyeful -- Kelly spotted this cool "eyeball" -- actually it's the Grand Prismatic Spring according to those in the know.  And would you believe it heats up to a toasty 188 degrees F?!

http://www.yellowstonenationalpark.com/midway.htm

We managed to snap these photos while circling a few thousand feet above the spring (and those are people on that little bitty sidewalk!)

After the amazing sight of the Grand Prismatic Spring we couldn't imagine that anything else along the route back to BZN would be stunning, but we were wrong. The canyon that cuts through the valley was breathtaking, and though the turbulence was enough to make anyone else puke, we did manage to take a few shots of the area. Tumbling down the canyon walls was this beautiful waterfall, spewing a rainbow of spray over thousands of feet:




Unfortunately with the mean afternoon mountain air acting up we were tossed around like a sock in a dryer. Which, of course, made good photos of the Old Faithful Geyser difficult at best. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Faithful_Geyser

While Kelly flew around the geologic phenomenon like a mad woman, Erin snapped away. It's with sadness that we admit that the above photo is the best we could get of the geyser that decided to erupt just as we were approaching it! We'd just been talking about what a "ball of luck" each of our lives has been, wondering how long we'd have to wait before the thing erupted again (which happens every 60-90 minutes, we hear). Erin reminded Kelly that we were both exceedingly fortunate women who'd had amazing lives and that we ought to expect that she'd blow her cap about the time we rolled by. The zillion-year old spuot chose that exact moment to unleash her steam! Talk about a Luck Ball, eh?!

With the winds picking up, the turbulence tossing us around like fall leaves and the clock ticking we bittersweetly headed back to BZN. (Not to mention the fact that the ARC officials called looking for us after they noticed our plane had been gone for hours and that we were the only team yet to be inspected -- does this surprise any of our family?!) The terrain along the way was challenging but stunning, and despite the head-banging bumps along the way we managed a few nice photos of the scenery.



Once back at our temporary home away from home we prepared the Wonder Chariot for her inspection by airframe and powerplant mechanics. While Kelly was running up the engine for the propeller inspection with Ruby (who's 91, by the way) Erin was inside with our pilot credentials proving our worthiness to race. Unfortunately Erin had forgotten all of her licenses and certificates at the hotel, so that 1/2 of our team will be certified tomorrow. But the prop passed inspection, though the rest of the Deb will have to go under the microscope in the morning.

Meanwhile, the rest of the racers were headed over to the bar-b-que where the general public could "Meet the Lady Racers". Each team was introduced and good food was had by all. It was during this festive meal that we heard the familiar sound of a Debonair fly overhead. Erin's "second" parents, Phil and Maureen from Bellingham (north of Seattle) had flown in to cheer us on for the weekend. They own a Deb, and Erin and Mo have had literally hundreds of hours of adventures in that airplane (which in a round-about way got all of this Air Racing With Kelly and Erin stuff started!). We picked them up at their airplane and took them back to the bar-b-que after their long flight in through treacherous weather.

It means the world to Erin that they're here cheering on "Classic 31" and we're sure to have an advantage with the addition of Mo's experienced Debonair flying.

Stand by for more adventures from BZN (though our circle of trouble will be reined in with the impounding of the Wonder Chariot after her inspection in the morning)!

We're Here!

Bozeman, Montana

Friday, June 20

First things first today: a run for Kelly and a walk to the organic food market for an espresso for Erin. With our morning routine behind us we headed out to the airport to pick up a rental car (the hotel van driver was lovely, but the 20-minute ride each way to the airport and the lack of freedom to roam about as we wished just sucked).

Today yielded a lot of chores. We scrubbed the Wonder Chariot to within an inch of her life, cleaning off the BILLIONS of bug bodies that adhered to every surface of the airplane. Kelly poured out vast amounts of her mechanic-wanna-be knowledge to Erin, mainly in the form of changing the oil.

Dang, those bugs are STUCK on!

Kelly, Zen master of the oil filter....

Yes, folks, that really is Erin assisting with the oil change!

Then came the ceremonial affixing of The Numbers. With the aid of a squeegee we were really happy with how they turned out -- by far the classiest looking race numbers of any competitor!

"Classic 31" begins her metamorphosis...

This sticker stuff is tough work!

Without a doubt the spiffiest numbers in Bozeman!

After a long day in the sun spent doting on the Deb we tucked her into the hangar for the night and headed back to the hotel. We're still scheming and strategizing about a few things, but our hopes are high about the race. We've met some neat women and though we haven't had a lot of time to get to know everyone, it's been fun to watch the other teams go about their tasks. The hundreds of years of aviation experience, the tens of thousands of flight hours, the hundreds of races flown and the miles of smiles are making this a peak experience for both of us.


This Race is an opportunity of a lifetime!

A spinner so shiney you could....

Classic 31: The Occluded Speed Zombies

Quite possibly the cleanest the Wonder Chariot has ever been!

Erin's not just a monkey with a wrench....

We're Headed to the Start!

Wednesday, June 18

Erin airlined up to Detroit this morning so we could spend the day preparing for our long journey to the Start of this year's Air Race Classic in Bozeman, Montana.

We ran some errands, finished up last-minute chart printing, ate quite possibly our last healthy meals for 2 weeks, bought matching shorts.... Lezlee fixed us some amazing pizza for dinner and we slept well considering our nerves.



Thursday, June 19

This morning dawned early with a phone call from the P.R. woman at Kelly's office. She told us that the Detroit Fox News crew was waiting at the airport for us! We scrambled to get ready and get out the door, arriving at VLL ready to load the plane by about 0830. We spent a little over an hour being interviewed on TV (obviously it'll be edited!) about the Race, about each of us and our interest in aviation, about the Air Charity Network and Angel Flight, about the 99s, etc. Both of us did a good job with our interviews (thankfully "Bernouli's Principle" was NOT talked about in this particular interview -- way to go, Kelly!), and without too much more fuss we were airborne. The camera woman wanted to get a shot of us doing a high-speed low-altitude fly-by, and as you can imagine we were only too happy to oblige. We took off and flew the traffic pattern, turning final going warp speed, swooping down to about 200 feet off the deck as fast as the Wonder Chariot would go, then shot back up to altitude like a rocket. (A maneuver of which Patty Wagstaff would have surely approved). With our nose pointed west we started off on what would be a 9.5 hour flight out to Bozeman, Montana.

With our bladders getting full we decided to stop for fuel in the booming metropolis of Mason City, Iowa, conveniently one of the stops along the Race route.


The W.C.'s tanks were full as were ours (the term "gastronomic delight" was used sparingly in conjunction with our lunch at the little airport cafe), so after about 30 minutes on the ground we took off with Aberdeen, South Dakota in our sights. We were feeling pretty fresh still so rather than landing we scoped out the airport from altitude (which is also another fly-by/stop point in the Race) and continued west. By the time we reached Miles City, Montana we were both feeling tired and anxious to be done with the trip. But just east of the airport we encountered our first weather of the day:

The trusty Garmin 496 with weather uplink warned us of the 2 cells up ahead....

Amazingly, they parted just enough for our airplane to slip through without much hassle at all! It rained and spewed out lightening just off of both wings, but other than some moderate turbulence (which made it tough to get good photos) we escaped unscathed!

We landed in Miles City and were happy to encounter a few teams of fellow racers. After brief introductions and the refilling our both our water bottles and our fuel tanks, we were airborne for the last time today. Finally down to the last 2 hours of flight time we were eager to get to the hotel and chill out.

But we wanted to experiment with a few potential race strategies. Because all sorts of eyes are reading this blog we're going to refrain at this moment from discussing specifics, but suffice it to say we were very pleased with our discoveries regarding altitude, airspeed, autopilot usage, weight and balance issues and antelope spotting.

We'll elaborate later....

We Meet!

It's official! We're officially the Occluded Speed Zombies, Classic 31. That's our number, #31. Which is backwards for #13, which is excellent.

And the best news of all so far is that Kelly and Erin finally met in person! We had a fun (and successful) trip from TUL to VLL (in Detroit) in the Deb after her new autopilot was installed. The 4.5 hour flight was uneventful despite a stormy beginning in TUL. We waited for the giant storm cell to pass and then took off to the east, getting as far ahead of it as we could before turning north (a little prematurely, but that's another story) toward the Motor City. Kelly's a great pilot and no one was harmed in the making of Our First Adventure.

The following day saw us boring holes in the skies about Michigan. Kelly played hookey in favor of consuming some serious amounts of avgas (and a good club sandwich) to "practice" our race flying. Mostly we goofed around, landed in Clare for some cookies and a photo op., and then headed north for Erin's first trip to Mackinac Island. Being rushed for time we zoomed into the little strip, literally trotted through the woods into town (snagging bicycles about half-way to expedite our adventure), rustled up some grub (the aforementioned club and fries) and tried unsuccessfully to con anyone on the island into giving us a lift back up the huge hill to the airport. Unfortunately the bikes we'd picked (there are hundreds of them lying about for public use as Mackinac is mostly auto-free) were a little rusty and small (though thankfully Kelly's had a basket to carry our foodstuffs). The image of Erin lagging behind (her excuse was that her bike was stuck in first gear and was too small for her long legs) is burned into Kelly's mind, accompanied by the theme song from "Wizard of Oz" when the Wicked Witch of the West rode by on her bike. Remember that one?

Here's the proof that we've flown together and survived:

Geez, Kelly, nice earrings....

Erin's working on getting her lower extremities a little more aerodynamic....

And even though we learned that Erin can bake some mean chocolate chip cookies, (see Captain Morgan immitation below), after a close call and some sweeeet talkin' with the tower controller at GOV, the jury is still out on whether Erin can actually remember how to read those VFR charts ...


At the end of May Erin's headed back up to DTW to enjoy the Red Bull Air Races with Kelly (and to practice our flying, of course). Should be a good time. While we're up there we're planning to meet with a Super Top Secret Racer who'll download all of her Super Top Secret Secrets into our minds. More on that later.

For now, Happy May and thanks for your support!

The Race

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