Well here we are with July almost done. The crews are working long hours preparing their steeds. The work never ends. A little recap from last year. Precious Metals racing engine developed issues and they had to pull it and replace with stock engine and pilot Thom Richard flew it from Florida. During qualifying Voodoo flew with a special motor and then changed it out with the racing motor, strategy. During qualifications Matt Jackson in Strega lost part of the canopy and had to make a successful emergency landing. They found another one, did the modifications and started in the Bronze class racing on Friday to win his way back to the Gold Class. #232 an Hawker Seafury sustained damage to the engine and cowling forcing a Mayday and emergency landing. This is just a small sample of how racing week is in Reno Air Races.
This year
-Voodoo teams is working hard on the engines and airframe preparing for this year
- Strega is pretty quiet as Tiger is back at the controls
- Precious Metal teams is working on their racing motor for the races
- Several Hawker Seafuries will be there again
+ 232
+ Dreadnaught
+ Sawbones
Just to mention a few
Then you have the Rare Bear (Bearcat) and either Here Kitty or LaPatrona (Tigercat) flown by Rod Lewis.
Now that is just the unlimited, you have formula one,biplanes, T-6's, Sport, and Jet that have just as much work and excitement.
Now I challenge the young aeronautical engineers to come up with your version of an unlimited class airplane, build it and race it. We need some new blood and new styles of racing planes to start replacing our cherished WWII airplanes.
