Very early race morning...

It has been a very busy 4 days preparing to race.

THURSDAY - We passed through credentials. We got through aircraft credentials with a couple of minor bumps. My unplanned trip last month to Syracuse added hours on the flying time for 51-Charlie and left us with only 13 hours before a 100-hr required check for 2 ADs (Airworthiness Directives) - ignition switch and seat rail stops.  These are routine checks made every 100 hrs that the plane is flown.  The race will take 20 hrs of flying, so without having an A&P (mechanic) check and sign them off now, we would have lapsed during the race.  Check, check - done...good for another 100 hrs. Thanks, Kevin, at White Hawk Aviation. The last hurdle was having the AWAM (Assoc. for Women in Aviation Maintenance) volunteers complete the aircraft inspection. This inspection is to check a few key elements of the aircraft and to spot some Torque Seal in key places to verify that we are not modifying the performance on the aircraft in our spare time on the race. Except for a pesky strobe light that didn't want to wake up on the light checks, we were fine. At the end of the inspection, I tried the strobes again, gave it a few seconds to fire up, and bingo (!), it was blinking for them.  Good to go!

FRIDAY - play day with some friends from Richmond who came up to visit. I will come back and post on that

SATURDAY & SUNDAY - briefings, briefings, and more briefings. I'll try to revisit this.

MONDAY - it is race morning!!! The weather seems good. It is TOO EARLY - 5:00 AM! Blaghh...not my best time of day. Time to hit the shower, gather the bags, check out and go to the last briefing beofre the mad dash to the airport and planes...stay tuned.