13 days Until Race Start

One week from tomorrow Cara and Lydia will depart from home to meet up with the team.  Caroline and Fred have been diligently, with dedication, perseverance and care, completing the final stages of preparing the plane for racing. 

On the 17th N15695 will depart Silver City and its cozy hangar for the summer adventures.  At this time the forecast for the Prescott area is favorable.  Hot, dry. 

We are so very grateful for the countless hours, patience, kindness, inspiration, motivation and support of our friends and family. 

Flying Fun

Race preparations continue...

In New Mexico N15695 is undergoing final readiness for the journey to Prescott in 10 days.  Waxing, oil change, packing.

Lydia and Marc enjoyed a flight in Northern Colorado this morning.  The original plan was to fly to Laramie but up around the CO-WY border things started to get bumpy so turned back to Fort Collins.  We took our friend Stephanie on her first GA flight. 

Where have we been and what have we been doing?

 

The Baldwin Family Flyers

Where have we been and what have we been doing?




Caroline has had a wonderful year filled with books, singing, tennis, pickleball and travel. 
A trip to New Zealand and Australia in the fall with sisters was a highlight. 

 

 

 

 

Lydia completed a Masters in Nursing and continues to love life in Fort Collins, CO. 
Flying fun over the past year included returning N15695 to Silver City in November, and a beautiful fall flight to Steamboat, CO.

Cara just completed her second year at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach.  After achieving her Commercial rating in February, Cara has been working on the Multi-add on and learning new aircraft.  Yes!! 

The race last year was magnificent.  Wow. We had fun, worked hard, sweated liters and navigated our way to Fairhope, Alabama. The 2015 race was hot, and low over the middle states and middle Appalachian area, North to Kalamazoo, and West just as far as Kirksville, Missouri. We zigzagged up and down, looking ahead to try and comprehend the winds and weather. 

This year will be our fifth year racing as a team.  Last year was the first year we were not delayed in an undesirable way. There were 9 legs; each team member flew 3 legs. Following a flight leg, the pilot cycled to the back and the team continued with maximum refreshment. We worked well together, tightened the camaraderie, and enhanced flying skills.  There are race rules, and there are always the FARs.  Always learning and reviewing. 

This year will be a new challenge.  22 days 'til Race Start...

 

Memorial Day 2016



Baldwin Family Flyers near the pier in
Fairhope, Alabama at the terminus of the 2015 ARC

This year 54 teams are flying the race on a route that is honoring colleges and universities that have a specialization in aviation. 

19 of the teams are student teams from: Texas State Technical College, Indiana State University, University of North Dakota, Liberty University, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University-Prescott and ERAU-Daytona Beach, Southern Illinois University Carbondale, Purdue University, Minnesota State University Mankato, Western Michigan University, LeTourneau University, Kent State University and Lewis University.  Wow!  So many student teams - inspirational and quite exciting.

Over four days, for a total race distance of 2362 nautical miles or 2719 statute miles the teams will compete to fly the best cross country flight. 

Noteworthy for this Memorial Day is the news from two weeks ago that the President signed a law allowing the Women's Airforce Service Pilots to be laid to rest at Arlington cemetery.  Passed by the house in March, and by the Senate earlier in May, the WASPs, pioneering pilots are most deserving of this honor..
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-36316118

Bev Weintraub, fellow racer wrote this article:
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2016/05/19/eight-decades-after-amelia-earhart-made-history-lets-celebrate-todays-women-pilots.html

Another piece of news recently about the ARC that includes mention of the Baldwin Family Flyers:
https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2016/may/10/all-female-air-race-classic-honors-aviation-colleges
The photo at the top of the article shows our race plane with #13.  That year we had a super hot start at Lake Havasu, Arizona. 

2016 Air Race Classic

We are back!  It's us - The Baldwin Family Flyers.  Caroline, Lydia and Cara are in the midst of the final three weeks of race preparations.  The 2016 Air Race Classic starts on June 21 in Prescott, Arizona.  The team will convene on the 16th in Silver City, New Mexico and then fly together to Prescott on the 17th.

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What an exciting route!  The Baldwin Family Flyers are racing again as team #29.
More to come soon.

Catch up

Content and tired, we are here at the race terminus- Fairhope, Alabama. 

We are tired, grateful, relieved and proud. 

The past six days have been full of planning, briefings and long days of flight. 

On Saturday and Sunday, prior to the race start we were mostly focused on race preparations. There were briefings on proceedings, fly-bys, safety, start & terminus process and the weather. 

Kathleen and Sandy arrived on Saturday afternoon. That night we attended the Start banquet with the parade of race teams and a wonderful presentation by Bill Harelson. Bill presented pictures and spoke about the record he (and his support crew) set for 'speed around the world over both the Earth's poles' in a plane with a single combustion engine. The story was very impressive.   During the program many weather alarms sounded on smart phones signaling a local tornado warning. Tension rose as pilots wonders about the welfare of the aircraft at the airport. Our dedicated leaders committed to a trip out to inspect the planes, and we were relieved to see a subsequent message of confirmation later on that all appeared to be a-ok. 

On Sunday the briefings and our readiness planning continued. The nerviness was interrupted -gratefully - by some time with sisters, aunts, great-aunts and cousin Lydia, Patty and Susie who braved the crazy I-95 to meet up with Classic Racer 29. We finished our laundry, flight planning and packing. And then - a premier viewing of Beyond the Powder: The Legacy of the First Women's Cross-country Air Race, a documentary film by Hemlock Films.  This film was fabulous. Highlighting the 1929 race and showcasing the 2014 Air Race Classic. Team Baldwin Family Flyers showed up in the film and it was fun to see ourselves on the screen. The film is not in the final production form and is scheduled to show on PBS next Spring. 

The family entourage had a nice pre-race dinner in Frederickburg and then to bed for the final rest.  In Fredericksburg we were delighted to find the intersection of Williamk and Caroline Streets. 

Another terrific day: tip of Virginia's Northern neck and the airport BBQ

Friday AM team Baldwin Family Flyers did some administrative catch-up and then launched on some more road touring. First stop was the White Oak Civil War Museum. Wow. What a collection of artifacts and knowledge, of local civil war lore. The museum is managed by D.P. Newton whose family has been in the area for hundreds of years and were amongst those that found so many of the artifacts. The museum also contains a research center and D.P. certainly revealed a depth of knowledge that was impressive. Caroline began to recall the history of great, great, great grandfather Isaac Harris who served in the Sanitary Commission in 1860s. A message to Ned also revealed a wealth of knowledge about the history and region. We all felt some somber sentiments as we reflected on the times of war and strife amongst 'neighbors' near and far.  Our drive took us down to the 'crick' where the confederate soldiers were taken down to the shores. .

Next up for some more light regional flair and fare we drove to Fairview beach, a vacation spot on the Potomac River.  Tim's II restaurant served up some local crab cakes and a nice view of the river and across to Maryland. We parked in Virginia though for reasons I have not explored, the water is Maryland territory so once on the restaurant pier over the water we were technically in Maryland. 

The final tour outing of the day was to Caledon State Park. Here we enjoyed a 3-mile loop trail in the woods out to the Potomac. The park headquarters are in a house that was donated to the state, along with the large parcel of land,  for conservation. It is now a site of old growth forest preserve and prized bird habitat.   We enjoyed the activity and scenery. 

Wrapping up another fun day was the airport BBQ. Back at the hotel we freshened. Up and were fortunate to catch the ARC shuttle.  At the airport there was such merriment!  We chatted with racer friends, finally met our 'baby birds' Tiffany and Taylor, Classic Racer 45, and had fun. Tension was shed, we ate a picnic outside, played games, tried to hula-hoop and bopped to the music.