Gathering Data for the Handicap

       Early this morning, I pulled my plane out of the hangar, checked it twice, then I phoned Flight Watch, the organization that assists pilots in monitoring the weather. I asked him about the winds aloft at 3000 and 6000 feet above sea level. Fairly windy today on the surface, then at forty-four knots at 3000 feet, with nineteen knots at 6000. He warned me about wind sheer conditions, which tensed me up a bit -- but it doesn't take much to make me nervous. I would have put my plane back in the hangar then, but I saw Mary's car pulling up. I said hi and then mentioned the wind. "Yup, it's a windy one today." She did not appear worried, as I felt, so I hopped in the airplane after her feeling confident in our flight today.

        Mary flies Cessnas. Big Cessnas. So crawling into a Cherokee 180 felt different to her. But she found all the buttons and levers and we took off smoothly from Kickapoo Airport. Our destination: Stephenville Airport to meet Carol, who volunteered to calculate the handicap of our airplane for the Air Race Classic. At Stephenville we had a ninety-degree crosswind at a meager ten knots, but it was enough for Mary to say after landing: "I don't like Pipers." I said, "You'll have plenty of practice landing this Piper during the next couple of weeks!"

       We parked and shut down the engine in front of Stephenville Airport's terminal building. Carol came out to greet us. Carol has raced sixteen times and won once. Her advice: "Race your own race," she said as she sat down with us at the conference table. Out came the airplane log books, handbooks, weight charts, and performance capabilities of the plane. Carol jotted down all information, taking an hour or so before the two headed out northwest of town. She also calculated density altitude, figuring that at 4500 feet above sea level they would fly in the best conditions for speed at full throttle. In the meantime, Mary calculated the center of gravity of the airplane with the load it would haul around during the handicap flight, which did not amount to very much. Mary and Carol don't weigh much put together and sopping wet, but the plane had 300 pounds of fuel on board.

       The calculations reflected the strength of the winds aloft at 4,200 feet: The speed of the plane varied from 115 mph to 154 mph. Carol will send the data to ARC headquarters where a computer will show our handicap.

        While Mary and Carol flew to gather the handicap data, I pulled up the AOPA site on my laptop to study the kind of conditions we would experience during our return flight to Kickapoo Airport. (The yellow on the screen shows the Dallas/Fort Worth air space.)

        Now we wait for the handicap, which we should know in a couple of days. We do not have the fastest plane, but we do not have the slowest; still, we will race smartly and safely.

        Carol has raced for time around the world. Yes, around Earth, beating the record set by a faster airplane. She and her friend Carol Ann fly to raise funds for Lou Gehrig's Disease. Visit their Facebook page for more dazzling information about their feats.