Reno 1999

The last hoorah

Once again we returned to Stead to race both airplanes.  Val-Halla was raced in the Bronze and Wampus Cat was raced in the Silver.  The biggest thing we noticed this year was the shortening of the course (due to the successful whining of those that chose to build or buy their houses by Stead Field) dramatically reduced the ability to actually race on the course.  It's basically one big turn with no real straight-away for passing.  Additionally, since the Heritage and Legacy flights had become more successful, giving the Museum ample exposure, we decided that risk/benefit ratio of racing was getting to high on the risk side for our rare and valuable aircraft and that this would be our last year of racing.

Since we were less focused on racing, and more on crowd exposure, Bill, Valerie and the pit team made sure we and the Air Force Demo Team (and USAF Heritage Flight colleagues) were supplied with a pile of ribs, kegs of beer and good dose of entertainment at the ready at the close of the day.  To that end we invited the worlds greatest fighter pilot minstrel, Dick Jonas, to join us. In the pits, after racing, we sang a few of the fighter pilot standards immortalized on his collection of CD's available through his web site. (Dick Jonas'es Web Site)  While no longer racing, Bill and Val-Halla still do the USAF Heritage Flight show at the Reno Air Races.