And the excitement continues! After last year’s incredible photo‐finish between Bill “Tiger” Destefani in Strega
and Steven Hinton in Voodoo during a heat race, and Thom Richard’s disqualification flying Heavy Metal in the
Gold Medal final race, many thought it would be years before we’d see anything near as thrilling. When
“Tiger” retired, Heavy Metal was heavily damaged by fire on its way to the races, and Rare Bear declared a
Mayday landing on Monday those fears seemed to be confirmed. But as veteran air race fans can tell you,
anything can happen and “it ain’t over until the planes are on the ground and a clean race has been an‐
nounced.”
The 52nd annual National Championship Air Races took place at Stead Field from September 16 to 20 this
year. The weather was characterized by clear skies and mild temperatures: perfect conditions for racing. 116
planes qualified in the six classes and the action was pretty much non‐stop all week. When not flying, the air‐
craft were being fine‐tuned or overhauled in the pits. The crews often worked late into the night to recover
from damage or to coax the last little bit of performance out of the airframes and engines. Racing began
around 0800 and didn’t finish until about 1600. Interspersed with the racing in the afternoon were the air
show performances, which we highlight in another review.
Attendance continues to grow, both in numbers of fans and numbers of racers. Over 150,000 spectators at‐
tended this year’s event. The Sport class attracted 37 entrants and featured some intense duels in the four
medal races (Gold, Silver, Bronze and Medallion). The Jet class qualified a record 17 aircraft, dominated by
eleven L‐39s. The field also included an L‐139, three L‐29 Delfins, and a TS‐11 Iskra. But it was a DH 115 Vam‐
pire jet, Vampire, piloted by Pete Zaccagnino, which took the gold. Steve Senegal, in Endeavor, dominated the
sixteen plane Formula One field. And even the sometimes staid T‐6 class saw some spirited action this year,
with Dennis Buehn, in Midnight Miss III, taking the gold.
But it is the Unlimited class which attracts the most attention and which this year created, once again, the
most excitement. Thirteen highly modified warbirds qualified to race and no fewer than seven P‐51D Mus‐
tangs showed up. Unfortunately Heavy Metal had been damaged by fire during a refueling stop on its way to
Reno and did not participate. Completing the impressive lineup were four Sea Furies, a Yak‐11, and perennial
fan favorite Rare Bear. The F8F Bearcat captured pole position with a qualification time of 480.644 mph, but
also showed s