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Brief Overview Air racing was popular and reached its peak during the golden age of aviation between World Wars I & II. It still lives on today, but with far fewer venues than that era. The biggest and most well known today is the Reno Air Races. There are six classes: Bi-Plane, Formula 1, Sport, T6, Jet and Unlimited. There’s plenty of great racing in all the classes especially in the “stock” classes, such as T6, where all the aircraft are essentially unmodified and about equal in performance. The highlight of the week-long event is the Unlimited Class races. There is basically one rule - the aircraft must be powered by piston engines. There’s a minimum weight rule also but, that’s about it. Engine sizes top out near 4400 cubic inches and aircraft speeds near 500mph. Generally this class is populated by WWII fighter aircraft, though there have been a few "scratch-built" aircraft, notably the Burt Rutan designed, Nissan GTP automotive powered, Pond Racer and the late John Sandburg's Tsunami. I can imagine the Sport Class aircraft becoming the Unlimited in the future as the old war birds become rarer and the technology of the Sport Class advances. The “Cincinnati Guys” Every year is a great year at Reno, especially as part of the "Cincinnati Guys." The “Cincinnati Guys” team is headed and organized by Tom Scott of Scott Models in Cincinnati. A typical day starts with breakfast at Mel’s Diner or Stead Field for the Boy Scout pancake breakfast. The van train stops every morning on the way to the field at Scolari’s Grocery to load up on the day’s essentials. Beer and snacks mostly and sometimes sandwiches from the sub shop next door. Much milling is done in the parking lot as we load the coolers, ice the beer and reload the vans. When we get to the field we unload the vans and, for a small fee, the boy scouts take everything to our box. The box is our base of operations for the day making trips from there to the pits, vendors, static displays or whatever. At the end of the day we load the vans back up and head down to the pits. Here are the 2006 Cincinnati Guys..
10. Rudy "Peashooter" Siegel 11. Mark Feist 12. Paul Siegel 13. Vinnie Siegel 14. Tom Scott 15. Jeff Loewe 16. Paul Conrad 17. Michael Conrad 18. Craig Grunkemeyer 19. Mario Traviseo 20. Ulla Peralta 21. Isaac Austin 22. Nathan Newman 23 Skip Greer
2006 New for me in 2006 was a media credential. This allowed me out to the pylons and various other areas off limits to the public. I flew out on Wednesday morning which gave me time to get to Stead mid afternoon. Enough time to catch the end of the T6 race, the sport and jet classes. After tagging up with the Cincinnati guys, we finished the day at the Warlock party before heading back to the hotel. Thursday dawned a miserable day, cloudy, windy and cold. Temps were only as low as the forty’s but with the wind, it felt like it cut right through you. The lighting made for challenging shooting conditions and I used a lot of disc space getting it dialed in. The wind and the desert teamed to make my contact lenses blinding and incredibly painful. I’m sure it wasn’t as challenging as it was for the pilots trying to fly in it. Other than that, it’s a neat experience standing under the pylons as the racers go by. There seems to be a comradery amongst most of the photographers and everyone was friendly, even to strangers such as me. The only draw back I see with being out at the pylons is the down time between races. Show time is filled with various acts of the air show back at the flight line. The bus that takes you out to the pylons only makes the trip a couple of times a day and you’re with it the whole time. There isn’t much happening out there when a race isn’t running. Friday was cool and windy like Thursday except it was mostly sunny. It made shooting a bit better but it didn’t help the pilots any. The Sport gold race was canceled for the day. Again, I spent the first half of the day out at the pylons until the dust and the cold finally soaked through and I went back to the box. Saturday was a much better day, less wind and t-shirt warm. I spent the morning in the pits and checking the static displays. I headed out to the pylons for the afternoon races. The evening was again spent in the pits. The highlight of the evening was the hanger party sponsored by Wild Orchid Gentlemen’s Club. Everyone seemed to be there. Saturday also seemed to have its sad side too. After blowing an engine on Monday and putting a new one on in time to qualify on Wednesday, Merlin’s Magic had an oxygen bottle blow up, while it was being filled, doing significant damage to the aircraft. My heart goes out to the Merlin’s Magic team. Rare Bear was sitting in the pits, sans engine, as it blew earlier in the week and the Warlock T6 team was working hard looking for the source of metal chips in the engine. I spent most of the day Sunday in the box and enjoyed the bits of air show that I had missed earlier in the week. John Travolta made a fly by in his motor home and the Thunderbirds were the main air demo of the week. I spent the Unlimited Gold race out at the flight line. I’m more photographer than writer, if you haven’t noticed yet. I’ll work on that for next year. If you’d like to read the best, one page, summery of the 2006 Reno Air Races that I’ve found, check out this letter to the editor at The Southern Aviator.
All the pictures are in chronological order, edited only for focus, not necessarily content or dirt on the lens. Attention Cincinnati Guys... If you'd like low resolution (emailable) electronic images of any shots on these Reno pages send me an email listing the ones you'd like and I'll email them to you. All photographic material ©2002-2007 by Jeff Loewe. All rights reserved. No duplication without authorization.
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