The Lancair (kits) factory people were shocked Sunday morning, when they went to visit one of their machines, which had been left in the 'secure' hangar, with the rest of the Sport Class airplanes.

It should have been safe.

Everybody in that class knows everybody else; and besides, you can count on at least one, and probably several, teams' pulling all-nighters. So, when the Lancair people came to the hangar, they were doubly shocked: their 'baby' had been violated.

The cowling was off, and there were a couple drops of oil beneath the engine, sure signs of 'surgery.' Further inspection revealed that the machine's pushrods had been 'borrowed.'

More-obviously, its 3-blade Hartzell prop was gone.

The Lancair folks didn't immediately dial 911, or even have heart attacks. They knew there had to have been a logical explanation... or two.

There were.

Darryl Greenamyer's very special Lancair racer (right) needed those pushrods, and it was 3AM when they needed them. Hey -- hadn't the Lancair people said they'd do anything to help? Poof: six pushrods, gone! (Darryl, as everyone else had feared, could still go fast enough later on Sunday to hold off an heroic charge from Rick Vandam's Lancair, to win the Gold.)

But wait! There's More (or, er, less)!

Dave Morss, who has done his share of flying for Lancair, and was contending for the Silver after having set his plane up to cruise to Reno [not the ultimate race beast, with which he was used to winning -- that machine tragically crashed last October, taking two of our friends with it, in a 'pilot error' scenario], found that he couldn't go so very fast.

Part of his setup was an M-T prop, which Dave, we were told, had figured was going to be better for cruise, and just about as good for the race, as the Hartzell most of the field used.

[Note: that sign says, "Do NOT Allow Lancairs to Share Hangars. THEY EAT THEIR OWN"]

As it turned out, that M-T was indeed just fine for the trip to Reno (bottom photo), but it wasn't the hot setup for the race. Dave looked at that factory Lancair, and got a little idea... Poof: Dave's supercharged plane had a Hartzell on the nose! [We heard that, in the race, he flew with 7" less manifold pressure... and he went 10mph faster. Fuel consumption? Hey, he was racing! --ed.]

That brings up another point:

In an earlier article, I mentioned that I had heard from other Sport Class competitors, especially in the Silver race, that Dave might have been 'sandbagging,' because he didn't want to fly against Greenamyer's much-faster machine. I said that accusation didn't sound right, knowing the competitive spirit between the earpieces of the headset of said Mr. Morss. Sure enough, he wasn't sandbagging -- he was just uncharacteristically, legitimately, slow in qualifying.

Oh -- he easily won the Silver, at 272.922 mph.

FMI: www.lancair.com