Tue, Jun 30, 2009
Best Among The 34 Team Field
They flew mainly in the morning to avoid the heat of the day.
That was part of the winning strategy for Kelly Burris and her
co-pilot Erin Recke in the Air Race Classic, an all-female
cross-country airplane race.
Racers departed Denver last Tuesday. Burris and Recke finished
in Atlantic, Iowa on Friday, but didn't know they had won until the
awards banquet was held Sunday. Burris, who is from Ann Arbor,
Michigan, told the Detroit Free Press "We decided to stay as low as
we could. It was a very hot route. We went down through Texas. We
would fly a couple of legs early in the morning. We would be done
by noon. When it was hot and bumpy in the afternoon, we
didn’t fly. We let the airplane rest."
Burris, and her Atlanta-based co-pilot Erin Recke finished the
course three knots faster than any other team, considered a wide
margin in the rally-style cross country race. The team
finished the race last year, but were disqualified for using a
navigation system rather than dead reckoning. “This is
something we have wanted really bad after our goof up last
year,” Burris told the paper. “This was a nice slice of
redemption. The other racers were so happy for us. We put a lot of
thought and strategy into it and it all paid off. We won by quit a
bit, which was a nice feeling.”
The Air Race Classic is designed specifically for women in
aviation. It was first developed by Amelia Earhart in 1929, and
this year's event was the 33rd race. Burris and Recke have donated
their $5,000 prize to Air Charity Network, which claims to be
the largest charity air transportation organization in the
world.
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