Flying: Just a Dry Run

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The things a man can do in the gentle name of sport. He can wrestle 750 lb. steers, shatter concrete blocks with his hand, dangle from 20,000-ft. mountains on strands of rope. And when he gets bored with such jejune pursuits, he can take up racing airplanes around 50-ft. pylons stuck in the ground — a sport so suicidal that the U.S. Government outlawed it 15 years ago. But you can't keep a madman down. Last week, with the reluctant blessing of the Federal Aviation Agency, 100 daredevils converged on a patch of desert outside Reno to resume the National Championship Air Races, delicately described by the promoter as "the biggest, safest event in U.S. aviation history." He should have added: "Since the dogfights over MIG Alley."

Most of the pilots were pros—airline captains, crop dusters, Air Force officers—shooting at $45,000 in prize money for the nine events. The rest were out for kicks. "I know it sounds ridiculous, but my bathtub at home is bigger than this plane," sighed Clyde Parsons, a 215-lb. California rancher who won a midget-class race by averaging 147 m.p.h. around a 21-mile course in a plane he had painstakingly built in his own garage.

Into the Wire. For nine days the races went on—hair-raising stunt competitions (one pilot painted his name in big letters upside down on his plane for easier reading), a balloon race, skydiving, a pylon race for ladies. During the cavalry-charge start, one plucky aviatrix banked so boldly that she clipped a wing on the ground, somehow landed safely, and climbed out cursing her evil luck. But all that was minor compared to the big show: the pylon race for unlimited class planes, souped-up World War II Mustangs and Grumman Bearcats capable of speeds up to 450 m.p.h.

This was the event that put an end to the races in 1949—after famed Racer Bill Odom piled into a Cleveland apartment house, killing himself and two other people. Practicing at Reno last week, Miro Slovak, a Czech who fled West in 1952 and now flies for Continental Airlines, screamed down the straightaway at 400 m.p.h.—square into a badly marked 13,000-volt power line. Sparks showered over Slovak's Bearcat; one wing was gouged, but miraculously Slovak kept control. With extraordinary efficiency, the power company restrung the wire overnight. Next day—boing!—another pilot knocked it down.

Off the Dirt. The rules of the game were simple enough: first, each pilot had to qualify by lapping "safely" around the oval 8.5-mile course—which meant at 350 m.p.h. or so. Then each would fly three 85-mile heats against varied opposition, winning points for his standing in each heat. So far, so good. But there was one catch: Promoter Bill Stead, 40, insisted that the pilots take off and land on a dirt runway located in front of the grandstand and the TV cameras. The pilots rebelled, insisted on using the paved runways at Reno Airport instead; the dirt, they said, was unsafe. Oh yeah? growled Stead, whereupon he qualified his own Bearcat at 350 m.p.h. and threatened to take the $5,000 prize himself. That did it: the pilots rushed out to qualify in such a tearing hurry that one anxious flyer did not even bother to change out of his business suit, silk shirt and tie.