Registration open for forty-fourth Air Race Classic

The 2020 event will cover 2,646 nautical miles. The University of North Dakota is hosting the start. Teams will travel to Pierre, South Dakota; Sheridan, Wyoming; Sterling, Colorado; Dodge City, Kansas; Ada, Oklahoma; Pine Bluff, Arkansas; Mount Vernon, Illinois; and Tullahoma, Tennessee. Indiana State University, based at terminus Terre Haute, Indiana, often fields teams of pilots in the air race, which is flown in day VFR conditions.

Up to 60 teams will compete in the event, which is flown in normally aspirated piston aircraft manufactured under Part 23. Each airplane is assigned a unique handicap, and racers fly to beat their best time, using weather and winds.

The Air Race Classic has roots that extend to the 1929 Women’s Air Derby, in which Louise Thaden, Amelia Earhart, Blanche Noyes, Pancho Barnes, and other women pilots raced from Santa Monica, California, to Cleveland.

Registration closes March 31. The Air Race Classic welcomes volunteers, pilots or nonpilots, at each of the stops.