The Rocket
Racing League, a group of high-flying rocketeers eager to race each other across
the sky, will debut its new stock racer today during a demonstration flight at
a Wisconsin air show.
The exhibition
flight will mark the first public debut for the league's Rocket Racer, a sleek
rocket-powered aircraft designed for aerial
track racing. More demonstrations are set for Friday and Saturday at the EAA
AirVenture air show in Oshkosh, Wisc., where some 700,000 spectators are
expected.
"It feels
great," Rocket Racing League CEO Granger Whitelaw told SPACE.com, adding
that he's both cautious and nervous. "It's just there's a lot that is important
about these flights, not only for Rocket Racing, but for aerospace and general
aviation."
Founded
in 2005 by Whitelaw, an Indianapolis 500 veteran, and Ansari X Prize-founder
Peter Diamandis, the Rocket Racing League is aimed at melding human spaceflight
with NASCAR-like competitions in the sky. The racers are designed to belch
15-foot (4.5-meter) flames from their engines that can be easily seen by
spectators, and carry limited amounts of rocket fuel to fly through a
three-dimensional aerial race course.
"It's the
start of a new industry, and certainly a new sports and entertainment company,"
Whitelaw said.
Six teams
are now on the roster along with a title sponsor DKNY Men, a New York
City-based men's sportswear line that is also sponsoring the league's Bridenstine
Rocket Racing Team led by former U.S. Navy jet pilot Jim Bridenstine.
During
today's demonstration, the league's go-to rocket pilot Rick Searfoss will fly
the Bridenstine team's racer. The exhibition comes fresh on the heels of the
private spaceflight firm Virgin
Galactic's Monday debut of WhiteKnightTwo, an enormous carrier plane
designed to launch the SpaceShipTwo spacecraft on passenger trips through
suborbital space, in Mojave, Calif.
"He's just
going to fly a very simple flight pattern, the plane has still got some more testing
to do," Whitelaw said of today's planned flight. "We just want to show it
basically and that's it. And that's a great step."
Challenges
still ahead
There have
been some setbacks, Whitelaw added.
Originally,
Searfoss was expected to fly his racer through
a three-dimensional track in the sky that fans could follow along with
using large television screens and helmet displays, but logistical challenges
for the screens' placement made it untenable, Whitelaw said.
The league also
hoped to hold its first exhibition race between two vehicles this weekend using
the Bridenstine team's race - powered by a liquid oxygen and kerosene engine developed
by XCOR Aerospace - and the Santa Fe Racing team vehicle, which uses an
alternate engine designed by Mesquite, Tex.-based Armadillo Aerospace that runs
on liquid oxygen and ethanol. Those races were slated for Aug. 1 and Aug. 2,
but the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) had yet to clear the Santa Fe
team's racer for exhibition flight using the Armadillo-built engine.
"It's been
ready to fly for weeks," Whitelaw said, adding that he did feel some
disappointment since the Armadillo team did a great job getting the engine
ready. "It's the engine and its integration within airframe that the FAA has to
get its arms around."
The
Armadillo engine should be clear for flight demonstrations planned for later
this year at the Reno National Championship Air Races in Reno, Nev., between
Sept.10-14; X
Prize Cup in Las Cruces, N.M., in late October; and at Aviation Nation at
Nellis Air Force Base in Las Vegas, Nev., on Nov. 8-9.
Rocket
Show and Tell
But while
the public may only get to see one of the two racers fly at OshKosh this week,
there will certainly be a lot of face time with both of the rocket planes,
Whitelaw added.
The
Bridenstine and Santa Fe racers, which are based on airframes built by Velocity
Aircraft, will be on hand for photographs and up-close scrutiny. The league
also plans to host a series of other events throughout the air show to discuss
the history and future of its high-flying sport.
Last week's
announcement of the title sponsorship with DKNY Men also marked a major step
forward for the league. Not only is the fashion firm sponsoring the league and
Bridenstine's team, but it also designed the flight suits to be worn by Rocket
Racer pilots and pit crew, as well as executive league clothing.
"Rocket
Racing is innovative, fast and fun - which also defines the kind of man who
wears DKNY," said Patti Cohen, the firm's executive vice president of global
marketing and communications, in a statement. "This partnership is just
the beginning for both the brand and the sport."
Whitelaw
said that corporate sponsorship is vital to extend the league's reach to the
public and investors, and that the DKNY Men deal is just the beginning.
"We're
going to be announcing more sponsors, and I think that's a good thing because
then people can touch and feel a real rocket, and they can get more excited
about it," he said, adding that more exposure could also help other
space-oriented firms like Virgin Galactic, XCOR and Armadillo Aerospace with
their own private suborbital efforts. "I think it's a very important step in
the underpinning of the industry. I don't know if there can be a more important
step quite frankly."
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