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"Adventure is worthwhile in itself." — Aviator Amelia Earhart (born in 1897, disappeared in July 1937)

FRYEBURG — The Eastern Slope Regional Airport is the epicenter of women's aviation this week, with the western Maine airport serving as the terminus of the 2,656-mile 42nd annual all-women Air Race Classic.

Featuring 53 teams of two to three women pilots per plane, the nine-stop Air Race Classic took off Tuesday from Sweetwater, Texas, at Avenger Field Airport, and was set to proceed with fly-ins in Alva, Okla.; Beatrice, Neb.; Faribault, Minn.; Galesburg, Ill.; Auburn, Ind.; Cadillac, Mich.; Newark, Ohio; and Penn Yah, N.Y. before landing in Fryeburg by the 5 p.m. deadline Friday.

Severe weather, however, precluded two or three of the planned stops, according to a spokesperson for the event.

With Fryeburg serving as the finish line, an open house is slated at the airport today. Planes will be on display; a youth aviation event, with ice cream, will take place from 1-3 p.m.; some non-competition planes will have cockpit displays; and the public will get to meet the pilots, who range in age from 17 to 90 years old, and include several mother-daughter teams as well as 22 collegiate teams (see accompanying story).

Air race Fryeburg event chair/pilot Brenda Thibodeau, pilot Shadow Gorrill of Ossipee, airport manager David Cullinan, pilot Lisa Reece of Georgetown and Jenny Jorgensen of  West Bath, Maine. (Tom Eastman photo)

The airport has been a beehive of activity all week, with organizers preparing for the arrival of the competitors who were due to touch down on Thursday and Friday.

"Oh yes, we've been out straight!" said local event chair Brenda Thibodeau, an avid pilot who operates Green Thumb Farms of Fryeburg with her husband, Don, and a member of this year's event host organization, the Katahdin chapter of the Ninety-Nines international women pilots group, with the Katahdin chapter representing Maine and New Hampshire.

As part of the weekend activities, pilots have Sunday to explore the area, noted Brenda Thibodeau. The event wraps up Sunday evening with an awards banquet at 7 p.m. at the Red Jacket Mountain View Resort in North Conway, where the pilots, who depart Monday, are staying.

This year's start in Texas commemorated the 75th anniversary of the founding of the Women's Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) at Avenger Field, their training base during World War II.

The 2018 Air Race Classic teams at the start of the race at Avenger Field, home of the WASP training ground, Sweetwater, Texas. (Courtesy photo)

Under the rules of the competition, race teams consisting of at least two women pilots must fly VFR (visual flight rules) during daylight hours only and are given four days to make flybys at each en route timing point and then land at the terminus. The race route changes each year, and always consists of approximately 2,400 statute miles of flying, with eight or nine timing points. A statute mile measures 5,280 feet, as opposed to a nautical mile (often used in flying, which allows for the curvature of the Earth and measures 6,076 feet, or 1.5 statute miles.

First place gets $5,000; second, $3,000; and third, $2,000. Each leg winner also receives a prize.

Dee Bond of Pukekoh, New Zealand, who was half of last year's winning team (with Florida Tech student McKenzie Krutsinger) is back for her ninth Air Race Classic. A commercial pilot, she holds a multi-engine instrument flight instructor certificate. In the event program, she noted that she flies "for fun and friendship, and because it is a great way to see the U.S.A. in the company of like-minded pilots."

Her teammate, 21-year-old Krutsinger of Sidney, Ill., is flying the ARC for the second time. In the event program, she notes, "I race to gain experience and because now I am hooked. After last year's race, I wish I could race every year. The people you meet and the experiences you have here are amazing."

They will be flying in the Classic Racer 9 class, in a Cessna Skylane 182R.

Last year's race started in Frederick, Md., and ended in Santa Fe, N.M. Next year's will go from Jackson, Tenn., to Welland, Ontario.

Women's air racing got off the ground in 1929 with the Women's Air Derby. Twenty pilots — including aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart, who placed third in the heavy plane division — raced from Santa Monica, Calif., to Cleveland, site of the National Air Races.

After that race, Earhart called a meeting of female pilots. At the time, there was a total of 117 licensed women pilots. A group of 99 attended that first meeting or expressed an interest — hence the name, The Ninety-Nines.

According to airraceclassic.org, racing continued through the 1930s and was renewed again after World War II, when the All Women's Transcontinental Air Race (AWTAR), known as the Powder Puff Derby, was launched in 1947.

Team #FlyFactoryNew lands their 2014 Beechcraft Bonanza G36 at the Fryeburg airport after completing the 2018 Air Race Classic Thursday. The team consists of Mindy Lindheim of Atlanta and Chelsea Carlin of Wichita, Kansas. (Jamie Gemmiti photo)

The derby held its 30th and final flight in 1977. When it was discontinued, the Air Race Classic, Ltd. (ARC) stepped in to continue the tradition of transcontinental speed competition for women pilots and staged its premier race.

The Air Race Classic was reincorporated in 2002 into the Air Race Classic, Inc., a non-profit 501(c)(3) educational organization. The ARC encourages and educates current and future women pilots while preserving and promoting the tradition of pioneering women in aviation.

The early air races were the "on to" type, with noon and night control stops, and the contestants more or less stayed together. In that manner, weather and flying conditions were practically the same for each entrant, and the race officials could release standings to the media after each day of racing.

In the Air Race Classic of today, each airplane is assigned a handicap speed — and the goal is to have the actual ground speed be as far over the handicap speed as possible.

The pilots are thus given the leeway to play the elements, holding out for better weather, winds, etc. The objective is to fly the "perfect" cross-country. In this type of race, the official standings cannot be released until the final entrant has crossed the finish line. Actually, the last arrival can be the winner.

The races in the 1930s flew shorter legs and made more stops than the current races. Races in the 1980s through 2000 flew longer legs of 350 to 400 miles.

Now the legs are 280-320 statute miles, with between seven and nine control stops designated for either landing or flyby for timing. The races are open to all women with fixed-wing airplanes from 100-570 horsepower.

The earliest races were flown solo, in the single- or two-seat airplanes available at that time. Today, a team consists of a pilot and co-pilot, with additional teammates to spread out the workload and add to the fun.

According to the race webpage, scoring techniques evolved over the years. In earlier days, the fastest airplane with no specified handicap was in a good position to win, if it held together over the long haul and there was no big navigational error committed.

Shelby Satkowiak, 23, of Mio, Michigan, smiles as she arrives at the Fryeburg airport after completing the all-woman 2018 Air Race Classic Thursday. Satkowiak's team was from Western Michigan University. (Jamie Gemmiti photo)

In 1952, the AWTAR began using the handicap system of scoring — each airplane flying against the best speed for that make and model of airplane. The Air Race Classic continued to use this type of scoring, until methods were developed to compute a handicap that is specific to each individual airplane.

The goal is for each team to have an equal chance of victory, depending on the accuracy of the handicapping. All participants are true winners in their own right, flying the best possible race.

As of 2018, there are 155 Ninety-Nines chapters across the globe, including a "virtual" chapter, the Ambassador 99s, which meets online for those who are too busy or mobile to be in one region for long.

"Our goal really is to get young people interested in aviation," said Brenda Thibodeau, who has been flying since 2001 and a member of the Katahdin Ninety-Nines since 2003.

She said the Eastern Slope Regional Airport put in its bid to host the event four years ago. She added that more than 80 volunteers are helping with this year's local race. "We really want to inspire young people to learn to fly."

She was joined at the airport Wednesday by fellow Katahdin Ninety-Nines members Jenny Jorgensen of West Bath, Maine, Lisa Reece of Georgetown, Maine, and Shadow Gorrill of Ossipee, as well as by airport manager David Cullinan.

A past Air Race Classic competitor, Jorgensen is an educator who got her pilot's license 23 years ago, while Reece got her commercial single engine land and sea rating in 1991.

Flying is freedom, but safety is paramount when it comes to being a good pilot. As Reece quipped, "Takeoffs are optional; landings are mandatory."

Outside on the runway, after a group photo, Reece further explained the joys of flying, noting that she and her husband often fly to their camp in northern Maine — taking an hour to complete a journey that otherwise would take five hours by land.

They have flown all over the country, exploring all that it has to offer.

As for this weekend's event, she agreed that it's about getting more young people interested in flying, especially young women.

"You don't hear a lot of women voices on the radio when you're flying around Maine or this country. It's really unfortunate, as we need to get these young girls and women, whatever age they are, and boys for that matter, and have them involved in aviation, as we're not getting any younger and we need to really pick up the pace for the next generation of pilots," said Reece.

Like Earhart's contributions to aviation, former Bartlett resident (and daughter of Col. George Howard (USAF-Ret.) of Jackson and the late Tish Howard) four-star Gen. Lori Robinson, 58 — who retired earlier this month — helped to break the glass ceiling when she flew higher and higher in the Air Force ranks.

"Those stories (such as about Gen. Robinson) really need to be told, as they are inspiring not only to me, but everyone. It's important to hear," said Reece. "Like anything," she added, "if you don't see someone that looks like you in a profession, you don't think you can do it. Women have made inroads in all sorts of professions, in business, academics and politics, but women are like only something like 3 percent I'm guessing of the total pilot population. Whatever it is, it's not a lot. We need to improve on that."

Like Amelia Earhart or Robinson, who knows — there just might be a young pilot-in-the-making at today's open house at the airport. The sky's the limit.

The Eastern Slope Regional Airport is located at 210 Lyman Drive, off Route 5/113 in Fryeburg.

For more information on today's Air Race Classic, go to airraceclassic.org. To find out about learn-to-fly programs, call Eastern Slope Regional Airport at (207) 935-4711 or go to easternslopeairport.com.