Queens Of The Sky All-Women Airplane Race Wings Past Coeur D’Alene

Mardell Haskins is 56 years old, a mother of eight, grandmother of 25 and one heck of a fly-boy.

Make that a fly-woman.

Haskins and fellow pilot Esther Grupenhagen swept into the Coeur d’Alene Airport Thursday in their 1967 single engine Piper Cherokee.

They had just clipped off the second leg of a 2,573-mile transcontinental airplane race and were aiming for their third victory.

But theirs was just one of 40 other airplanes - all piloted by women - expected to pass through the Coeur d’Alene Airport Thursday and today for the annual Air Race Classic.

“You can get in a plane and putt around but it’s a lot different than flying in a race,” Haskins said, two small gold airplanes dangling from her ear lobes. “It takes every skill you have … your navigation, your piloting, knowing your plane.”

The Air Race Classic is an all-women’s airplane race that starts in Nevada and ends in West Virginia.

College students, mothers and professional pilots from across the country are among the women who are not only vying for top flying honors but also are hoping to be an example to other women.

“Part of this race is to publicize that aviation is a viable activity as well as a career for women,” said Nancy Sliwa of Florida. She and her co-pilot, Marcie Smith, both worked for NASA and were the first to land in Coeur d’Alene.

Although women have been flying for almost as long as men, they still make up only a small portion of the pilots, Sliwa said.

“I like the feeling of pioneership,” she said, clad in a green flight suit. “You feel like you’re still on the cutting edge.”

The race began Thursday morning and the women, two to a plane, have until 5 p.m. Sunday to finish.

In between, they will pass through seven airports. The pilots must at least fly by each airport to be timed but they can also stop, refuel and even spend the night.

The clock stops while the pilots are on the ground.

Much of the skill involved in the race lies in deciding when to take off again.

Sliwa said it’s extremely important to watch the weather. She and Smith spent early Thursday afternoon carefully eyeing the cloud-enshrouded mountains around Coeur d’Alene.

Good tail winds could have helped their time if they took off immediately. But, they would also have had to deal with low clouds, forcing them to detour off course and lose time.

They decided to wait and watch.

“Every time I fly a race I learn something new about the weather and my own abilities,” Sliwa said. “It challenges you both physically and mentally. It makes you do things you wouldn’t do otherwise.”

Thursday’s flight was the first race for co-pilot Amie Hellmann and her pilot Mary Helen Dunnan.

Hellmann, 21, admits she decided to race the Classic because she thought it would look good on her resume.

The junior from the University of Central Texas is studying to be a professional pilot.

After switching schools and majors a couple of times, she says she finally realized flying was something she could enjoy as a lifelong career.

“It’s just a lot of fun,” Hellmann said. “You get to go fast. And it’s a whole different perspective when you’re up there looking down.”

But it’s not easy. She and Dunnan spent about four hours in their plane Thursday flying to Coeur d’Alene from Reno.

“You can’t just stop when you’re tired,” Hellmann said.

The first plane across the finish line is not necessarily the winner, said race officials from the 99s International Organization of Women Pilots.

Each plane is handicapped - giving the smaller, slower airplanes an equal chance of winning.

The annual race got its start in 1977 but draws its roots from an allwomen’s airplane race that began in the late 1920s or early 1930s dubbed the “Powder Puff Derby.”

As a 15-year-old girl, Haskins dreamed about racing airplanes after hearing about the derby.

Now a heavy equipment operator, flying the Air Race Classic the last six years has been a dream come true.

Concentration and consistency are the keys to her two prior victories.

“I don’t think about winning, I work on what I’m doing right now,” she says.

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