Midphase Checkride Next Week

Wow, a lot has happened in the past two weeks...especially this past week. We've continued to have great weather and the flying schedule has been pretty intense. Some days we've been flying twice a day along with sims and tests, (100% on the Advanced Instruments test...rock on!) so it's been busy. But it's all good!

Tuesday this past week is where the fun began...solo day! My IP and I took off about 0600 that morning to an awesome sunrise, no clouds and no wind. There are some required things I had to do in the jet before I could solo that morning and those were three landings, a break-out and a go around. Those all went fine, so we landed and taxied back to the chocks to drop off my IP so that I could have some fun on my own. After he gave me his nametag with wings on it (it's bad luck to fly your initial solo without a pair of wings on your chest) and jumped out, I started the engines back up and headed back to the runway. Holding short of the runway I gave the radio call, "Number 1, Wings 07, static patterns." The Wings callsign is what all students use for their initial solo. A few seconds later I heard, "Number 1, you're cleared for takeoff. Winds are 150 @ 6." SWEET!! It was time for a little fun tearing up the pattern alone! I can't even explain how cool it was to be up there by myself with about 8-10 other planes flying around with me. I wasn't nervous, but it felt more like game time...you know when you step on to a court or field with the pregame jitters. The whistle blows, the jitters are gone and it's game on! It's the coolest thing in the world!

Well, after the ride is over it's AF custom to get thrown in a big tank of water if you get caught. I tried to get away but the odds weren't very good with all the guys around. I decided to suck it up and go for a swim to celebrate a big and totally fun accomplishment in my pilot training career!


After Tuesday, I was able to fly twice both Wed and Thurs for a total of 7 flights during the week. Double turning like that really pushed me ahead towards my first checkride, Midphase. The purpose of this checkride is to see if you can handle flying out to the training areas alone to practice acrobatics. If the weather stays nice I"ll be checking on Wed. I'm feel ready for it, and as long as I get enough sleep and just relax it'll be fine. This checkride has been known to cause trouble for a lot of people because it's their first one and the nerves cause them to do dumb things. In addition to the things I mentioned last post about the maneuvers we've been practicing in the area, we've added the loop, slit-s and aileron roll...fun times!! That just means a few more things to polish up before Wed rolls around. Well, I'll give it my best shot and let you all know how it went in a couple weeks or so!