At Reno 2005, 34 year old Will Whiteside made his debut air racing appearance in the Sport Class. He flew a Glasair III that was built and owned by fellow air race instructor/pilot C.J. Stephens. With Will at the controls, C.J.’s Glasair III named “INFANT MONKEY” finished second in the Sport Bronze at a speed of 255.237 MPH.

     For work, Will is a corporate pilot for two local Sonoma County Families. Will has recently retired from being an Airline Pilot and was flying the Boeing 757 and Boeing 737. For fun, Will is an Instructor Pilot and he flies aerobatics in Experimental homebuilts Will spent his childhood flying computer flight simulators and Radio Controlled models. After learning to fly full-scale airplanes, Will got the chance to fly with friend Lloyd Hamilton up to Reno and around the pylons in his Bristol Centarus powered Hawker Sea Fury, “Baby Gorilla”. After that ride, the decision to race at Reno was purely academic.

     Will is no stranger to going fast and turning left. He spent his years prior to becoming a pilot as a professional dirt motorcycle speedway racer. In 1994 at the age of twenty three, Will ended a five year racing career to pursue his love of flying. After learning to fly, Will gained flight experience and became a Certified Instrument Flight Instructor. He worked for an overseas airline, training their pilots to fly as airline pilots. After a brief time as an instructor, Will was offered a job flying LearJets and Gulfstreams by an old air racer named Clay Lacy. Clay Lacy Aviation out of Van Nuys, California proved to be a great place to learn to fly jets in the charter environment. Will flew the Learjet 23, 24, 25, 35, 36, 55 and Gulfstream II, IIB, III, IV, IVSP. Flying with Clay himself, He flew aerial photography or “ASTROVISION” flights on various airliners and military aircraft for movies and television commercials. Wanting to fly for the airlines, in 2001 Will left Clay Lacy Aviation as a full time pilot and remained on as a contract pilot while he took his next career step to work for American Trans Air Airlines or ATA. After a hiring freeze at ATA, Will went to work for NetJets International as a Gulfstream IV pilot. After one great year working for Warren Buffett at NetJets, Will left to go fly the larger jets at ATA Airlines.

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     After extensive modification program and flight testing, SteadFast was ready to take to the pylons again for the Reno National Championship Air Races Pylon Racing Seminar or PRS. We showed up a few days early as the Sport Class had put on a formation School or F.A.S.T. Clinic that Will instructed at. With excellent weather and a group of great guys, the clinic was a complete success for all participants. Wills student, Tom Mcreynolds, a Lancair legacy pilot from the San Francisco Bay Area showed up and realized the rewards of his winters hard work. Will and Tom had been flying together for the last 6 months, Will teaching him the nuances of formation flying and Reno air racing in his legacy.Tom performed excellent and really had a great time!

      When PRS started, SteadFast was put on the course twice a day for three days and Will worked on refining his line around the Reno pylons. " I tried wide lines and tight lines, I played it pylon to pylon and then a faded course that runs pretty loose down red Rock Blvd or between Pylons 5-7. The line I used last year reported the fastest lap speeds from the crew in the pits". Our modifications from the winter months yielded lower temperatures and much higher speeds. Will made a number of laps with friend, Michael Brown in September Pops and Mike was heard to say, "That little Yak really hauls!" Look for faster qualifying speeds out of the little Yak in September 2007.
We are trying to better our last years fastest lap of 363 MPH so Team SteadFast has been working with Pete Law this year to develop an A.D.I. system or anti detonation injection to water inject the Pratt Whitney R-2000 radial engine on SteadFast. R-2000's were never equipped with Water from the factory so Pete has his work cut out for himself. Among the other modifications you will see at Reno 2007 will be a new propeller and spinner combination on Loan from friend Ira Salgiman. Ira owns a Yak also but won't be ready to take to the skies for a year or so. This Prop Spinner combo is the same that has gone so fast unofficially here at Reno in 2001 just before the terrorist attacks. It went right at 400 MPH!
We are looking forward to a great year at Reno and can't wait to see all of our friends and fans. Keep up the support as we cannot field this little green racer without your help and encouragement!

      After a full nine months of working on the SteadFast evry day mostly all day, the team has come together again to test the winter modification program. We changed Oil Coolers, Landing gear rigging, Spinner blade cutouts, added an after body to the spinner, sealed off the foot steps and cleaned up the induction trunk to the carb. These are just some of the larger items accomplished. The list included over one hundred additional items that needed looking at before Reno 2007. After 40 laps of practice, the Yak seemed to be better in all respects. We will now go back to the shop and install A.D.I. (Anti Detonation Injection) and a new propeller to bring the Yak up into the top of the Unlimited Silver class right next to the Fast Curtiss Wright 3350 powered Hawker Sea Furys. The A.D.I. should boost the Pratt Whitney R-2000 from 1400 Horsepower to around 1600 Horse Power. The new propeller was mainly sponsored by Bob Cannon and Wally McDonnell, long time warbird pilot, friend and air racer. Thanks! Bob & Wally. It is unknown at this time if SteadFast will show up in its Romanian primer green paint or a racy new scheme. We have a few favorites so far. We are still waiting for a major sponsor to have the airplane painted in thier colors.