Week Twenty-Six: Track Select

Well, we've finally moved on from T-6s! Track select was Thursday night and it was a pretty good time. I'll get to my assignment at the end of the post...

So after preparing all of the things we needed to, like the roasts of everyone in the class, the slides showing our info and "hero shot" pictures, and our red carpet sim times, we really ended up just kinda waiting around for Thursday. Which was nice, because it was a well-deserved rest from the quick pace we had been going at.

One of the more interesting things we did was welcome the new class into our flight room, showing them the ropes and giving what advice we could. I was in charge of showing how to prepare the briefing slides for the morning's formal brief. There are quite a few steps, and it was pretty funny to see the looks on the new guys' faces as they watched me set them up. Keep in mind this is just a PowerPoint presentation, which is nothing compared to what they'll do on the flight line. But they'll get it down just like we did. Anyway, we also gave them some phony information just to have a bit of fun. For example we included a "Dawg of the Week" slide on the formal brief, which we never actually did. Our IPs sent a pic of it to us the next day when they briefed it... haha it was funny to see that they were so believing.

My parents also came into town, so it was really nice to see them again and to show them the booming metropolis of Enid, OK.

Thursday rolled around and we were all getting stoked for track select to happen. That morning I showed my mom and dad around the base and the flight line, which they enjoyed. We also had about twenty minutes to mess around in a simulator, so my dad hopped in and I tried to give the best instruction I could while he flew around. Needless to say, it was difficult to tell him what to do! He did an alright job, but it was hilarious watching him start to dive toward the ground without even realizing it. I'm like, "Pull up! Pull up, you're gonna crash!" He did a good aileron roll though, and his landing went decent. Overall not too bad. I got a sense for how the IPs feel with brand new students doing stupid stuff.

At four we had our party, where we provided beer, wings, and pizza for the variety of guests. Then finally at five we started the ceremony. After walking into the auditorium in alphabetic order (except for our SROs, who would be going first) we quickly started the roasts. Each person gets called up to the front and are made fun of for a bit, then their selection is revealed. Everything was going as we had expected (you kind of get the sense where people will be headed, especially based on their choice and on hear-say). But there was a point where a guy who was a strong candidate for 38s didn't get them, and that made me nervous.

By the time I went to the front, 5 T-38s had already been handed out. Fortunately, that number included 3 international ones, which are automatic, so I was still in the running. After my roast, which made fun of me for overspeeding my flaps and various things I've said and done, the three aircraft went up on the screen. The UH-1 quickly went away, leaving just the T-38 and the T-1...

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Then, as I looked nervously at the screen, a big picture of a T-38 formation popped up! I got my first choice!

Hell yeah

After saluting my flight commander and shaking his hand, I walked over to my classmates who'd already gotten their planes and gave everyone a high five on the way down the line. It was a pretty amazing feeling to have gotten 38s, and I was still kind of reeling from it. It hadn't really kicked in that I got them yet.

One other cool thing that happened was we had a guy going for helos, and he got them! He was the guy who had gone through the Commander's Review process, so everyone was pretty stoked for him.

After meeting up with my parents again, who were justifiably proud and emotional (you know how parents get haha) our new flight commander called the nine of us over to a corner of the room. We were told to report to our new flight room for a briefing.

After walking into our new room, we were sat down and given a couple talkings-to about what it meant now that we had become T-38 students. It was intense, and I got a sense of how things will be here. We were given a new boldface/ops limits to fill out and memorize, and told to show up prepared to test on it.

So it starts all over! We got a our publications on Friday, were given a couple introduction briefings and tested on our new boldface. After studying for a couple hours in the flight room, we got released.

This weekend has been pretty fun, Friday night was a big celebration night for everyone in our class, and it was a doozy. As I finish typing this, I'm sitting in front of my stack of study materials, so I've gotta end it and get back to them.

See you next week after our first full week of T-38 training. Only three weeks until our dollar rides!

Take it easy.

~ Dakota