Look! In the Sky. It's a Rocket Racer.

From NYT > Science:

The Rocket Racing League, a long-promised attempt to create a kind of Nascar of the skies, will hold its first exhibition races this year. The racers may finally be reaching the starting line. The Rocket Racing League, a long-promised attempt to create a kind of Nascar of the skies, will hold its first exhibition races this year, its founders said. The races are promised as a kind of living video game — but louder — with a virtual raceway laid out in the sky that will be visible on projection screens at the site of each event. Racers in rocket-powered aircraft will fly four laps around a five-mile "track" at anywhere from 150 feet to 1,500 feet above the ground. The planes, designed to fly at 340 miles an hour, will start side by side, two at a time. The pilots include professional test pilots who received their training in the military and a former astronaut. As pilots follow the course, spectators will be able to see alternate views from remote cameras and the cockpits. The league has signed up six teams so far. "We're taking the business of auto racing and the business of air shows and we're combining them," said Granger Whitelaw, the league's chief executive and a partner in professional auto racing teams. The races will consist of four heats, each of which will take about 15 minutes, he said.

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