B1 Before

Back in 2006, I had the opportunity to go to the Daytona 500. I wasn't too excited by the loud and fast cars going round and round, but they did have a flyover by a B1 bomber the day before the big race and I was there. Unlike the other flyovers I've seen by this plane, this time it was actually staying there, and I could see it at the airport next door if I climbed to the top of the grandstands. And sure enough, that's what I did. I stayed up there until the thing took off, and got some half-decent shots. Having watched it for an hour before hand, the actual fly-over at the start of the race was a little bit anti-climatic. If you don't have a sense of how large this plane is, look just behind the forward landing gear in the picture above. You can see a crew member sitting on the ladder leading up into the plane.