Hundreds of planes will be touching down in Oshkosh next week for the EAA AirVenture, but in Stevens Point, dozens of pilots and their crews are waiting anxiously to see who's won the Marion Jayne Air Race, part of the National Air Races, including the final leg, the Wisconsin 300 Air Race.

It was a navigational challenge, so the pilots have to know exactly where they're flying.
But the catch is, all the plane's high-tech instruments are covered up, so the pilot and navigator only have a compass and a map.

Then as they fly a triangular route, this time in the Upper Peninsula, they have to look for landmarks on the ground to make sure they're on track.

"We set a course line, and if we can fly the course line for 10 or 12 minutes, then we find something else that's important to update our position, and it keeps us on the line running around the course," says Rick Vandam, who navigates for his team.

Pilot Mike Jones and Vandam were the first to arrive Saturday afternoon, but that doesn't mean they won.

"We've got a 250 knot handicap, or 300 mile an hour handicap," Jones says. "So it's very important that we go just as fast as we can, and as accurately as we can."

There were some rain showers in the area, so organizers moved up the start time. Vandam says they needed to fly around some showers on their course, so they had to keep track of how far out of their way they went.

This race combines with another navigational race, and other cross-country races. They'll find out who wins Sunday.

Each plane has a GPS logger, that plots out their coordinates and time, so they download the information onto a computer, and into a map program, so they can see how well they stayed on course.

Find out more about the National Air Races at us-airrace.org.