A Palette of People, Planes, and Plains — Reflections on the Outback Air Race 2025

Australia’s landscapes rarely sit in just one shade. Flying between Esperance and Forrest, in Western Australia, we came across pink and purple salt lakes stitched into green paddocks — an unexpected palette, much like the spectrum of people, planes and pressures that made up OAR25.

I started the Outback Air Race with a plan: to blog daily, share reflections, photos, and give readers a sense of the journey in real-time. After day one of the race, I stopped. Not because I had nothing to say, but because in the cockpit, living it—and sometimes just staying ahead of it—took precedence.

That’s when I realised the race was not just about colour and spectacle, but about a palette—of people, of planes, and of plains. Each day revealed something different, unexpected, and worth seeing clearly before it faded. The photo I took between Esperance and Forrest—pink and blue salt lakes bleeding into green paddocks—captured that feeling perfectly. Surprising beauty, layered against expectation, reminding me that nothing about this country—and this race—was just one shade.

The Stop Before the Start

By the time I conceded daily blogging, frustration and quiet guilt had set in. I’d told people to expect it. Vince, my pilot and race partner, filled his Facebook feed with excellent, sweeping daily recaps: every event, every dinner, with great images. And they reached our crowd. I didn’t want to layer another narrative on top of it.

Charlie A. Foxtrot on the Ceduna, SA ramp — Team 35’s Piper Cherokee, VH‑CAF, carried us across 10,906 kilometres of skies in the 2025 Outback Air Race and transits, every flight a new brushstroke in the palette of people, planes and plains.

So, I pivoted. Short-form video became my medium of choice. With an iPhone in my pocket, an Insta360 at hand, I found myself shooting single “arty” images, short-form video on the tarmac, or underwater snippets that could be cut together into an AI-powered highlight reel in minutes—sometimes pieced together on a bus ride back to our Broome accommodation. I clicked publish and felt relief. It wasn’t the blogging I’d promised, but I felt it kept our audience engaged—and it freed me to live the race as much as record it.

Flying the Race

The OAR isn’t a race in the classic sense. It’s a time trial scored on seconds, gates, and precision. But that’s just the numbers. What it felt like was endurance—of trust, skill, and patience.

For me, flying has never been about blind trust. Not in myself, my crewmates, not even in my systems. Thirty-plus years of Air Force flying conditioned me otherwise. Especially in the F‑111 at night, flying 10 miles a minute only 250 feet above the ground. In OAR25, with 37 aircraft converging on the same invisible gates, that instinct counted for more than points.

Vince and I adapted. We navigated visually, old‑school, and usually hit our marks within a handful of seconds. It undoubtedly cost us points in the race’s scoring system, but our discipline was safe separation.

The most powerful moment wasn’t ours though. On the last leg from Exmouth to Carnarvon, one aircraft had a mechanical issue just after departure over forbidding country. A second race aircraft picked up the emergency radio calls and shadowed them the entire leg, ready to help if the problem worsened. When both planes landed safely, their pilots met on the tarmac in a massive embrace. Shared adversity, quiet thanks. No cameras. Just a palette of human colour richer than any landscape.

The Cause Beyond the Race

Team 35’s Piper Cherokee, VH‑CAF, on the apron outside the Alice Springs, NT, Royal Flying Doctor Service hangar. A reminder that while we were racing gates in the sky, the real mission of the Outback Air Race was to keep the RFDS flying.

Amid the flying, the fundraising heartbeat of the Outback Air Race kept running. At its core, this event raises vital support for the Royal Flying Doctor Service, and it was humbling to be part of that mission. Vince’s tireless work in the months before OAR25 paid dividends—our team finished 4th in fundraising. That result was only possible thanks to the extraordinary generosity of our supporters, friends, and families who dug deep for a cause that serves all Australians, and to our sponsors who not only backed us financially but enabled us to complete the race itself. Their contributions reminded us that while we were chasing gates in the sky, the real race was always about keeping the RFDS in the air.

People & Plains

At Yulara, night one, Vince and I discovered we’d be sharing a room—a theme that sometimes repeated through the race. Not planned, but it forced us to understand each other quickly. Likes, dislikes, humour, stress points. Bonding.

The same could be said for our relationships with the other crews. Early impressions grew, over thousands of miles, into (likely/hopefully) life-long friendships. Shaped by shared interests, and by overcoming shared challenges.

Australia’s plains weren’t the only landscape shifting each day. People did too.

Content & Creation

I came into OAR25 with ambition: to fly and to document. The lesson hit hard. I couldn’t chase both the quality of storytelling I planned, as well as simultaneously execute the standard of airmanship I expected of myself in this race. Not in the way I wanted.

So I learned to let go. My mirrorless camera was a handful in turbulence. Drone shots were mostly ruled out by flying ops and national park restrictions. But AI‑edited reels on a phone? They worked. Efficiency isn’t laziness—it’s realism when choices mattered.

Short-form video reel created at Ningaloo Reef during the Outback Air Race 2025, capturing the adventure and colourful spectrum beyond the cockpit.

And the broader truth? Better to post something real and alive in the OAR25 situation than to sink under the weight of “perfect.” Curated beats prolific. Clarity beats ambition.

I still have a lot of content. My task now is to practice different ways of delivering it to those that want to see it.

The Unfinished Question

Would I do it again? I don’t know.

If I did, I’d need to decide up front which lane I’m in: either as a co‑pilot/navigator wholly committed to the time trial, or as a storyteller wholly committed to documenting it to the standard I want. In OAR25, I chose flying. And while I loved that role, I felt it came at the expense of some unique imagery. From the air, we all see roughly the same horizon. The trick is in perspective—something I partly surrendered by mixing roles.

But maybe that’s the point.

OAR25 wasn’t just a test of gates and seconds. It was a spectrum—of people, of places, of pressures. A palette unexpected. And I’m still mixing the colours in my mind.

I thank Vince for opportunity to participate as part of Team 35 Charlie A. Foxtrot. I had a blast. I loved getting to go flying again, and I loved practising my photography in a different, target-rich environment. I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.

In the coming weeks I’ll share some of that content — highlights, short reels, and photographs — as I explore different ways of bringing the palette of OAR25 to life beyond the cockpit. Stay tuned.