Colorado Springs, CO - "I want to be the first man to walk on the surface of Mars", said 14-year-old Jacob Pfund, opening a recent presentation to the Colorado Springs City Council. Jacob was asking the council to allow model rocketry flights to continue with special permits during the summer fire ban. Jacob and other students from Cheyenne Mountain School District will participate again this year in the prestigious Team America Rocketry Challenge (TARC), the world's largest model rocket contest.

About 10,000 middle and high school students participated in last year's contest, which was sponsored by the Aerospace Industries Association and the National Association of Rocketry. The Defense Department and NASA are both government partners in this year's competition, the fifth year of the Team America Rocketry Challenge.

100 teams flew at last year's finals, and the Cheyenne Mountain team placed 48th. Lots of photos are available here, as well as a truly intense strap-on-your-subwoofers launch video. The team's final competition flight was an aberrant 50 feet too high, but the parachute ejected beautifully at apogee. The team had 3 test flights the previous day and if they'd been able to maintain consistency, would have scored in the top 20..

The teens learned a lot and are better prepared this year to place in the top ten; they won the Boeing Teamwork award at the national finals. They worked together and had tremendous fun doing it, which was obvious to the judges. The prep and setup was much more complex than average because of the tube launch system compared with the rods most teams used, and each team member worked efficiently and cheerfully to launch successfully.

This year's student team members include Jacob Pfund,Tanner Greimann, and Nathaniel Lane. Jacob said he was excited about the opportunity to participate in the contest and hopes his team will qualify to be among the top 100 teams that will travel to the National Finals event in The Plains, VA just outside of Washington, DC, in May, 2007.

The most difficult problem to overcome, he said, was achieving repeatable performance. The best part about this contest, said Tanner, is hands-on experience attempting to hit precision goals with real aerospace tools and materials. The team uses materials from local (Penrose) model rocket company Estes, and designs the rockets with software from local company Apogee.

The contest requires that students design, build and test a model rocket that can fly for as close to a 45 second total flight duration as possible while reaching an altitude of 850 feet. The rocket must also return one raw egg back to the ground unbroken.

Team supervisor Jeff Lane, of Colorado Springs Rocket Society (COSROCS) said, "The contest is an excellent opportunity for students to learn hands-on lessons in aerodynamics. Participants apply concepts like computing trajectory and eliminating drag to their models and see the results immediately... there's a deep satisfaction in knowing things you have learned are helping launch something into the sky; this brings these concepts home to the real world for the students.''

"The project had the team building rockets in a manner not too far off from professionals. The contest promotes teamwork, delegation of tasks and group decisions", Lane said.

The ambitious undertaking has costs, and the team is looking for sponsors to help defray the cost of supplies, practice launches, and, if chosen for the finals, hotel and travel costs to Washington, DC. Last year, the team was sponsored by Brandango.us, LegacyRoad.com, Wells Fargo,Lance P. Sijon Chapter of the Air Force Association,Colorado Aerospace Education Foundation, and others. The team has many expenses and would welcome new sponsors. Sponsors may land on national television and will certainly get some exposure locally.