It's All About Speed
Top NASCAR team owner Jack Roush uses a Beech Premier to keep his far-flung operations moving fast.
By J. Mac McClellan
Photographed by Jim Drury
July 2009
The Beech Premier IA is the fastest business jet that you can fly by yourself so it's no surprise that Jack Roush, who owns five Sprint Cup NASCAR race teams, owns a Premier to fly to and from his many business locations, and to race tracks spread across the country.
Roush is like most pilots in that he had always wanted to learn how to fly. He was born with the natural curiosity about all things mechanical that is also common to most pilots. But he was born with uncommonly good mechanical talents that led him first into building and racing cars.
Drag racing was Jack's first passion and from 1966 to 1979 he raced and won on the national Pro Stock circuit. Though he was apparently a talented driver, it was his ability to improve on existing engines and cars that made him a success in business. Soon he was so busy building engines and cars for others there was little time left for driving.
The next racing venue he conquered was road racing, winning the 10 out of 10 Daytona 24-hour endurance races that he entered with cars and engines that he created, or at least highly modified. Building engines that delivered maximum power, but had the durability to run to the finish, built his reputation and expanded his business.
By 1988 NASCAR was starting to break out of its Southern homeland and become a national sport so it was natural that Roush would see an opportunity to grow with stock car racing. In 1988 he teamed up with the talented Mark Martin to race what was then the Winston Cup circuit, the top level of stock car racing. Roush and Martin didn't win a race that first year, but by the following year they were winning races.
With NASCAR expanding so fast it became clear that the only way Roush could get to each track for the race, plus spend time at Roush Industries that makes high-performance automotive components in Detroit and his NASCAR headquarters in Concord, North Carolina, was in his own airplane. His first was a Cessna 421 with a pilot he hired to fly it.
Roush and his pilot were flying the 421 about 400 hours a year, and Jack spent the time in the front seat gaining experience in all kinds of weather, but not logging any time as formal instruction. By 1993 he wanted to take command so he enrolled at a Florida flight school and quickly became a private pilot. In short order he added the instrument rating and commercial certificate and was on his way. He also earned an ATP certificate after logging the required hours.
It quickly became clear to Jack that a jet is what he needed for his frequent and varied-length trips. And he wanted to fly it himself so the Cessna CJ was the obvious choice in the 1990s. He flew his CJ for 3,500 hours, overhauling the Williams engines once, and flying them to overhaul a second time. He had excellent success with the CJ flying it 400 and more hours a year all over the country, but more speed was always high on his wish list.
Just over two years ago he took a demo flight in the Premier and was hooked by its Mach .80 maximum speed, which equals 459 knots true airspeed. Even when not flying at optimum altitudes the Premier trues 430 to 440 knots, giving it a big speed edge over the original CJ. The deal was done, and Jack bought a demonstrator that had around 100 hours in the logs. He has flown the Premier just short of 800 hours in two years and is in the cockpit several times a week.
Though he loves the jet to go places, Jack's passion -- and livelihood -- is linked to pistons, so how could he not be drawn to the most glamorous piston engine of them all, the Rolls-Royce Merlin.
Because the Merlin is so closely identified with the North American P-51 Mustang, Roush had to have one. And then more Mustangs. One was painted in the "Old Crow" colors of ace Budd Anderson and for several years Roush graciously welcomed Anderson to fly it at big events like Oshkosh.
Jack's most recent Mustang is a rare "B" model, the first in the P-51 series to be powered by the Packard-built Merlin engine. The airplane was in terrible condition and many fundamental airframe components had to be built new from scratch using North American's drawings for guidance. The finished airplane -- like all machines Roush drives or flies -- is perfect in every detail. The "B" model was also first to have drop tanks, and originals are hard to come by so Roush builds exact replicas in his composite shop.
The P-51 was one of a few warbirds to be certified by the FAA in the Limited category after the war. That means you can operate the Mustang much like any other airplane without the restrictions placed on the Experimental Exhibition category that covers most warbirds. Though nearly all Mustangs still flying are the "D" model with the familiar bubble canopy, Roush was able to convince the FAA that his "B" model belonged in the Limited category too.
As Roush became ever more involved with Mustangs it became obvious that there was no shop that was capable of overhaul and repair of the Merlin engines to his standards, or those of the FAA, so he created his own. Jack has a huge collection of original spare parts and engine cores and has received FAA approval to make a number of improved parts from scratch. For example, the people in the Roush Merlin shop have a new design for connecting rods -- one of the less robust components in the engine -- and are in the process of gaining FAA approval to manufacture the part. Roush has tackled even something as basic as sparkplugs for the Merlin. The original plugs are almost impossible to find, and don't work all that well in any case, so the Roush Merlin team identified a current production automotive-type plug, earned FAA approval, and have experienced good results and much reduced cost.
Discuss this article in our forums
| 
Copyright @ 2009 Bonnier Corp. All Rights Reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited.
