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ROCKET MEN

The Rocket Racing League® announces the formation of its first team

The Rocket Racing League® is a cutting-edge challenge for heroes and visionaries, so it seems only appropriate that the men forming the first RRL team - Leading Edge Rocket Racing™ - are both.

Don A. "Dagger" Grantham, Jr. and Robert "Bobaloo" Rickard are both F-16 pilots as well as successful business entrepreneurs and will take possession of their first rocket powered Mark-1 X-Racer™ later this year.

"We are honored and delighted to have been selected by the Rocket Racing League® as its first team. The prospect of competing against our peers under rocket power through a virtual track in the sky is thrilling," said Rickard, Chief Executive Officer of Leading Edge. "The unlimited potential of rocket power and a 20-foot trailing flame will redefine the concept of air racing."

Rickard and Grantham, longtime friends and fellow pilots, have a shared history of flying the F-16 Fighting Falcon and diverse backgrounds in business, consulting and engineering.

Rickard holds a degree in electrical engineering and served in the active duty Air Force for more than 13 years piloting the F-16. He has amassed 2,450 total flight hours and was awarded "Instructor Pilot of the Year" for two separate Fighter Wings while on active duty.

Rickard is also a graduate of the US Air Force Fighter Weapons School, the most challenging and prestigious doctorate-level flying course in the world. He leads the Rickard Consulting Group, Inc., which provides technical expertise on a wide range of tactical flying programs in the public and private sectors.

Grantham is a graduate of the United States Air Force Academy and served as an Air Force F-16 Instructor/Evaluator Pilot as well as an Advance Agent for Air Force One. With more than 16 years of flying, Grantham has accumulated 2,000 total flying hours and has received a variety of awards at every phase of his professional flying career from wingman to flight instructor/evaluator pilot.

In 2002, Grantham became one of only three officers in the history of the Air Force One Advance Agent program to be decorated for service above and beyond the call of duty. Currently, Grantham is co-owner and founder of five companies involved in a variety of enterprises including development of multi-use helmet technology. He is also the General Manager of a large Phoenix-based manufacturing company which he has led through two years of unprecedented growth.

The duo has been flying and working together for years, and have recently pooled their expertise to form several companies that capitalize on their experience. Grantham is the "idea guy visionary," while Rickard is the "practical technical" one. This combination fosters their ability to develop the ideas into successful endeavors. It's a working relationship amplified by the fact that both share that fighter pilot military mentality that things get done right no matter what, and that extra effort is standard procedure.

"I saw the news about the formation of the Rocket Racing League® on CNN.com and heard the sound of opportunity knocking," says Grantham. "It's easy enough to look down the road ten years or so and see the military going almost entirely to unmanned aircraft, and we see the Rocket Racing League® as a way to capture that talent as it leaves the military and give them something to do besides becoming airline pilots."

Within minutes of viewing RRL's website and discussing the possibilities, Grantham and Rickard immediately sent the RRL a two-line e-mail stating their credentials and interest. COO Tim Gormley responded quickly, scheduled a meeting that included CEO Granger Whitelaw, and within a few weeks, the RRL's first team was approved.

"These guys are the real deal, Air Force Top Gun and successful entrepreneurs," says RRL CEO Granger Whitelaw. "Both are unbelievably qualified and it's a pleasure to launch the first team with them at the controls. They're the perfect combination of talent and credibility for this league right now."

Grantham and Rickard decided on the team's name, Leading Edge Rocket Racing, and the team motto, "Maximum. Kinetic. Potential™." A marketing and branding firm in Texas, RM Communications Group, Inc (www.rmcginc.com), was hired to begin organizing the commercial side of the team, a web site was created (www.leadingedgerocketracing.com) and a merchandising program implemented to begin selling team t-shirts, hats, pins, etc.

The nucleus of Leading Edge Rocket Racing™ will be a small, but extraordinarily qualified group of staff and ground crew, initially about eight and expanding to fifteen over the next couple of years. Almost as important as the pilots themselves will be the ground experts in servicing the X-Racer during pit stops who will also be charged with developing new technologies and procedures to speed up the 'pit stop' process during competition.

And, since Grantham and Rickard are planning to focus on the organizational side of Leading Edge and development of the Rocket Racing League® rather than step into the cockpit themselves, one of the immediate tasks is to pick one or two pilots to man the controls of the team's X-Racer.

"We already have the advantage of a three to four month lead on any other team, and Dagger and I are going to focus on creating as professional a championship team as possible. We will select two pilots, one primary and one backup, who will focus totally on the flying," says Rickard. "To make a winning team, we need three key areas of expertise. We will take traditional motor sports racing expertise, combine it with professional air show methodology, and enhance it. We feel it will take three things to turn Leading Edge into a winning team; the technical and tactical experience we bring from military aviation, and the active involvement of top experts from the auto racing and air show industries."

And it appears that Leading Edge will not have a problem finding willing participants. According to Rickard, "Every top expert we talk to about the RRL and the Leading Edge Rocket Racing™ team is eager to get involved."

Over and above the immediate challenge of putting together a world-class team to compete in the Rocket Racing League®'s first season, the Leading Edge duo is intrigued by both the long-term potential of the technology being developed for the Rocket Racing League®, and the groundswell of interest and activity in developing private and commercial space flight.

"We're both a bit amazed to find ourselves standing at the base of a brand-new mountain with all the tools needed to get to the top," says Grantham. "The work that the RRL, Leading Edge and the other teams soon to come will be doing over the next couple of years will drive the development of new technology and help spur the creation of the next generation of spacecraft ships. It will intrigue the public, invigorate industry and usher in a new era of opportunity, adventure and exploration."