MURFREESBORO, Tenn. (WTVF) — Most of us managed to get into a little trouble in school. What if you could tell your teacher now some of those stunts you pulled honestly did pay off one day? We take you to a competition some of us have unwittingly trained for all our lives.
"I didn't realize that paper airplanes were such a big competition," laughed MTSU student Joel Irwin from a hangar at the Murfreesboro Municipal Airport. "I was, like, heck, I'm in, ya know?
The Red Bull Paper Wings Qualifier is a competition testing the distance and air time of paper airplanes. All the MTSU students on Thursday had a strategy.
"I want to make it narrow as possible, that way it can cut through the air," Joel said.
"Aerodynamics. I need a tiny little lift here in the back," added Nate Tiuseco, showing his plane.
"I just folded it in half a bunch of times." laughed another MTSU student.
So, was everyone feeling pretty confident?
"Absolutely not, but I'm happy!" said one student.
"Not super confident, but I've definitely got enough to get the extra credit points for Dr. G's class," smiled Alyssa Smith.
She walked up to throw a paper plane she'd given a name.
"Number seven, cause that's how many I've made at this point," she laughed.
"If I can be shown how it's done, I can do my best to replicate it," said Jonas Sich.
He'd run into unexpected issues. His how-to-make-paper-planes video stopped loading.
"You caught me at the worst time!" he said.
"I was hoping for a couple hundred feet, but I'll settle for 24 feet," Jonas added after his throw.
"My design went 51.9 feet," Nate said after throwing his plane out of the hanger.
The MTSU student who wins the qualifier goes on to compete against others across the county in a regional competition in Huntsville. A global competition follows that in Austria. For many at the qualifier, this was all just all too good to miss. Jonas summed it up.
"I got to make a plane, and I got to throw it and drink Red Bull in the process!" he said.
