Axel posted this after his first solo, on the 2nd of March 2006. He went through a lot of steps since then, but the first solo is memorable for each pilot, so I’m happy to re-publish it here. Vincent.

This morning around 7am I taxied out to runway 25L at Daytona Beach Intl. airport. The deal was, I would do three good landings with Troy (my instructor) in the plane, then he would jump out of the plane and I would do three more take-offs and landings by myself.

My first landing this morning was really good, but the next one was rather bad and made me pretty frustrated. I guess that put me in the right mood because then, for the first time ever, I was able to nail three good landings in a row and thereby complete my part of the deal. After that Troy was more than happy to do his part and let me drop him off at a nearby parking ramp from where he could watch me venture off on my own.

So, for the first time in my life I, Pilot in Command Axel Smidt (cool, huh?) taxied out to runway 25L all by myself, received my clearance for take-off, and a few seconds later I was airborne – for the first time all alone and only myself to rely on. That worked out surprisingly well and soon I was lined up on final approach doing one of my best landings ever. Happier than ever and with my confidence level rising rapidly, I taxied back to runway 25L and took off again. The next landing was even better than the first one…it was so soft I almost could not feel the plane touching down! I taxied back and took off one more time and was able to deliver one more really good landing. So I was done and had completed an indeed very successful first solo! I taxied over to the parking ramp and the very proud Pilot in Command (me) picked up instructor Troy who seemed almost as happy and proud as myself. (In case there is any doubt, that means he was extremely happy ).

While I was flying solo, Troy was put on the job of operating my digital camera. He captured my proudest moment ever on about 70 pictures which you can see in this gallery, so you can all see for yourselves how well I did.