JERSEY SHORE, Pennsylvania USA — Michala Alexander's new hobby is really taking off - literally.

She and her father, Scott Alexander, competed in their first national rocketry competition - actually, their first rocketry competition ever - a few weeks ago. It was the 50th National Association of Rocketry Annual Meet (NARAM 50) in The Plains, Va., about 15 minutes outside of Manassas, Va.

SLIDESHOW: Michala Alexander wears her first-place medal at the National Association of Rocketry’s annual meet held recently. Her father, Scott Alexander also competed at the national level.

Michala may not have known the ins and outs of rocketry competition when she arrived at the meet July 26, but she had clearly proven herself a fast learner by the meet's end on Aug. 1.

In her very first event, Set Duration, Michala tied another young lady for first place in the A division, which is for 7- to 13-year-olds. The goal for participants in the event was to launch their rockets and keep them airborne for as close to 50 seconds as possible. Her rocket stayed up for 48 seconds, giving her only a 4 percent margin of error.

"It felt awesome [to tie for first place]," Michala said. "The girl I tied with, her family's been doing this for a long time, so it was kind-of cool that I did so well."

She earned her second medal later in the seven-day event, when she took fourth place in her division in the D Egg Lofting Altitude contest. After reaching an altitude of 355 meters, her rocket came back down with the egg inside it still intact, meeting all the requirements for the contest.

Michala even placed well in events in which she didn't earn medals. She took fifth place in the D Boost Glider Duration event, launching her glider, by means of her rocket, on a 148-second flight followed by a disqualification in the second round; sixth place in the C Payload Altitude contest, flying her rocket to 298 meters; and seventh place in the B Streamer Duration Multi-Round, flying her rocket for 102 seconds and 92 seconds in the first and second round, but being disqualified for lack of safety in the third round.

Michala went home with more than just two medals, though. Trip Barber, president of National Association of Rocketry (NAR), signed her glider.

Michala's father didn't do quite as well, though he was still pleased with his results. Scott placed 45th overall out of more than 150 adults age 20 and over who competed at the event. After a few disqualifications thanks to technical difficulties, he placed 18th in his division in the Set Duration event and took 23rd place in the C Payload Altitude event.

Regardless of results, both felt they had achieved their goals for the event- to spend quality time together as a family, with Michala's mother, Michele, and younger sister, Sarah, serving as cheerleaders and pit crew to assist in rocket repairs.

"My dad wanted to do this (go to the meet). He thought it'd be cool to do it together and help each other with our rockets," said Michala.

Already they have plans to attend next year's NAR annual national meet, to be hosted in Johnstown. But first, they'll compete in regional and open events to begin earning points well before the national meet. In fact, they may compete as soon as this month, in a meet scheduled for Aug. 30 that would kick off the 2008-09 competitive year.

Scott and Michala may only be beginning their competitive rocketry careers, but the hobby has been a part of their lives for years. Scott's interest in rocketry took off when he received an aerospace science kit, that contained a rocket, when he was about 10 years old. He built four rockets, which he used until he graduated from high school. Three of them survive, and one has seen more than 100 flights, Scott said proudly.

His hobby was pushed to a back burner when he went to college - "You can't really keep big rockets in a tiny dorm room," he said. There it stayed until about five years ago, when Michele began teaching fifth grade at Lock Haven Catholic School and inherited a curriculum that included an astronomy unit at the end of the year.

Michele invited Scott in to teach her students how to build a simple rocket and help them launch their creations. They hosted their fifth annual launch this spring.

When Scott rediscovered his hobby so he could help his wife's class, he rekindled his desire to build rockets in his spare time. And that's how Michala came to be involved.

"When I was working on my rockets in the basement, the kids would tag along. We tend to do things as a family. So I started showing them how to build rockets and teaching them the science behind rockets," said Scott.

Understanding those concepts are key to succeeding in the world of competitive rocketry, as Scott and Michala found out earlier this summer. Michala built her award-winning rockets through trial and error, testing one combination of parts after another until she found the mix that was just right. For streamers for her rocket in the B Streamer Duration Multi-Round event, she used "mylar banners from CVS that said Happy Birthday and Congratulations on them."

"What's nice is that beyond slowing [the rocket] down just enough, mylar reflects and so it helps the trackers see where the rocket is going as it comes down," she said.

Michala and Scott patched up any snags they ran into at the event with some friendly advice from fellow rocket fliers. Scott said it's common for fliers to help each other, despite the competitive atmosphere. After Scott's two botched attempts in the D Boost Glider Duration event, some of the trackers shared a tip involving orange straws, provided at the event. That tip came just in time to help Michala in that event.

"It was a learning experience for us," Michala said. "When my glider snagged the wires on my motor, we learned that we could put the wires and electrical clips through these orange straws they had there. I guess they always have these straws at events and now we know why."

Beyond doing frequent repairs and continually trying new combinations and materials, rocket flyers must also be able to use basic trigonometry to calculate how high and how fast their rocket went - a skill that would make most kids going into the sixth grade pale with apprehension.

Not Michala.

"It's pretty easy once you get the hang of it," she said.

The truly "easy" math in model rocketry is the cost. Kits are quite inexpensive and supplies to "scratch-build" rockets can be about the same. Even hard-core rocket flyers tend to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars only when using incredibly advanced materials or complex designs.

Michala's first-place-winning rocket was built from an Estes StarDart kit that cost $9. Her egglofting rocket was handmade at a cost of $7 for the capsule that held the egg and about $2 for the rest of the materials. She spent only $7 on materials to build her glider for the D Boost Glider Duration event. She did spend four days sanding it, though.

"We like to do most of our rockets from kits, but for this event we decided to scratch-build ours so we could possibly get better performance out of them," said Michala.

Despite the craftsmanship involved in sport rocketry, it's extremely safe. NAR enforces a "safety first" policy in all its events and has never had a major accident, Scott said.

Michala experienced this firsthand when her rocket was disqualified in the third round of the B Streamer Duration Multi-Round event because it failed to meet safety standards. Some of the glue holding pieces of the rocket together had melted, the fins were too hot and the rocket, as a whole, was unstable, so she couldn't complete the last stage of that event.

"The number one injury in rocketry is slips, trips and falls," Scott said jokingly. "It makes for a safe yet enjoyable family activity."

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