"Here, hold this bucket," the young pilot says with a mischievous gleam in his eye as you settle into the passenger seat, "just in case you, ya know, puke." This is how Trent Smith, Oklahoma's all-world tight end and the favorite to win this year's Mackey Award, welcomes you aboard his family's single-engine, four-seat plane, a 1957 Beechcraft Bonanza. It's also how Smith unwinds from the hectic pace of being a college football player.

Smith has already drained a vial from the fuel tank to make sure there's no water inside, tested the V-tail to make sure it's on tight and checked just to make sure no birds have decided to nest inside the nose of the plane.

	Oklahoma's Trent Smith is arguably the best tight end in the country.

Before he barks out the words "Clear Prop!" in case any poor sap happens to have unsuspectingly walked in front of the plane, Smith triple-checks to make sure all his circuit breakers and fuses are in proper alignment, his engine gauges are moving and that he's switched over to his fullest fuel tank. Smith plugs in your headset so you can hear the control tower and each other. It gets really loud in the air, and pretty friggin' hot once the door seals shut.

"So you ready?" he asks.

Um, yeah. (You're lying, but you figure Trent has already shown you pictures of his girlfriend, a stunning blonde who was Ms. Oklahoma and finished 6th in Ms. USA. He's also really jacked about the new twists new Sooner offensive coach Kevin Wilson brought with him from Northwestern to spice up the OU attack. Nah, you think, Trent won't be reckless up here.) And then he closes his eyes for a split-second and crosses himself.

Smith has to consider a lot more in here than what goes through his head after breaking the huddle. Still, as Smith, pulls the plane's yoke towards him on liftoff as he speeds down the runway of Oklahoma's Westheimer Airport, he explains that there's no better escape from the grind of being a college student-athlete. The 22-year-old is in total control up here. Every little movement or tweak is magnified 10 times of what it feels like on a big commercial plane, but once you settle in at 3,000 feet, nestled nicely on top of the clouds, you feel like you're floating.

It's up here, a half-mile above where the Sooners play their home games that Smith explains how flying is in his blood. He first took the controls of his daddy's plane at 8. Darrell Smith, a former lineman with the semipro Oklahoma City Wranglers, was in the oil business and had bought a plane to help with his company. Trent's grandfather died when his own plane crashed when Darrell was 14. Trent's mother, grandfather and even her great-grandfather also were pilots.

An Aviation Management major (OU is one of the few universities with such a major), Smith had flown about 35 hours before getting his pilot's license two years ago. (He now has flown 220 hours). He even flew himself and roommate Nate Hybl, Oklahoma's QB, to spring break in Colorado last March. In the offseason, he gets to fly 10-15 hours a week. He can even fly himself home in 30 minutes to have lunch with his folks at their place in Clinton, Okla. (It'd take an hour and fifteen minutes driving). In season, Smith is lucky if he can get in the air once a week.

As you start to descend, Smith points to a sticker he has near the yoke. It reads GUMP DAMMIT. "Gump" is the pilot's acronym about the procedure for getting your landing gear ready. "Pilots love their acronyms," Smith says. Dammit is his own spin on things if he doesn't remember the gump part. Or if you get sick and can't find that bucket.

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