While most high school students were still asleep or getting ready for their day, Tristan Lorentz was already soaring into his senior year, literally.

At exactly 7:00 a.m. on a clear Florida morning, the Mount Dora High School senior completed his first solo flight, marking a major milestone on his path toward earning a private pilot’s license. A crowd of family, friends, and supporters gathered at the airport to witness the achievement, their eyes fixed on the sky as Tristan took off and performed multiple takeoffs, landings, and flight patterns, all on his own.

Tristan, an honor student with a 4.58 GPA, has been steadily working toward his dream of becoming a pilot. He was recently awarded a $12,000 scholarship from the Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) Chapter 1632, based out of

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