The Jerris Air Races takes place during the Bloodpeace Festival, yearly custom that has become an annual tradition. It commemorates when the Theran city of Skypoint and Vivane and the Barsaive city of Jerris formed a reluctant bloodpeace as a show of good faith to promote commerce in the region. Under the Bloodpeace, neither side can send airships to attack across the mountain range between the two. This pact is magically enforced by a stormy barrier that appears to buffet the offending ships, often leaving them crippled and in no condition to fight.
The Races themselves take place throughout the Wastes. The racing vehicles are small drakkars specifically modified and designed for the race format. They are among the lightest class of drakkars, swift and maneuverable, with a higher crew complement than a typical merchant drakkar. Weapons on the racing drakkars are carried sparingly; while there are many dangers even for airships in the Wastes, the added weight often gives a disadvantage. However, racers have been known to participate in minor skirmishes with each other. This behavior often produces deadly rivalries between racing crews, resulting in criminal acts just short of murder and sabotage. Reputation does provide some amount of protection, as any racing team caught sabotaging other drakkars will undoubtedly face angry retaliation for their misconduct from all of the other teams.
As a merchant sport, each airship participating in the race must carry a heavy cargo, which takes the form of an orichalcum box containing True Earth, enchanted to the appropriate weight class for the event. While the Orichalcum Box is a tempting target for thieves and smugglers, it typically is a minor pattern item of one of the Jerris guilds, and thus would be easy to track and retrieve should it be stolen. This load is warded against tampering (preventing magical interference) and checked at each of the 4 waypoints, each approximately a day's journey from the previous waypoint. At the waypoints, the racers rest, recuperate, and prepare for the next day's flight. The racers are given an appropriate handicapped starting time based on their previous day's performance.