From an outsider's point of view, it might seem a little strange to see a few men sitting in a row outside wearing goggles.

"I got my groove so it's going all right," Drone pilot Abel Almaguer said.

They're drone pilots. While they seem stationary, if you look a few hundred feet in the air you'll see these tiny drones zipping around, reaching speeds of up to 50 miles per hour.

"You have to be a little bit of a nerd cause you have to know how to program it to fly smooth," Almaguer said.

Pilots, from across the country, gathered at the Marion Airport this weekend for the first ever Midwest Drone Battle. They're racing to see who's drone is the fastest or has the best air acrobatics.

But both pilots and organizers say there's a larger purpose to the competition.

"Drones are good. They aren't just out there spying or flying into buildings," Organizer Caleb Howard said.

Organizers say the competition served as learning experience.

They say they want more people to know the positives behind drones, like being used for search and rescue missions, or monitoring crops.

"A majority of people that fly they like to take pictures to get a different view, like a bird's eye perspective, then there's people like us, we just like to have fun," Almaguer said.

Drone experts say races like these could easily become the sport of the future.

"Seems like this generation is picking it up faster with the video games these days," Howard said.

They say people will immediately be hooked, they just have to be brave enough to try it first.