I shoot Canon gear, so the Nikon lenses are unknown to me. I do know that a f2.8 zoom is fast, and in most brands is in either the professional or advanced consumer lens line-up.
Using a fast lens will allow the use of faster film speed, and/or faster shutter speeds which means less chance of blurry images due to camera shake. Like any hobby, speed costs money. I doubt you will be disappointed in the faster lens though.
You may know this already, but the sharpest images are taken with slide film. I like the Fuji Velvia 50, Sensia 100, Provia F 100, and shoot good ole' Kodachrome 64 when I can find it. In my opinion, the Fuji film produces more saturated colors than Kodachrome. Until the last year or so, all the images in Sport Aviation where shot on slide film. Now, most images are with the very high-dollar ($6K w/o a lens) professional digital cameras.
In the EAA video on photography, if I recall correctly the 80-200 range zoom is what they suggest for air-to-air work; for ground-to-air a 300mm; and ground-to-ground is in the 24 to 80mm range.
