Made slow progress as an airman (6)
I believe the answer is:
taxied
'made slow progress' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both to do with motion as well as being past participle verbs.
Perhaps you can see an association between them that I don't see?
'an airman' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite understand how this works, but
'an' could be 'i' (Roman numeral for one) and 'i' is found in the answer.
The remaining letters 'taxed' is a valid word which might be clued in a way I don't understand.
This may be the basis of clue (or it may be nonsense).
'as' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for taxied that I've seen before include "Travelled slowly, as a plane on the runway" , "Of aircraft, moved slowly on ground" , "prepared to take off" , "didn't use the bus!" , "Travelled slowly, as an aircraft on a runway" .)