(Photo by Daniel Grund/GlobalNewsroom/Getty Images)
Three races down, three to go, and three different winners so far—Hannes Arch, Nicolas Ivanoff and Paul Bonhomme! The championship is as wide open as it was at the beginning of the season.
As well, seven different pilots have challenged for the win this season—Hannes Arch, Paul Bonhomme, Peter Besenyei, Kirby Chambliss, Nicolas Ivanoff, Nigel Lamb and Mike Mangold.
Abu Dhabi
The season opener of the Red Bull Air Race started off in Abu Dhabi, and the biggest news came before the race when it was announced that the Emirate will get the privilege of hosting the opening round of the world championship until 2011.
To add to that, 2008 world series champion Hannes Arch received sponsorship from the Abu Dhabi Tourism Authority. He is now carrying "Abu Dhabi" on his wings, his flight suit, and in his hangar. He has become known as "Air Abu Dhabi!"
The race itself was a spectacle to watch. With a newly designed track, second place man Paul Bonhomme commented that it was very well-designed track compared to the previous year's track since different lines and angles could be taken, whereas last year it was a waiting game of getting through the gates.
Hannes Arch was the winner of that race with Bonhomme and Ivanoff right behind him. Nigel Lamb was the unlucky fourth, but his MXS keeps improving by the day. To add to that, Arch also won the qualifying round and took one crucial championship point as well as setting the fastest time thus making an air racing hat trick for the Austrian.
Abu Dhabi also was the debut ground for four new pilots to the series: Matthias Dolderer of Germany, Matt Hall of Australia, Pete McLeod of Canada and Yoshi Muroya of Japan.
Hall was the most profitable rookie in this round with him taking fifth place and just a hair out of the final four. Dolderer was the second-most profitable rookie in the Emirates with an 11th place finish and one point to his name in his first race.
The unluckiest pilots in Abu Dhabi was a tie with Michael Goulian and Pete McLeod.
Goulian, the amicable Bostonian, did not have an antenna properly connected, which would broadcast all sorts of information to the race stewards in the tower as a way to ensure that he flies properly. His time was upheld, but he wasn't allowed to compete in the second round of qualifying. With the race, he was too slow and didn't make it past the Wild Card.
McLeod on the other hand put two clean albeit slow times during qualifying but when it came to the race, the Canadian hit a pylon and had to perform an SCO (Safety Climb Out) because of some fabric stuck to the wings of his Edge 540 aircraft. He came in last place.
San Diego
The Red Bull Air Race moved to San Diego and home race for the three American pilots—Mike Mangold, Kirby Chambliss and Michael Goulian.
Goulian just wasn't able to capitalize and ended up out of the points while Matt Hall put in a second fifth place finish in a row.
Hannes Arch was able to win the qualifying again, but came short in the Final Four round after hitting a bird. His aircraft survived, but there was plenty of organic matter on the aircraft and the tailplane was pretty damaged. Arch came third in the second round of the race but had an extra point added because of his winning the qualifying round.
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