It's All Arch In Budapest

Hungary seems to be the land of first wins in motorsports. Jenson Button won for the first time in 2006 in Hungary while Heikki Kovalainen took his first ever win almost three weeks ago. That was Formula 1, but in the Red Bull Air Race, Hannes Arch took his first ever win in the premier series of air racing, and is tied for first in the overall standings.

Paul Bonhomme and Kirby Chambliss must be nervous now. There is a relatively young fellow who has just overtaken the American and is neck-and-neck with the Englishman.

At the beginning of this season, Hannes came second to Paul Bonhomme, and I was one to believe that this was just a one-off podium appearance and points haul. He had accrued nine seconds in penalties in the first place run of that first race and the fact that he made it through, at least in my opinion, was just of luck.

His rookie errors were still present in the first race, but as the season wore on, he was becoming more and more of a surprise.

He had taken out his former mentor and 2007 Red Bull Air Race World Champion Mike Mangold, he was regularly giving Kirby Chambliss a run for his money, but it was Paul Bonhomme that Hannes Arch was always playing catch up with.

But, yesterday, on a sunny day in Budapest, it all went right for Arch. He was not the fastest in practice neither was he the fastest in qualifying on Tuesday, but he was waiting in the wings to pounce!

His cause was helped out more with Kirby Chambliss being relegated to the Point One round after accruing two 3-second penalties and thus eliminating him from contention. Chambliss could not pick up any points from this race.

The man who would pick up one point from the bottom four was Sergei Rakhmanin, who is steadily improving his flying, albeit, a heck of a lot slower.

In the Super Eights, Paul Bonhomme was fastest with Arch nipping at his heels. Mike Mangold and Steve Jones took third and fourth, respectively. Peter Besenyei came fifth, with Nigel Lamb, Alejandro Maclean and Michael Goulian rounding out the top eight. It would come down to the top four to thrash it out for position.

In the semis, it was Bonhomme vs. Jones and Arch vs. Mangold. Paul Bonhomme picked up a 3-second penalty for incorrect knife-flying, which meant that Steve Jones waltzed into the finals for the first time this season. Both Mike Mangold and Hannes Arch flew clean runs, but it was the Austrian who was nearly four seconds faster than the American.

In the third place flyoff, which takes place between the losers of the semis, Paul Bonhomme was able to save face by winning against Mike Mangold by over a second.

The finals had Arch against Jones and it was Hannes Arch who took his first ever win by over 2.6 seconds against Steve Jones.

"It is just so overwhelming" said Arch, "I couldn't believe it. You had to stay focused until the very end and now I am just really happy."

With this win, Arch is level with Bonhomme at 45 points apiece while Chambliss languishes nine points behind in third with Mike Mangold on the same level.

At the track where the Red Bull Air Race has been held every year, there has been plenty of surprises.

Stay tuned in two weeks for the next Red Bull Air Race at Porto.

As well, if you want to watch the Red Bull Air Race online, download Joost. It is an online Video-on-Demand service and there is a dedicated channel just to the Red Bull Air Race, so check it out.

Photography Credit: Joerg Mitter, 2008