Red Bull Air Races kick off April 17-18, 2009 in Abu Dhabi (UAE)
Nigel Lamb tearing up the race course
I'm always looking for cool new aviation people to follow on twitter, and I found @RedBullAirRace the other night and followed right away. By the next morning they were following me back, as well as one of the race pilots NigelLamb! Nifty cool stuff : )
Right now is a great time to get 'Red Bullish' on the future cuz the start of the race season is just a few weeks away with the April 17-18 kick-off in the UAE at Abu Dhabi. The 2009 season includes more pilots than ever (15) and some rule changes that increase the competition. It looks like it's shaping up to simply blow away any other motorsport for a wild combo of extreme speed, skill, and excitement!
All this is causing me to build up some serious internal pressure at the thought that I might be able to be on-site in Windsor, Ontario (Canada), just across the river from Detroit on June 13-14 for race #3. To see it in person would have to be off-the-scale awesomeness.
If you haven't seen just what these races look like, watch the video above to get a feel for the 230mph 9g ride that these races are all about. The high speed and intense g loads make the precision of navigating the air inflated gates a very serious task.
It's this combo that would seem to make this the most demanding of all motosports. And it kinda makes for some fabulous spectating too! You can also get a great view of what the races look like from the pilot's point of view by going to the Red Bull Copilot website - it's truly awesome.
So, I suggest you get yourself up to speed right now by checking out the primary Red Bull Air Race website for all the details. You'll also find some great info at the race pages at Red Bull USA. Lastly, check out Nigel Lamb's blog to get a little behind the scenes view of the life of a Red Bull Racer getting ready to tackle the new season. And, you can expect a lot more coverage from me as AirPigz is very Red Bullish!
Thursday, June 4, 2009 at 08:57AM 