These guys are nuts. I would love to have a ride with one of these guys as they are pulling about 9Gs out there. It has been on FSN, and it is pretty cool to watch.

I've seen several of their races on Austrian TV

Red Bull is an Austrian Company, so once they started a game and the winner has got a flight to SF where they raced last year IIRC. Highlight was, that the winner got a ride in one of these Air Race Planes.
I tried to participate, but I was too large and too heavy for it

I'm sure this would have been one of the coolest things ever

I am watching the one in Switzerland right now, and those guys are flying... ummm well... you know what I mean One of the guys reached 9.9Gs on a turn. Most of which they are only 100ft off the ground.

Okay... A guy just did a turn at 10.9Gs. How are they not blacking out?

They are very fit, they are wearing pressure suits, they are acclimated to it, and they are not pulling that power for very long.

I love the idea of it, but I don't even like watching that. too much that can go wrong, and I have already seen one Pitts turn into a plow at a show.

I love airshows, but I am not a fan of air races.

Zach

At an airshow last month, down on the deck, glorious noise, but when he banked hard left......you suddenly drew your breath in. Good pilot, fun to watch, but when they do maneuvers this low, there is no margain.

Yeah, I caught a couple of races last week. WOW!!! They're doing some serious breathing to keep from blacking out at those G's.
No margin for error is right, it's not like you can bump a cone and keep going.

Three people died in three separate incidents this year at Reno, for exactly that reason. Something goes wrong and there's no margin for error. I just hope that this doesn't cause the media and ignorant public to get involved and try to shut it down or castrate it. I've seen it happen before. Someone dies and the media asks "should we really be doing this?" when it's not "WE" who are doing it in the first place. Then the public, who knew nothing of the sport or even of it's existence, demand change for the sake of not disturbing their perfect little aura. This usually catches the eye of some over-zealous public official who's looking for any pet issue he can find to win the public's hearts (and votes) with. Then the sanctioning body refuses to tell that public official to go F*CK himself, and a good sport gets ruined, because a few willing participants, who knew the risks going in, lost their lives. People die everyday. At least these guys lived before they died... if ya know what I mean.
Hijack over.
Mark D.
P.S. Yes, those guys are true athletes!

Well, they kind of can. The gates they fly throung are just made a light weight material that, if the wing of a plane flys through it, it will just rip.

One another note, I think the danger is the same as in all other racing. Sure if they crash they will most likely die, but isn't that always a fear when a car goes into a wall or takes flight? How about ralley cars that drive on the edge of cliffs?

i couldn't get beyond the 1 run, commercial, commercial, commercial...i used to love watching the old reno races where multiple war birds were on the course at the same time. those guys were gifted with HUGE brass ones.

k

I've always loved aerobatic flying - a friend of mine is a pilot and I've been lucky enough to get some fun rides. But THIS fuses it with racing - Love it!

I heard an interview with a pilot, and the talk is just like you hear in car racing... "Yeah, Joe has a little more power than me so the only thing I could do was try and take a more aggressive line through turn three..."

Here are a couple of videos:

San Diego Races (with aerobatic heli in beginning)

Hitting a Pylon (you can see how they just tear away like Jon said)

Dealing with G-Forces

Tons more at Youtube...

I went down to San Diego this Saturday to watch the race. Just like most racing it is a whole different world when you are so close to the action! Amazing!

Sadly, it was poorly organized. I hope it comes back next year but I doubt it.

Yes Reno would be a better arena but this had more incommon with F1 then AX.

My husband and I caught some of that on TV last night as well. We're looking into going to Reno for next year's show. My favorite part is when they're doing the slaloms. It's crazy the way they carve thru the pylons!

Jen

i could do with out the stupid hokey sound effects they had, the dive bomber howl and other engine sounds that would never come from those aircraft.

but i did enjoy the skill and action [next time i'll watch with the sound muted].

pix

more

very cool to watch!