Canadian Pete McLeod heads into Poland sitting 4th in points in the Red Bull Air Race Series. (Photo-Balasz Gardi/Red Bull Content Pool)
When the Red Bull Air Race Gdynia concludes this July, the season will be at its halfway point. If ever there was a time to get serious, this is it. With no clear favorite for the season title, the pilots are aware that a perfect performance in Poland could shake up the standings – or solidify a lead.
Gdynia, Poland - After May's blistering battle in Malaysia, Red Bull Air Race pilots are setting their compasses due north to bring the high-speed, low-altitude thrills of the world's fastest motorsport series to Poland for the very first time. The competition will be held in Gdynia, one of the biggest cities located in the north of Poland with beautiful beaches and vast cultural infrastructures.
The aerial racing action will take place along the Gdynia sea coast on the South of Baltic on July 26 and 27 is shaping up to be a nail-biter, with no fewer than five pilots in double digits in the points standings as the season nears its halfway mark.
A win in Putrajaya by Britain's Nigel Lamb was a shakeup after the season-opening events in Abu Dhabi and Croatia where fellow Brit Paul Bonhomme and Austria's Hannes Arch had been locked in a back-and-forth tussle for first place.
Arch – who in 2008 became the first European to claim the world title – has been the most consistent this year and remains first in the standings with 30 points as the championship moves to Gdynia. But Bonhomme, the defending world champion, is a mere 5 points behind in second. Lamb and young Canadian charger Pete McLeod each have 17 points, while another young gun, Matt Hall of Australia, has logged 14. And the seven other elite pilots rounding out the lineup are no less determined to dazzle the crowds on Seaside Boulevard with scintillating runs to put them back in the championship hunt.
Meanwhile Poland's own Luke Czepiela, a prize-winning aerobatic pilot, will be looking to move up in the Challenger Cup standings. The 31-year-old from the city of Poznań is currently ranked eighth in the Challenger Cup, a new facet of the Red Bull Air Race that gives up-and-coming pilots a chance to develop their low-altitude flying skills under race conditions.
Gdynia is the northernmost stop of the season, and its famously pleasant summer climate will be a relief to the pilots, who endured temperatures as high as 45 degrees in their cockpits in Putrajaya, Malaysia. Temperate conditions will also enable their planes to achieve top performance, though any Baltic winds could be a significant factor: even the slightest deviation from a perfect line can cost fractions of a second that mean the difference between first and also-ran.
The 2014 Red Bull Air Race World Championship makes eight stops in seven countries. Top pilots race against the clock as they navigate their planes through inflated pylons ("Air Gates") that create a challenging low-altitude slalom course. In the fight to earn points toward the season championship, the pilots reach top speeds of up to 370 kilometers per hour and endure forces of up to 10 Gs.
World Championship Standings: 1. Hannes Arch (AUT) 30 points; 2. Paul Bonhomme (GBR) 25; 3. Nigel Lamb (GBR) 17; 4. Pete McLeod (CAN) 17; 5. Matt Hall (AUS) 14; 6. Martin Sonka (CZE) 8; 7. Yoshihide Muroya (JPN) 7; 8. Nicolas Ivanoff (FRA) 5; 9. Matthias Dolderer (GER) 4; 10. Peter Besenyei (HUN) 2; 11. Kirby Chambliss (USA) 0; 12. Michael Goulian (USA) 0.