Red Bull Air Race 2007 Perth

Yu-Jin and I attended the Red Bull Air Race held above, only just, the Swan River yesterday. It features daredevil pilots racing at up to 400 km/h only 15m above the water and carrying out loops, knife maneouvres and perhaps a few barrel rolls afterwards if you're lucky.

We had a reasonably good spot although we were in the sun. Bringing a tent next time would be a good idea. There were two formation flying displays prior to the elimination round whereby the 12 pilots who had qualified would be cut down to eight who would then be matched in quarter finals, semi finals and the grand final.

Yu-Jin lost interest before the elimination round was finished. Following that I let him play on the playground where he met one of his classmates. He then joined some boys playing football. We then had an ice cream each as it was approaching 30 degrees.

Back to racing by this time for the quarter finals. The two men who could still win the world championship, Paul Bonhomme and Mike Mangold, were paired against each other. Mangold won this duel, after trailing by 0.05 seconds at the last marker, and went on to take third place and the world championship on countback.

Time to go home. I didn't have intentions to stay the whole day anyway and could watch the rest on television. Luckily it was being beamed live to the eastern states and so was on a two hour delay to Perth.

Red Bull Air Race 2007 held above the Swan River in Perth.

Red Bull Air Race 2007 Low Flying by one of the Red Bull team, probably Peter Bensenyei.

Red Bull Air Race 2007 Perth knife edge+manoeuvre between the quad pylons.

Red Bull Air Race 2007 Perth Red Bull Plane between pylons.

Plenty of dunnies on hand.

Interested spectators with a decent view in South Perth.




Michael Goulian in the Red Bull Air Race 2007 Perth elimination round.




Mike Mangold in the Red Bull Air Race 2007 Perth elimination round.




Mike Mangold vs Paul Bonhomme in the Red Bull Air Race 2007 Perth quarter final.




Paul Bonhomme vs Mike Mangold in the Red Bull Air Race 2007 Perth quarter final.

Results

Ford - King Of The Mountain

The Bathurst 1000 was on yesterday and what a great finish it was - Ford one, two and three. Stick that in your pipe and smoke it, Holden.



It was an ordinary sort of race for 149 of the 161 laps of Mt Panorama. That was until the rain came and almost nobody changed to wets because it wasn't very heavy. Then they started crashing all over the place. Oh, wasn't it nice to see Mark Skaife put it into the wall? I admire him as a great driver of V8 Supercars but he drives a Holden and so I hate him. He's just that good. Nice to see Greg Murphy, a Kiwi (and a damn fine, niggling driver), finish in fourth, the first of the Holdens, and miss out on a podium finish.

Ford won the race last year but it was special this year as they outdrove the Holdens.

The Wallabies Have A New Addition To The Uniform

Following the Wallabies disgraceful loss to England on Saturday night at the 2007 Rugby Union World Cup I have decided that they need an addition to the uniform - a choker.

Wallabies Choker

On further investigation it appears that the New Zealand All Blacks have taken out a patent on the idea following another abysmal showing at the World Cup and so it won't be added to the Australian guernsey.