Aaaaaal righty!!! MAN what a weekend this has been!!! If you've haven't had a chance to witness the Redbull Air Race Series, DOOOOO IT! There is always the question that we see alot around these parts -- is this a race, or an airshow? I will tell you without a doubt that these races are as competitive as it gets. Throughout the week, Pedro "Pablo" Brantuas, Jason Shulman, Matt Szueber, Jeremy Billeadeaux, Brett Bayless, and myself had the opportunity to learn a whole bunch about the planes, competitors, and the series. And I gotta tell you, this is as real as it gets, and it's off the hook.
With press credentials in hand, we had our FG Crew had the best seats in the house. On the South end of the course, we were about 100 feet closer to the course than the general spectatorship, and our 400mm Nikkor turbo zoom lens brought back some great shots.
Thursday morning we drove down to San Diego to find a mostly empty venue, today was the day the pilots would practice, and wring out the course. We also had the opportunity to get a good lay of the land, and see first hand what to expect during the actual race. We also got to see the Navy Seals practicing their water rescue demo routines. On Thursday, they were doing this VERY close to shore, and the blast from the rotor wash practically knocked us down on more than one occasion.
Credentials in hand, we were finally official.
For the first time, all of us had the chance to see the pylons blown up, and take shape in a site that we had only witnessed second hand. Man these things are big! The pylons are meant to self destruct in the event of collision with one of the race planes. While we didn't get a super close up look, it would appear that the separate sections are held together with some velcro-esq type of mechanism as to minimize damage to the planes. They also stood very, ahem, erect in the often times windy conditions.
There a bevy of very impressive yachts that came through the harbor on Thursday, including this one. Go get 'em boys!
The Redbull AR control tower - there's some pretty impressive stuff going on in here including direction of all air traffic, and video feeds from the countless cameras around the race course.
