20 November 2017
+VIDEO Tim Cone of Fresno, California won the 2017 Air Race 1 World Cup held at at U-Tapao Naval Air Base, Pattaya, Thailand at the weekend. Cone dominated the final in his Cassutt racing aircraft named ‘What Airplane Honey?’.
Cone, whose aircraft was named when his wife only realising he owned it when she saw him flying it on TV, was initially relegated to third place at the race start, but rapidly caught and passed fellow Californian Justin Phillipson in ‘No Strings Attached’ then, in a repeat of his charge in the morning’s semi-final, passed Philip Goforth of Texas in ‘Knotty Girl‘ for the race lead and victory.
Behind the lead trio, Florida-based Swede and 2015 Air Race 1 World Cup winner Thom Richard in ‘Outrageous’ fought Phillipson hard in the closing stages, but was forced to settle for fourth place, ahead of the home Team Siam Air Racing ‘Hysteria’ flown by Bangkok-based Parisian Lionel Mougel.
The final Gold places went to Steve Temple of Sonoma, California and Ryszard Zadow of Waller, Texas, while Jerry Marshall of Denning, New Mexico was forced to retire from the race.
Earlier in the afternoon, Swaid Rahn from Springfield, Georgia, was a delighted winner of the Silver Final, finishing ahead of ‘Miss USA’, flown by Chip Maples of Florida.
British racer, Trevor Jarvis in ‘Sonic Zoom’ repeated his weekend-long feat of heading the field into the first turn, but was steadily overhauled by the pack. Scotland’s Des Hart suffered a string of technical issues through the weekend and had to retire, giving up third place to Scott Holmes of Edmonton, Canada in ‘Outlaw’, who took the chequered flag ahead of Paul Newman of Ohio, Kent Jackson of Washington DC, and Trevor Jarvis.
