Martin Sonka erased the pain of being disqualified in Abu Dhabi a year ago to claim the maiden win of his Red Bull Air Race career in the capital on Saturday.
The Czech got his 2017 season off to a flyer in the Emirates, winning his first race in four seasons of competing in the championship with a brilliant display on the capital’s Corniche.
Sonka, fastest in qualifying on Friday, maintained his red-hot form over the championship’s opening weekend, posting a blisteringly fast time of 53.139 flying second in the Final Four stage to take the lead from Canada’s Pete McLeod.
The 38-year-old then held off the challenge of Spaniard Juan Velarde and reigning world champion Matthias Dolderer, with the German actually incurring a two second penalty in the final that saw him slip off the podium.
You could forgive the 38-year-old for having largely unhappy memories of the UAE prior to Saturday, having been disqualified on race day last year for flying too low. But he was soaring after his triumph.
“I was disqualified last year for going below the ground line,” said Sonka, who recovered from the opening race disappointment to finish seventh.
“We actually had the same issue here too. I was close this year too, I had to be really careful not to do the same again and I was really afraid of it. Fortunately it didn’t happen and everything was as we like it.”
Sonka did admit 2016 was a testing campaign, as he had flown a Zivko Edge 540 V3 craft belonging to inaugural Air Race world champion, Peter Besenyei.
But with his own plane this season, he is feeling far more at home in the cockpit.
“It’s been very hard work,” he said. “Last season we started with a plane that wasn’t ours. It was set for him (Besenyei) so it was like I was sitting in someone else’s plane. But this season it is set for my hands. I like everything on it more or less, I’m comfortable, it’s how I need it.”
Sonka had an early scare in the opening Round of 14 yesterday, his 53.202 was slower than Peter Podlunsek but the Slovenian was disqualified for breaching the safety line while flying through one gate.
He was much smoother though in the Round of Eight, beating 10-year veteran Nicolas Ivanoff by over a second, with Ivanoff always in trouble after posting a time slower than he had in the Round of 14.
Sonka, who had previously recorded two third place and two runner-up finishes, roared into the lead when it mattered in the Final Four, his time recorded as the fourth fastest of the day.
Victory was confirmed when Dolderer was slower, even before he over rolled in the penultimate Gate 14 on lap two, with Velarde also coming up short, although he will be ecstatic with his first-ever podium.
“It feels like a victory for me and the whole team,” said the 42-year-old Mardid native, who was also appearing in the Final Four for the first time in his third campaign.
“Today was my first Final Four and just to make it there was a success, to be on the podium is a huge success and to be second is even more.”
Elsewhere, the Challenger Class was won by Swede Daniel Ryfa, who is aiming to finally break his duck after three consecutive runner-up trophies in the last three seasons.
He recovered from being behind on each of the first three split times to beat fastest qualifier, Florian Berger, the reigning champion, with Frenchwoman Melanie Astles third.
It was an enthralling day of action from the very beginning on race day in Abu Dhabi, which was celebrating a decade of hosting the Red Bull Air Race.
There was drama aplenty in the Round of 14 where eventual runner-up Velarde actually clocked the fastest time of the day, 52.795, despite the fact he was only using his heat as a practice run after Japanese opponent Yoshi Muroya was disqualified for exceeding the maximum G-limit.
Czech Petr Kopfstein, Chellenger Cup champion in 2014 and billed as a future Master Class champion after a solid debut in 2016, was also surprisingly knocked out by Ivanoff after he incurred two separate penalties, including hitting a pylon.
American Kirby Chambliss, champion in 2004 and 2006 and the only pilot to compete in all 12 seasons of the Red Bull Air Race, also blew his chance of victory after he was penalised for climbing in the final Gate 15 on his second lap as Francois Le Vot went through.
