NEW YORK – Months of anticipation are finally over for American Red Bull Air Race podium hopeful Kirby Chambliss as he prepares to unleash the power from his new highly-tuned engine in front of his home crowd this weekend on 19 and 20 June.
Following a false start with the new engine in Windsor, Ontario, the patient pilot from Arizona put aside his frustration and played it safe, opting to use his old motor to take 3rd place for the second year running in Canada.
The reassuring result raises questions about how much importance teams are placing on engine power – if a podium can be achieved with a slower engine, has the wait been in vain? Chambliss is a definite advocate of more power and is a particularly aggressive competitor. He has never wavered on his decision to invest in the improved engine and instead believes it will be the key to fighting against the top few teams in the championship. Chambliss doesn’t feel aerodynamic mods are by any means essential for race success and openly admits it’s all about the power up front.
“I was 3 seconds off the pace in Windsor and that’s huge,” says Chambliss, currently in 4th position overall in the championship with 26 points. “I flew the same line each time but you can’t win that way, waiting for someone to make a mistake. I want to make the podium because I fly as good or better than everyone else. I’m watching out for all these guys. Everybody that is running up front has a strong engine and yeah, it’s great having a slicker airframe but we’re not going 400mph. If we were going that speed it would become more important because as speed doubles, drag quadruples so that’s a big deal. I think the engine is really, really important.”
Chambliss has a strong track record, winning the championship in 2006 and maintaining a presence in the top half of the table since he began competing. Last year he finished in 4th place overall and vowed to do better this year. Whether he can catch up with Bonhomme, Arch or Lamb by the end of the season remains to be seen as the top three show little signs of easing off at the halfway stage of the 2010 season.
“It’s not so much about speed but it’s acceleration,” continues Chambliss, explaining his justification for pinning his hopes on the engine. “Every turn we take, we knock energy out of the airplane, so it’s got to recover that. It’s more about getting going again and accelerating fast. Just because you have the fastest top speed doesn’t mean you’ll win – you’ve got to have a high thrust to weight ratio. That’s why it is about the engine. You’ve got to drag this thing out of the hole and get going again.”
As he is flying in New York without a spare engine, Chambliss has relied on technician Jason Resop to break-in the new engine and ensure it is completely race-ready. In addition to five hours on the test bench, Resop flew the Edge 540 from the engine tuning shop in Massachusetts to iron out any anomalies before the big day. “My other engine is being refreshed so we can use it as back-up in Europe,” adds Chambliss. “It isn’t even here so I can tell you, if it goes south on this, we’re done.”
Comments
Add a comment