German Matthias Dolderer scored his first ever Red Bull Air Race victory in a snowy Spielberg, Austria on Sunday.
Dolderer beat home-town hero Austrian Hannes Arch by 0.66 of a second in the final four, clocking 0:56.996 to be the only pilot on race day to go below 0:57.000. Briton Nigel Lamb came in third with a 0:57.349 to grab the last place on the podium from Canada's Pete McLeod, who clocked a 0:57.589.
Aussie Matt Hall was classified fifth after McLeod out-flew him in the Round of 8.
For Dolderer, the first win has been a long time coming.
"This is absolutely fantastic," he said after the race, "my dream finally came through. It's a big mental game and the better you are prepared the easier it is."
Dolderer came second in Abu Dhabi, and this race win has catapulted him into the championship lead with 27 points to lead Frenchman Nicolas Ivanoff by six points. Arch is third on 12.
For Matt Hall, the result was not disappointing, given that he couldn't fly his MSX-R to the limit due to a debilitating back injury that required injections just for him to get into the cockpit.
“There’s more we could have done but I just wasn’t prepared to push it with my back," he said.
“I wasn’t comfortable pulling g (forces) and so I wasn’t able to fly the plane to its potential and my own potential.”
The third round of the championships will take place in Chiba, Japan, on the first weekend of June and Hall is confident he can return to something close to full health.
“We have to get me back to being strong and healthy again so I can fly the plane to it’s potential,” he said.
“I am confident that I can do that and be ready. We know the plane is fast and if I’m healthy I know I can fly it fast.”
Hall now sits eighth in the championship, 19 points behind his good friend Matthias Dolderer.