Paul Bonhomme got the 2008 Red Bull Air Race World Series off to a flying start today with a resounding victory against Hannes Arch of Austria in front of 400,000 spectators in Abu Dhabi.

Bonhomme, who was runner-up in the championship last season to American Mike Mangold by a heartbreaking fraction of a second, got some sweet revenge in the United Arab Emirates capital. He also demoralised the other 11 pilots in the process with incredible times throughout Training and Qualifying. Arch got second place and Mangold finished third after winning against Hungary’s Peter Besenyei in the battle for third place.

“I’m very pleased, especially with the consistency,” said Bonhomme, who leads the championship with nine points. “I’ve been watching Hannes all week and he has been doing well. If you take off the two 3-second penalties he got, it was very close.”

Bonhomme was in a class of his own, recording the fastest times in all training sessions earlier in the week and dominating the qualifying sessions on Thursday. Bonhomme, in his new Edge 540, was also by far the fastest pilot in the ‘Super Eights’ and crushed Besenyei in the Semi-Finals (by more than 6 seconds) before beating Arch in the Final by 7.05 seconds.

The pilots once again had to master the challenging conditions – gusting winds of up to 30 km/h, blowing dust and high temperatures of up to 35 degrees Celsius -- while navigating the Air Gates at speeds of up to 400 km/h per hour and enduring forces of up to 10 g as they flew just metres above the water.

The Red Bull Air Race took place in close partnership with the Abu Dhabi Tourism Authority and under the patronage of His Highness Sheikh Hazza Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Chairman of the Abu Dhabi Sports Council. Spectators watched in awe from the Corniche in front of Abu Dhabi's skyline above the turquoise waters of the Arabian Gulf.

The Red Bull Air Race World Series will now move on to the next stops in San Diego and Detroit, USA before returning to Europe for races in Sweden, the Netherlands, Great Britain, Hungary, Portugal and Spain before the season finale in Perth, Australia.