Flying again

Back in the air after repairing the tail plane and making a new canopy at the Xtremeair factory in Germany.
Soon the last Red Bull Air Race for this season. After that it won't be until 2012 that the next edition of RBAR will be seen.
So, Team Muroya is looking forward to a smooth and trouble free race to finish the 2010 season on a high note!

pics by Taro Imahara / T.I.P.P

Plane during final preparations at Xtremeair GMBH (nearest the door)

Flying again at last

Red Bull Air Race World Championship 2010 New York Report

An unfortunate run of bad luck has forced Team Muroya to drop out of the New York race. After an earlier mishap in Windsor that saw Team Muroya having to hurriedly prepare another aircraft to compete in, pilot Yoshi Muroya chose to stay in Windsor with the new plane to get as much practice in as possible prior to flying the plane to New Jersey for the New York round.

Bad weather then forced a difficult ferry flight in marginal weather requiring him to turn back twice. Muroya suffered the misfortune of clipping the propeller while landing at the Race Airport in New Jersey.

Without enough time to complete repairs prior to the New York race, Muroya took the decision to retire from the round, regroup and assess the problems of the last two weeks - and work towards a strong comeback in the European rounds of the Red Bull Air Race World Championship 2010.

Team Muroya expressed its apologies to supporters and fans for the disappointment and inconvenience caused in the Windsor and New York rounds.

 The team looks forward to their continued support going in to the European stage of the World Championship.

 Posted by Team MUROYA Racing

Windsor report and results

Windsor, June 4, 2010

Regrettably and with much disappointment, Team Muroya has been forced to withdraw from the Windsor round of the Red Bull Air Race Championship 2010.

During a practice session overhead Windsor Airport, a problem developed with the cockpit canopy which led to irreparable damage to it. Unfortunately the canopy is a custom item and a replacement is not readily available.
The biggest disappointment for the team is that the plane had been worked on for 2 weeks prior to arriving in Windsor to improve the engine and overall performance. These changes had shown to be effective during practice and the plane was performing well.

It will take approximately three weeks to reproduce a new canopy so a decision was taken to accept Team Arch’s offer to use their race plane from last year for the Windsor and New York rounds. However this aircraft was located in Oklahoma at the Zivko Edge factory and needed to be assembled including mounting the engine and various other components.

Team Muroya made a huge effort to get to the Zivko factory and prepare the plane in the short time available. Pilot Yoshi Muroya, Technician Takashi Nishimura and TC Rob Fry worked long hours for 2 days with a deadline of 3pm local time in order that Yoshi could ferry to Windsor before sunset on June 3rd. Unfortunately, although the plane was assembled and ready to go a problem was discovered with the electrical system and the engine could not be started as the time limit went by.

You can see Yoshi's Interview just after the retirement for the Windsor round here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUwEIp5BMTk

Posted by Team coordinator Robert Fry

Out in the rain

After working late on the aircraft last night to improve the performance we were looking forward to a good day and a chance to claw our way back into the running.

The wild card round went reasonably well with a good net time (without penalties) showing the plane is now back running well again. The 4 seconds of penalties were unfortunate but we managed to squeeze into the top 12 after Sergei hit a pylon while pushing the lines aggressively.

As light rain started to fall we were first up in the final 12 round. The start was good and everything going well to the 270 turn where Yoshi was called by the judges for "descending in the gate" resulting in a disqualification. Yoshi after reviewing the video felt it was not deserved however the judges call is final.

Shortly after, the rain started more heavily and after the first 4 Pilots completed their runs racing has been postponed for a while.

But for Team Muroya, the racing in Rio is over. Tomorrow we disassemble the aircraft and on the 16th May we reassemble in Windsor, Canada then fly the plane to a small airport near Detroit for some modification work prior to the next race in Windsor.

Photo by Taro Imahara

Rio de Janeiro qualification report and results

Japanese Pilot Yoshihide Muroya qualified 13th today at the Rio de Janeiro round of the 2010 Red Bull Air Race World Championship. Hannes Arch took the bonus qualifying point with Nigel Lamb 2nd and Paul Bonhomme in 3rd.

After 2 clean rounds it is evident that Muroya’s plane is not performing as powerfully as the others and although admitting to be able to close up a second or two through better lines through the course, a thorough check of the engine settings is in progress to find out where the difference in engine performance could be.

Team Muroya will now compete in the Wild Card round going into the final day of racing and is looking forward to the opportunity to advance into the top 12 and then subsequent rounds.

 
Final will be live streamed on  http://www.redbullairrace.com/  9/May 24:51 Japan time.
Please keep an eye on Yoshi’s Performance on high speed track at Rio de Janeiro.

Team MUROYA official site　http://yoshi-muroya.jp

Red Bull Air Race official site  http://www.redbullairrace.com/

Photo by Taro Imahara/TIPP

Posted by Team Muroya Racing

Training flights at Rio

Two days of 4 training flights were to be held however we only got one flight yesterday. 2 Flights today plus 2 compensation runs through the track. The Rio track is proving to be less technical than Perth so outright speed (power) is proving to be important. Our result in T4 was 11th and this determines our start order position tomorrow for the qualification rounds. Our flights were quite clean with one penalty for an early pull up but looking at our times against the other pilots (disregarding the penalty) our speed does not seem very good. We will be looking to make some engine adjustments and pilot Yoshi is studying the course again to try and find some shortcuts!


However the weather forecast is not looking very good and rain might cut the racing short. Lets hope that it doesn't and we can ge some good racing in and a good result!

New Sponsor for 2010!!

Team Muroya is proud to announce Aqualine Ltd., a Japanese water supplier as an official
partner for the remaining races of the 2010 Red Bull Air Race World Championship. Aqualine
Ltd. will be providing its best quality water and their support to Team Muroya from Rio de
Janeiro onwards.

Fans will see the Aqualine logos on Yoshi's aircraft and his flight suit. 
Aqualine is renowned for their high quality water products in Japan for both consumers and
companies. The natural bottled water “aqua-aqua” is their main brand and the water is carefully
chosen from a spring in the Tachikawa mountains, rated one of the best natural water sources in
the world.


"Team Muroya is delighted to the have the valuable support of  Aqualine in our quest for
success in the 2010 seasonsponsorship”, said Muroya.

The Red Bull Air Race World Championship is a motorsports competition rapidly gaining on
popularity and as an exciting test of physical and mental endurance in race aircrafts  flown by
the world's best race pilots. The high speed, low-level races are held on demanding courses in
cities around the globe.


Photo by Taro Imahara/TIPP
Posted by Team Muroya Racing