Cone Crowned World Cup Winner

Tim Cone wins World Cup in What Airplane Honey

Tim Cone of Fresno, California was crowned champion of the Air Race 1 World Cup Thailand presented by Chang, at U-Tapao Naval Air Base, Pattaya.
Cone dominated the final  in his Grove-Winged Cassutt racer #99 ‘What Airplane Honey’, to win the World Cup Gold Final.
Cone, whose aircraft was named when his wife only realising he owned it when she saw him flying it on TV, was initially relegated to third place at the race start, but rapidly caught and passed fellow Californian Justin Phillipson in #79 ‘No Strings Attached’ then, in a repeat of his charge in the morning’s semi-final, passed Philip Goforth of Texas in #69 ‘Knotty Girl for the race lead and victory.
Behind the lead trio, Florida-based Swede and 2015 Air Race 1 World Cup winner Thom Richard in #12 ‘Outrageous’ fought Phillipson hard in the closing stages, but was forced to settle for fourth place, ahead of the home Team Siam Air Racing #22 ‘Hysteria’ flown by Bangkok-based Parisian Lionel Mougel.
The final Gold places went to Steve Temple of Sonoma, California and Ryszard Zadow of Waller, Texas, while Jerry Marshall of Denning, New Mexico was forced to retire from the race.
Earlier in the afternoon, Swaid Rahn from Springfield, Georgia, was a delighted winner of the Silver Final, finishing ahead of #40 ‘Miss USA’, flown by Chip Maples of Florida.
British racer, Trevor Jarvis in #58 ‘Sonic Zoom’ repeated his weekend-long feat of heading the field into the first turn, but was steadily overhauled by the pack, while Scotland’s Des Hart, who suffered a string of technical issues through the weekend was again forced to retire, giving up third place to #9 Scott Holmes of Edmonton, Canada in ‘Outlaw’, who took the chequered flag ahead of Paul Newman of Ohio, Kent Jackson of Washington DC and Trevor Jarvis.