AMERICA'S WORLD CHAMP; California flier Mike Mangold wins Red Bull Air Race World Series above San Francisco Bay.(Competition)

Byline: PETE LYONS

Red Bull boss Dietrich Mateschitz means to make an American racer a world champion. We don't want the Austrian energy drink tycoon to quit now, but in fact he already has his man.

Mike Mangold is America's new champ, and he does his racing in the air-barely. Flying just feet above the windswept waters of San Francisco Bay at upward of 250 mph, pulling turns so tight he was pulling more than 10 g, Mangold dominated the finale of the Red Bull Air Race World Series on Oct. 8 with two flawless runs against the clock.

It was the 49-year-old Californian's fifth race victory in the seven-round series, the first six of which were held in the Middle East and Europe. Fellow American Kirby Chambliss, 46, from Arizona, was a close second in this round and clinched third place in the championship. Third at San Francisco and runner-up on series points was Hungarian Peter Besenyei, victor of the two races Mangold didn't win.

Mangold, Chambliss and Besenyei are professional aerobatic competitors, among other things, and all three were flying American aerobatic planes, Zivko Edges built in Oklahoma and powered by Lycoming.

This is a very different kind of air racing from what we see at Reno. There, huge hot-rodded old Warbirds thundering out thousands of horsepower race each other around an eight-mile oval laid out across the desert, a sort of giant Talladega in the sky. Airspeed approaches 500 mph.

Red Bull racing is more like slaloming, but in three dimensions. The planes are tiny stunt models made of steel space frames with composite aero surfaces. They weigh less than 1200 pounds empty and are astoundingly agile. Their 540-cubic-inch, opposed six production engines, normally rated around 300 hp, are pumped up to some 350 to 360 hp, according to Mangold.