“It’s going to be fun with three races to go, isn’t it?” Bonhomme said with a smile after emerging victorious from the race in which an incredible six pilots all had a shot of winning. Bonhomme was clearly relieved to finally climb back on top of the podium after taking second place in the first two races of 2009 - in Abu Dhabi and San Diego - and even happier to move in front of France’s Nicolas Ivanoff (24 points) into second place on 32 points, just one point behind Arch’s 33. “As we’ve seen before, lots can happen in this championship and I reckon it’s still wide open. Any one of us can still win the championship.”

Bonhomme, who got his record-breaking 9th career victory by mastering the whimsical winds in Windsor better than his rivals, knows better than anyone else how quickly fortunes at the top of the table can change. He was, in fact, leading the championship in both 2007 and 2008 when it headed to Europe. But Europe’s summertime heat proved too be too much for the Brit and he lost the championship lead and title in 2007 during the European leg to American Mike Mangold and then again in 2008 to Arch.

Bonhomme is nevertheless the most successful Red Bull Air Race pilot of the last 2 and half years with 8 of his 9 career victories coming in the last 21 races. He also out-performed Arch, who has 3 career victories, on race days this year with one win and two second places compared to Arch’s one win (Abu Dhabi), a second (Windsor) and a third (San Diego). Under the scoring system of the past  Bonhomme would be leading the championship going to Europe but Arch has picked up two crucial additional points – one point is newly awarded this year for posting the fastest Qualifying time - in both Abu Dhabi and San Diego. Arch, who once again suffered a two-second penalty in the final that cost him the victory, tried to put behind him the bitter disappointment of posting a faster net time in Windsor but coming up short.

“It was a close call but basically I trust the judges,” said Arch, 41, who shares the same September 22 birthday as the 44-year-old Bonhomme. “It looks like this season is going to be another nail-biter, but I’ve got the nerves to hold on when it comes to the crunch.”

Budapest promises to be not only a battle between Arch, flying near his home country, and Bonhomme. American Kirby Chambliss, the 2006 world champion who took third in Windsor and won the Qualifying point to Bonhomme’s chagrin, has returned to the top of the field with a new engine while Mangold got a season-best fourth in Canada. The field has become more competitive than ever before with nine pilots crowding the top of the time sheets and proving capable of reaching the podium. Russia’s Sergey Rakhmanin got a career-best fifth in Windsor as did American Michael Goulian with sixth. High-flying rookie Matt Hall fell to seventh but moved up to fourth in the overall championship in Windsor ahead of Britain’s Nigel Lamb, who got a disappointing eighth ahead of Ivanoff’s ninth. But, as Bonhomme and Arch know, all nine are within striking range of the podium or possible of even winning in Budapest.