- Canadian pilot Pete McLeod wrote history when he became the Red Bull Air Race World Championship series' youngest pilot at age 25.
Truly a lifetime aviator, Pete received his first flight in the family plane at six weeks old. His mother recalls how a six-year-old Pete would sit on his father's lap, hands on the control column during flights to remote lakes. From that point on, he learned to fly float and ski planes over Canada's rugged north.
Pete qualified for his private pilot's licence at 16, earning his aerobatic-instructor rating at 18. It wasn't until Pete took delivery of his first high-performance aerobatic aircraft, a Pitts Special, that he began flying serious competition aerobatics.
2004 was Pete's first full competitive season, and he went on to fly undefeated, winning multiple awards in his class and becoming the 2004 North American Collegiate Aerobatic Champion. In 2006, he focused on professional aerobatics and took a second place Advanced category finish at the US National Aerobatic Championships.
By 2007, Pete earned his unrestricted surface-level aerobatic waiver, allowing him to continue to progress his flying. Pete was invited to attend the Red Bull Air Race Qualification Camp in Spain in September 2008, and he was one of four rookies - the youngest-ever and only Canadian - selected for active race status.
He joined the Red Bull Air Race World Championship in 2009 and showed tremendous promise in his first two seasons, jumping from 15th place in his rookie season to fifth the following year. When the Red Bull Air Race returned in 2014, Pete stormed into the season's first race with his best-ever result, a third-place podium, laying down the gauntlet as a World Championship title contender. He ultimately finished the season in fifth place once again. In 2015 Pete was looking to move up the overall standings even further and began the season with a podium place in Abu Dhabi. However, he wasn't able to hit those heights again that year, ultimately finishing in eighth.
A strong finish to the 2016 season, including consecutive podium places at Lausitz and Indianapolis, saw him post a season-on-season improvement once again, taking seventh spot in the classification. In the 2017 race in Chiba, he caught everyone's eye with brilliant runs in Qualifying that gave him both pole position and the DHL Fastest Lap Award.
With Red Bull Air Race will not continue past 2019, Pete wrapped up the final airshow season with flights in front of Canadian crowds at the annual Airshow London, right in the Ontario city where he lives.
When he's not speeding through the race track or thrilling crowds with wild Freestyle Aerobatic displays, an avid outdoorsman, Pete can be found flying a bush plane towards his next adventure and spending time on the remote lakes of northern Canada.- IMDb Mini Biography By: Red Bull
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content