Team Space Balls Wins Flugtag Peoples' Choice Award

Red Bull Flugtag Peoples' Choice Award winner, Team Space Balls, here before your very eyes! They got 6700 votes, by text message.

I have to admit if I were a text-messenger, this way cool Winnebago would have gotten my vote, too!


Mama got a big kick out of this entry, especially since it reminded her of the 1987 Winnebago that she and Daddy had, right down to the shape of its nose and the color, too. Their actually Winnebago was a 33-footer, she told me just now. I couldn't remember that statistic, but I can say that I agree with her--the similarities are uncanny.


There's Princess Vespa, playing to the crowd during their skit. Dark Helmet and Lone Star duel while Barf looks on from the front of the Winnebago.


I'm particularly impressed with the streaks of white paint on the black windows which lend an air of realism to the craft. How about those windshield wipers, too?




See Pizza the Hut, the fifth member of Team Space Balls, running to catch up with the others as they push the flying W towards the end of the flight deck?


It's off! Hilarious fun for everyone!

HOME HANGAR: Everett, WA
PILOT: Matt Solie
FLIGHT CREW: Wayne Akana, Takaichi Aoki, Seth Cardon, Chris Carlson, Pierre Chambion, Marylou Collins, Hiromi Imai-Dellario, Stephanie Lightbody, Brian Mann, Michele Mislang, Maya Okano, Natalie Saez, Dave Smolinsky

ITINERARY: “Our inspiration comes from the movie ‘Spaceballs,’” says Matt Solie, captain of the eponymous Red Bull Flugtag team. “Being that we work at an aircraft interior manufacturing company, this will be one pimped-out flying Winnebago!” Matt is employed by Jamco America in Everett, Washington, and the co-workers who appear with him on the flight deck this August 2 (Chris Carlson, Stephanie Lightbody, Brian Mann, and Michele Mislang) will be representing a larger, multicultural contingent of employees who are helping to build the funny flyer.

While it’s true that the group is constructing their craft on the Jamco manufacturing floor (after business hours), fellow competitors shouldn’t worry too much. These teammates realize just how unlikely it is to fly any handmade aircraft lacking mechanical propulsion, let alone a boxy recreational vehicle. A master of statistics, Matt enumerates, “The budget for the movie ‘Spaceballs’ was estimated at $22,700,000. Our budget is a handful of screws, old airplane parts, and whatever we can gather at the company bake sale. We’re just looking to have fun and show the crowd a good time.” He evaluates the entry’s chances like this: “Your odds of being killed in a tornado are 1 in 2 million; and the odds of our flying over the river are about the same.”

Here's a Red Bull USA crowd shot, 80,000 came to Flugtag.