A new sport kicked away this month when the first ever jet-suit race was held in Dubai. Each racer wore an array of seven 130-hp jet engines (two on each arm and three in the backpack for a total 1,050 hp) that are controlled by hand-throttles. After that, the pilots use the three thrust vectors to gain lift, move forward and try to stay above ground level while negotiating the course … faster than anyone else.

They begin the race with 5 gallons of jet fuel in the backpack, and end it with very little – the total flight time possible is around 9 minutes, so long races are not on the agenda for a while yet.

For safety reasons, races are held over a water course, so the sport can be staged in the center of any city with a suitable water course and now that the ice has been broken, we expect there will be more and bigger events staged.

The first ever race showed the sport has plenty of potential as a live-spectator sport, particularly if each leg of a world series were held in conjunction with one of the world’s famous waterside festivals, and while the number of competitors who could afford a US$400,000 jet suit was clearly still modest, it’s a sport that has an inevitability about it.

The corollary of the above is that for $480,000, you can get yourself something exciting to do on the weekend – compete in a Grand Prix in an exotic city. There weren’t a lot of starters and there’s plenty of opportunity in any sport that has just started.

Like all other highly desirable things that start out very costly to do, the sport will grow and evolve over time, and there’s little question that a Jet Suit Grand Prix would be a huge drawcard for any waterside festival, and the spectacle is large enough to entertain a crowd of hundreds of thousands on a river or lake bank.

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The Dubai Jet Suit Race took place in Dubai on 28 February 2024, and was one of the main attractions of the Dubai Boat Show.

The other advantage of staging these Jet Ski events is the relative absence of setting up, at least compared to staging a motor racing event. The five-meter-high pylons used as course markers are inflatable, each suit weighs 26 kg and hence it’s an easy add-on for any large scale event wishing to bring in a crowd.

Gravity, the maker of the jet suits, is funding the event and has high hopes for it.

Source: New Atlas