Racing Drones Could Be the Sport of the Future

The crowd at East Grinstead would have been a strange sight, most people are wearing plastic goggles with long antennas sticking up, ignoring their surroundings and staring out into what looks like empty space. The new race of cyborgs? No! it’s Just Drone racers!

Despite this, they all act like a crowd at a football match, letting out sighs of oohs and aahs in unison, responding to some unseen action; much like the little green aliens in Toy Story. Then, all of a sudden a small drone skitters out of the trees on their right, crashing through the brushes before landing in a spray of dirt and leaves.

This is the new and intriguing world of  drone racing, as drones become an increasingly mainstream phenomenon, racing leagues have popped up around the world. Anyone who takes it seriously — pilot or spectator — doesn’t watch their craft from a distance, but instead uses mounted cameras and special video goggles to see the world from their drone’s perspective, also known as first-person racing or FPV.

The course at East Grinstead is 100 meters long and is rather rural, It runs through a stretch of woodland on a steep hillside. The course is so narrow they can’t race several drones at once so instead, use a timing system to take part in time trials. Each Pilot pays £10 to enter and gets four laps around the track and the winner takes the pot.