Combining the finesse of expert flying with the heart pumping action of racing, Jake Yubeta is pushing drone racing videos boundaries. We caught up with him at the Tiny Whoop course at the Liberty Science Center in NYC. He was there for the New York City Drone Film Festival.

"I got nominated for the extreme sports category, which is a lot of fun for me because my background is in motor sports. Up until 2 years ago I raced short course road trucks. Drones allowed me to get all adrenaline without the financial outlay or the risk of bodily harm that comes with racing. It’s been a lot of fun and after a few years of doing the FPV stuff, I was able to bring it back to the off road side and get some really cool angles on the race trucks that were sort of new."

Jake has become a trailblazer in the industry, not just by being a pilot that drone races but one that makes videos with big time motocross companies.

"Being an innovator comes with some difficulty because it’s not the kind of thing where we can show up and do it. Or when they’re comfortable with us jumping in the regular media credential, it’s something where if they can give us access, whether it be the motocross athletes or trucks, we’re creating content they’ve never seen before." That type of FPV flying lends itself to the sport he knows well and is something he realized only a drone can do. 

"That’s where I really think the close-up tight in your face, sort of gritty angles of FPV can shine. The motor sports and the action sports it's hard to get that POV angle rotating or flipping or skateboarding or BMX or whatever, those are the type of targets I’m trying to identify. I just did a project with McGrath trucks called Truck Furma, they did motocross and off-road trucks on the same track, that was amazing, my worlds collided! My whole world until this point was off road racing and I raced short course trucks. Then FPV racing, combining those two I was literally chasing Monster Trucks with mini quads, it was just a match made in heaven."

His advice to anyone watching? "The biggest advice I wish I would have given myself earlier was just get out there and talk to people and try to make connections. If you want next level stuff with really exciting content, for me, the most powerful thing has just been going up to people and making that connection and making that face to face expression of what I’m trying to do. I love the Tiny Whoop partially because I got good at it because I was flying at home a lot. The coolest thing about the tiny whoop is you can take it to places you wouldn’t necessarily be able to take a drone. Those same motor sports guy's, this museum, events I can’t get drone credentials for I can take the tiny whoop and it’s an ice breaker, a way to initiate that conversation. It’s a cool thing to bring to get people’s minds thinking about drones and the existence of FPV technology, it blows people’s minds still every time."

With advancing technology and drones becoming more main stream Jake sees this niche in the industry taking off.

"It’s all full speed ahead on the motocross stuff right now, I’ve got a couple exciting projects in the works, hopefully we’ll be able to bring more jobs for talented FPV pilots to the industry. That’s the long term goal with what I’m doing with my company Belief-Cam, is the motor sports thing. The long-term goal there is to create more jobs and more ways for all of these fast FPV pilots, these artists that are cultivating the skill set, I want to give them another place for that skill set to shine."