Mark Jefferies
British Aerobatic Champion 1994, 2005, 2006 & 2007

Mark Jefferies is managing director of YAK UK Ltd, surely one of the UK’s light aviation success stories. Flying his home-built Laser 200 he became the British Unlimited Champion in 1994, has since won the Advanced crown for five straight years from 1998 to 2002. The first person to win a UK championships in the aircraft built by the pilot. Mark won a bronze medal and a podium appearance for his 3rd place in the Advanced World Aerobatics Championships held in Slovenia in August 2002. Mark and his wife Cathy have two daughters, the family home being the farm at the heart of Little Gransden airfield in Bedfordshire. He flies many types of aircraft, notably from the Russian YAK series. It was the YAK 11 rebuild that led to Mark becoming the major exporter from the FSU of various types of sporting aircraft. Generally speaking an aircraft is brought in from the FSU every month (130 to date), on one occasion this leading to a rather close encounter with an SU-27 Jet fighter whilst in Russian airspace. The Polish, he says, are also quite "aggressive". 2007 saw Mark flying to 9th place in the World Aerobatic championships, Granada, Spain in the Extra 300s. Mark flies airshows most weekends throughout the summer in a selection of aircraft, Laser 200, YAK 11, L-29 jet & YAK 50 (for display information) and has also flown with the Aerostars formation team of seven aircraft.

Profile updated in March 2008

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