The date has finally been announced and it’s more imminent that you might think. May 1st will be the day Richard Branson will honour the bet made back at the beginning of the 2010 Formula One season. Branson and Tony Fernandes, of Team Lotus, had wagered over whose Formula One team would place higher at the Bahrain Formula One race.

The bet was simple: Branson, whose Virgin group sponsors the Marussia Virgin Racing team, would need to have placed higher than that of Team Lotus co-principal Tony Fernandes’s team. Tony coincidentally also happened to be the founder of AirAsia.

In true Branson spirit, he will now board an AirAsia X flight from London on a 13 hour flight to Kuala Lumpur as a stewardess all in the aid of charity.

The airline declared in a statement on Wednesday:

Five months after the colourful evening in Abu Dhabi, the day of reckoning for Sir Richard Branson has finally arrived.

(He) will don AirAsia’s famous red female flight attendant uniform and strut down the aisle to offer coffee, tea or any other food or beverage to Tony Fernandes and 250 other guests on the special 13-hour KL-bound flight.

The airline was selling 160 tickets for the charity flight and passengers are also to be entertained aboard by street magician Dynamo and Eddie Jordan’s four-piece band, Eddie & The Robbers.

AirAsia X is a long-haul affiliate of AirAsia and Branson’s Virgin Group. They also service about 150 routes covering destinations in Asia, Australia and Europe.

[Source: AFP]