Spirit of Norway Clinches Euro crown

 
Victory Team clinch second and third spots

The Norwegian city of Oslo yesterday saw the crowning of Steve Curtis and Bjorn Gjelsten in Spirit of Norway as 2002 European Champions for the UIM Class One Offshore Powerboat Championship.  

Runners-up were Dubai ’s Ali Nasser and Ali Al Qama in Victory 7, with third place going to Saeed Al Tayer and Mohammed Al Marri in Victory 1.  

“It was a great race and we are ecstatic to win the title,” said the jubilant Steve Curtis.

Over 250,000 spectators lined-up the shores to watch the dramatic 10 boat 105-nautical mile 13-lap race that signals the halfway point and the final European leg of the championship.  

In a heart-breaking turn of events for the Victory Team camp, the Dubai stars experienced their first finish off the podium yesterday in over three years. A broken fly wheel forced defending European Champions Ali Nasser and Ali Al Qama, holding second place to an early retirement.  

Unlucky start

“We got off to a bad start, but we caught up with Spirit until the third lap saw us out of the running,” said Ali Al Qama. “This is racing and because you are dealing with machines, the smallest thing can affect the performance. However, you have to keep going and not get too down. Just try for the next time.”  

The chase for the checkered flag then went to defending world champions, Saeed Al Tayer and Mohammed Al Marri in Victory 1.  

Devastatingly, they too faltered in the second to last lap with water entering the engine compartment, stalling them to fourth place finish and gifting Riviera to a second place on the podium.  

The red boat Jotun proved to be the winner with a third place on the podium; well-deserved after their spell of bad luck this season.  

Today’s line-up sees a change as both UIM officials and the team’s hope to improve on the existing start of race procedure. In the past the pole position never held any bearing on the race the next day. Earlier this year, rules were changed which said the pole position should act as a qualifying for the next day’s line-up.  

Vital points

Although this has made more sense to the pole position, there are still some vital points that need to be fine-tuned and it seems that the new pole position is being perfected through trial and error.  

Heat thee held in Plymouth last month saw the line-up on race day, which proved a disaster for Dubai’s Victory Team that may well have cost them the British Grand Prix and their lead in the championship standings.  

Gianfranco Venturelli , General Manager of the Dubai team commented: “According to our pole position qualifying from the previous day, we started the race in third and fourth position. Unfortunately at the start of the race some boats started ahead of us. So in fact we started fifth and sixth place when the flag was dropped.” Initially leading the race by at least 500-600 meters, Ali Nasser and Ali Al Qama were forced to take a longer outside line of travel to the first buoy that saw them lose their noticeable lead and come into the buoy in second place behind Spirit of Norway.  

“In that case there was no way to beat Spirit of Norway, because if you have to go wide as once a boat is in front it is very difficult to get ahead. With so many buoys and a shorter course as was seen in Plymouth , it is very difficult to pass the lead boat.”  

In fact, to reiterate this point, the new start procedure states. ‘With shorter races and more competitive and equally performing boats, the race can be won or loss at the start’.  

The start of the Middle East Championship and the fifth round of the UIM Class One Championship will be held on September 8.