It is the end of another season of Class 1, the most famous motor catamaran offshore race. The triumph of the Victory 77 team (pilot Arif Saif Al Zafeen, throttleman Jean Marc Sanchez) was a logical outcome of the team's efforts during the whole history of the competition.
This season's main intrigue began as early as the first stage in Athens, when the Victory 77 bolide came to the finish line first leaving the most prominent sportsmen from the Spirit of Norway far behind (at the 5th place, in the end). Indeed the season has turned out to be very lucky for Victory Team: two first places in Athens (Victory 77, Victory 7), best time (54 minutes 19.96 seconds), best speed (190 kmph). The main players in the races were Victory Team, Qatar 95, 96 and the Spirit of Norway. The Victory 77 won exactly half of the eight stages; the other half went to the Spirit of Norway
Compared with the last year, Victory 77 has made great progress moving up from the 3rd place to the leading one, beating among others Qatar 96 in the process. On the other hand, the Jotune 90 team hasn't been lucky at all: compared with the last year, it went down from the 5th to the 9th place. The Foresti & Suardi 8 team confidently holds the 7th position. Qatar 95 went from the 6th to the 4th place. Hassan bin Jabor Al-Thani and Luca Nicolini (Qatar 96) have been breathing down the leaders' necks during the whole year.
The geography of the stages also was different from the last year's: Grand Prix in Athens, two Grands Prix in Norway, stages in Romania, Egypt and Doha and two Grands Prix in Dubai.
The next year's season is going to be extremely interesting due to certain changes in the teams. First, pilot Bjorn Rune Gjelsten announced that he was leaving the big league sport. He made this announcement after the end of the season, when his team won the Dubai Grand Prix but failed to win the championship. This great duet with Steve Curtis has 32 Grands Prix to their credit. Bjorn ends his wonderful career on the peak of success and popularity. Secondly, Sheikh Hassan Bin Jabor Al-Thani announced that the Qatar team is taking on the talented throttleman of the Spirit of Norway 10 Steve Curtis. Chances are Sheikh Hassan will be performing in the next season with him.
Spain, China, the Ukraine and France were considered among other countries as possible venues for the competition's races, but the final arrangement looks like this:
28 February – 1 March – QATAR, Doha
25–27 April – BRAZIL, Rio de Janeiro
23–25 May – MONTENEGRO, Budva
18–20 July – NORWAY, Arendal
15–17 August – NORWAY, Oslo
29–31 August – ROMANIA, Constanta-Mamaia
16–18 October – EGYPT, Porto Marina
27–29 November – UNITED ARAB EMIRATES, Dubai
4–6 December – UNITED ARAB EMIRATES, Dubai.
Konstantin Startsev
Photoreport
USD:
EUR:
