Sunday, September 2: MAMAIA (Romania):
Royal Southampton's Steve Curtis, and his teammate Bjorn Gjelsetn had to be content with fourth place in an incident filled Romanian Grand Prix, round four of the WPPA Class 1 World Powerboat Championship
For the reigning world champions in Spirit of Norway it was not the result they were looking for in a race that went wrong for them at the start.
In practice at the weekend they were the quickest and clinche pole position for the race on Sunday, giving them high hopes of being in a strong position to regain their championship.
But finding themselves down in eighth place at the end of lap 1 after starting from pole position was not a good omen.
Having clawed their way back into fourth place, the pair then spun out on lap 7 while trying to pass Victory 7, dropping them back down the running order to sixth. And a penalty long-lap incurred several laps later for hitting a turn-buoy ended their hopes of a podium, and despite moving into third place in the title race, are now 30 points off the lead.
Both Gjelsten and Curtis were clearly unimpressed and angered by the tactics used by some of their rivals.
"Some people out there are driving like idiots and ignoring the rules." said Steve.
Honours in the race went to Victory 77’s Arif Al Zafeen and Jean-Marc Sanchez who took their third win of the season to clinch the 2007 WPPA Class 1 European Championship. Second place went to Sheikh Hassan Al-Thani and Matteo Nicolini in Qatar 96, with team mates, Abdullah-Al Sulaiti and Luca Nicolini completing the podium in third.
Following a chaotic start, with two boats appearing to go early, and despite starting from second place on the start line, Al Zafeen and Sanchez were lying in third place at the end of lap 1, behind Negotiator, with team mates, Al Sayed and Nadir bin Hendi, Victory 7, out in front. They overhauled Negotiator a lap later and fought back to grab the lead on lap 6. For the next three laps, Victory 77 fought off a strong challenge from rivals Qatar 96, who had moved up through the field from fifth place on the first lap, to be challenging for the lead.
On lap 10, Victory 77 took their first long-lap, but as they came off the lap, had to swerve violently to avoid Qatar 96, coming out of the turn. For the next 10 laps, Al Zafeen and Sanchez were able to maintain a narrow advantage over Qatar 96, going on to take the win and extend their world championship lead to 19 points.
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DISAPPOINTMENT FOR STEVE CURTIS