TEAM SUUNTO WIN HANKO RACE WEEK

July 5-8 saw the Scandinavian Melges 24 fleet enjoying four fabulous days sailing at Hanko Race Week in Norway. With glorious sunshine, 28-32EC and not a cloud in the sky the fleet completed two races a day in tricky 4-15 knot conditions. With 25 entries this year's event was smaller then usual, however, the majority of teams were using the regatta as a warm up for the Open Norwegian and the European Championships. With such variable conditions the crews had their work cut out to maintain boat speed and pick the shifts from day one. Peer Moberg opened the event with an outstanding 1, 1 on day one and was by far the most consistent performer over the first three days. Going into the two races he led Kenneth Thelen and the Suunto crew by what appeared to be a comfortable margin of 14 points with Kristian Nergaard 8 points behind that in third. Unfortunately the final day did not got as planned for Moberg who was OCS in the morning race and a disappointing 13th in the afternoon dropping him down to second. Thelen had his best day of the regatta to score 3, 1 and take the regatta overall. Nergaard's 2, 8 was just enough to keep him in third ahead of Herman Horn Johannessen. French National Champion Laurent Pages had made the trip north to sail with Vegard Arnhoff and this new partnership put in a very creditable performance to finish fifth.

With just seven weeks to go to the Europeans things are really starting to hot up with the crews taking every chance they get to trial against each other. The final major regatta before Torbole is the Norwegian Open, which takes place in Stavanger from 17-19 August. Already crews from Norway, Estonia, Sweden, Finland, England and the US are committed to attending and more details will \ follow shortly.
RESULTS:
1 FIN 236 | SUUNTO Kenneth Thelen
2 NOR 343 | NN Peer Moberg
3 NOR 400 | Baghdad Kristian Nergaard
4 NOR 418 | Rett Rundt Hjørnet Herman Horn Johannessen
5 NOR 189 | Computer Associates Vegard Arnhoff