Marit Strømøy and the Strømøy Racing F1H2O Team have been leaving nothing to chance in the build up to Sunday’s race. The Norwegian admitted that she and Polish team-mate Bartek Marszalek have new engines and propellers for the weekend. She said: “It’s been a short time between the end of 2022 and the start of 2023, so we are working double time to sort all the loose ends. We feel confident that we will get back on the podium again this season.”

 

American Brent Dillard is heading into his first ever F1H2O race after making the giant step-up from F2. He said: “We are on a giant learning curve coming here for the first time and spending time with my new team. I feel very relaxed and confident that we will make a mark on this sport. It has been a dream of mine to race in F1H2O. The China CTIC Team is very professional and they are making it very comfortable for me to slide into my new seat. They are learning a bit of my southern American accent and I, their French style as well!”

 

Erik Stark returns to the paddock with the Victory Team for the first time since 2019. “I’m truly over the moon after returning to F1H2O and the Victory Team,” said the Swede.

 

“We are all coming out of the starting gate feeling fresh and ready to impress. I’ve come so close to winning a title before and I now know what it takes to get the job done.”

Tomorrow (Friday), teams commence the first two-hour free practice session on the Lake Toba course from 11.00hrs (04.00hrs CET). The challenging nine-pin course features two right-hand corners (yellow buoys) and a pit straight of 520 metres.

Due to the race taking place on a narrow stretch of the River Saone the Race Officials had decided to choose a ‘rolling start’ rather than a ‘dead engine’ pontoon start. After two laps out came the green flag and Seliö sped off into the distance making the clear water ahead of him really count in his favour.

 

As the race reached the fifteenth lap Team Sharjah’s Ferdinand Zandbergen was towed back to the pontoon with electrical problems. Earlier in the day the Dutch racer had gone out to test his BaBa raceboat in Free Practice, this was after the team had worked through the night to replace all the electrics following his crash in yesterday’s Q3. Unfortunately, Zandbergen crashed this time without completing a lap. With no time to swap the electrics before the Grand Prix start, he lined up in his grid spot with no realistic chance of completing the full sixty lap race.

 

 

When Zandbergen spoke to PRW he said,

 

My weekend started out great and I was incredibly happy to make it into Q3, but then I was too eager, and barrel rolled on a wave on my first lap. The team worked hard overnight on my boat, for which I’m very thankful for but then in the free practice unfortunately the same happened to me at the other end of the course. Not the way I wanted to start my first F1 season, but I see it as a lesson in gaining experience for the rest of the year.

 

Portugal’s Duarte Benavente became the next race casualty when he went out with mechanical problems a lap later.

 

As the race began to settle down Seliö was maintaining a four second gap between himself and Torrente until lap thirty-seven when the Finn slowed down with a misfiring engine.

 

When he spoke to PRW the deeply frustrated Seliö said,

 

This hurts. That came totally unexpectedly, one minute I was comfortably ahead of Torrente, the next my engine was down to four thousand revs and he had passed me.

 

Throughout the race I didn’t really feel any pressure and thought I had everything under control. I had started to put in some good laps time then the stator broke. There was no warning or any sign that this was about to fail and even new one’s are not fallible.

 

Selio’s departure saw Torrente move into a lead which he never looked like surrendering.

 

The result underlined their status as overwhelming favourites for a fifth world team title and suggested that the two team-mates could go on to battle it out to decide this year’s individual F1H2O driver’s crown.

 

Peter Morin of the China CTIC Team took third place to become the first Frenchman to secure a podium finish in his home Grand Prix event. Hi team-mate Philippe Chiappe, one of only three drivers in F1H2O history to have claimed a hat-trick of world titles, was another to endure frustration on the day as plummeted down the field with a broken propeller with just ten laps remaining. He quickly came back to the pontoon where his mechanics fitted a new one which allowed Chiappe to head back out and claim ninth place. This was the third propeller that had failed him this weekend.

 

Finnish rookie Alec Weckstrom finished fourth in Macon from Sweden’s reigning F1H2O World Champion, Jonas Andersson, with Norway’s Marit Stromoy completing the top six.

 

Stromoy posted the following,

 

Not what I dreamed about, but not too bad either. It was a tough and long race of sixty laps in difficult conditions. Both me and my boat got a lot of beating, but we’re still in one piece. Valuable World Championship points collected though.

 

Next stop for the F1H2O World Championship is San Nazzaro, Italy, where back-to-back Grand Prix races take place on the Po River on 16^th and 17^th July.

 

This has been a happy hunting ground for Team Abu Dhabi, who have regularly trained and tested there in recent times under Italian powerboat racing legend and Team Manager, Guido Cappellini.

 

Al Qemzi’s took victory there last September and the vastly experienced Emirati driver, who now has thirty-nine career podium finishes to his name as well as eight Grand Prix wins, still passionately believes he can secure a maiden world drivers’ title, twenty-two years after entering the F1H2O arena.

 

He enjoys a unique partnership with Torrente, and while the American would love to grab the world crown for a third time, no-one would be happier if Al Qemzi were to finally come through to take the honours, after five third place finishes, and two runners-up seasons.