Finland’s Selio takes first GP win in France

by Philippe Stiernon on 21 May 2007 An exciting 18th Grand Prix of France, the second round of the 2007 U.I.M. F1 World Championship for power boating, raced in front of thousands of fans in the inner harbour of La Rochelle on the West Coast of France yesterday.

Finnish driver Sami Selio earned his first Grand Prix in his 64th start along with his BABA boat despite battling for most of the day in rough water and a loss of power steering.

‘I’m so happy I spent much of the winter in the gymnasium, ‘said Selio. ‘ I was beat up and worn out on this six turn, two kilometre course as I had a whole host of people chasing me at the same time which made this a very uncomfortable but satisfying event. ‘

The start of the 50 lap event was a bit confusing with several drivers jump starting the event with all eyes following Emirates team rookie Ahmed Al Hamli who led for the first few laps only to drop out and later penalized by the U.I.M. officials for jump starting the lights.

Pole sitter David Trask of Australia and the XPV Racing team was in a fight for a podium finish and the overall lead until his damaged boat, after a minor collision early on in the event, finally had the steering cable go out of song ending his day with just 3.5 laps remaining.

Thani Al Qamzi of the Emirates team took over first with teammate and number one driver Scott Gillman of Los Angeles, California holding onto second place despite a bad case of the flu finishing the day in the runner-up place picking up his 55th career podium and now leading the World Championship with 35 points to Selio’s 29 points.

‘I’m happy to leave France with this finish because I’ve struggled all weekend with the flu,’ said Scott. ‘Now we have some valuable time to prepare for the Grand Prix of Singapore in August. ‘

Swedish driver Jonas Andersson came charging up from starting ninth place to third on a steady drive that pushed Gillman to the last lap in his F1 Team Sweden boat. Fourth went to Qatar driver Jay Price who had a slow start fell to 15th and came charging up to the top five and picked up nine more valuable championship points for the driver from New Orleans, Louisiana.

French driver Philippe Chiappe in the Atlantic team BABA boat was fifth with his best result of the season while his teammate Duarte Benavente of Portugal finishing ninth in his Dragon boat after starting 14th.

Russian Stanislov Kourtsenovsky in the other F1 Team Energy boat started 15th and finished sixth on the day in a good run, while Italian rookie Leo Bonelli was seventh in the second Qatar boat.

Italian Fabrizio Bocca of the Rainbow team finished a fine eighth.
Marco Gambi of the Tamoil team got his first points since Qatar of 2005 finishing tenth.

Local La Rochelle pilot Philippe Dessertenne of the CTIC China Charente Maritime team was in the top five before he hit a buoy and later was disqualified for rounding a buoy illegally and being classified 23rd.

As the European part of the 2007 U.I.M. F1 World Championship for power boating comes to a close the next will take place in lovely Marina Bay in downtown Singapore on the 18th and 19th of August with drivers from four different continents expected to take up the next part of the battle for the world championship on water.

Grand Prix of France
Posn	Boat	Driver	Nat	Team	Lap's	Down	Points
1	5	SELIO Sami	FIN	F1 Team Energy	50	48:06	20
2	1	GILLMAN Scott	USA	Emirates F1 Team	50	4.01	15
3	14	ANDERSSON Jonas	SWE	F1 Team Sweden	50	6.59	12
4	11	PRICE Jay	USA	Qatar Team	50	22.79	9
5	9	CHIAPPE Phiippe	FRA	Atlantic Team	50	25.72	7
6	6	KOURTSENOVSKY Stan	RUS	F1 Team Energy	49	L1	5
7	12	BONELLI Leo	ITA	Qatar Team	49	L1	4
8	31	BOCCA Fabrizio	ITA	Rainbow Team	48	L2	3
9	10	BENAVENTE Duarte	POR	Atlantic Team	48	L2	2
10	22	GAMBI Marco	ITA	Tamoil F1	48	RET	1
11	3	TRASK Bob	AUS	XPV Racing	47	L3
12	33	ELLIOTT Andy	GBR	ACE Racing	47	L3
13	2	AL QAMZI Thani	UAE	Emirates F1 Team	47	RET
14	4	TRASK David	AUS	XPV Racing	46	RET
15	20	LUNDIN Pierre	SWE	Comparato Racing	40	RET
16	32	LAGIANNELLA Valerio	ITA	Rainbow Team	28	RET
17	8	PENG Linwu	CHN	CTIC China Charente Maritime	20	RET
18	27	AL HAMLI Ahmed	UAE	Emirates F1 Team	19	RET
19	15	TOURRE Philippe	FRA	F1 Team Sweden	19	RET
20	21	CAPPELLINI Guido	ITA	Tamoil F1	12	RET
21	24	CANTANDO Francesco	ITA	Singha F1 Racing	5	RET
22	19	COMPARATO Fabio	ITA	Comparato Racing	5	RET
23	17	DESSERTENNE Philippe	FRA	CTIC China Charente Maritime		DSQ
24	23	LEIDI Franco	ITA	Singha F1 Racing		DNS
	Remarks
	Boat No 6 one lap deducted for jumpstart Boat No 17 one lap deducted for destroying buoy turn 6 rule 313.03 Boat No 17 disqualified for rounding buoy twice rule 313.02 Boat No 27 one lap deducted for destroying buoy turn 3 rule 313.03 Boat No 27 one lap deducted for jumpstart Boat No 31 one lap deducted for jumpstart