Larsen and Geest win Leg 7 at Archipelago Raid

by Event media on 30 Jun 2006 Gunnar Larsen and Gerhard van Geest (Team Yamaha blue) won Leg 7 of the Archipelago Raid - the leg across the Baltic sea in style. The open stretch of water between Finland and Sweden is also called the Aland channel.

It was a fantastic crossing in extreme sailing conditions with clear crisp skies, big waves, wind from the northwest decreasing from 20 to 15 knots. With a south-westerly course therefore it was a fast jib reach to start with that ended in an even more spectacular spinnaker reach.

In the front part of the fleet it was very tight with close competition between Eric Proust en Gerard Navarin on Yanmarin (FRA), Will Sunnucks and Mark Self (GBR) on Team X-Leisure and the Dutch.

Two thirds across the channel Larsen en van Geest were the first to hoist the spinnaker and were off. In the end near to Fejan they were nearly surprised by the local teams who took a short cut. Like Andes Lewander on Tidermans. But on the line Larsen and van Geest were first.

The first teams finished the 32 miles long leg in approximately two and a half hours! Within minutes most of the teams sailed across the line in front of the Fejan Krog.

Second were the English Will Sunnucks and Mark Self. Third was local favourite Anders Lewander on Tidermans. Magnus Woxen and Damian Foxall followed close behind in fifth place on Sogeti, defending their first place in the overall ranking successfully.

Latest leading positions:

1 Sogeti (Woxén & Foxall) 174.5
2 X-Leisure (Sunnuck & Self) 155.5
3 Tidermans (Lewander & Thorslund) 152
4 Yamarin (Proust & Navarin) 150
5 GB Glace (Nissar & Schiratzki) 146
6 St Jude Medical (Gnosspelius & Grape) 142
7 Sundvallsbygg och Fastighets AB (Ekman & Tempelma) 141.5
8 Brossard (Bourgnon & Gagliani) 141
9 Glenn Marine Racing (Kjerstadius & Tempelman) 139
10 Garmin - RBSC (Demesmaeker & de Frahan) 138.5
11 Yamaha Blue (Larsen & van Geest) 136

Event website: http://www.ArchipelagoRaid.com