USA top Snipe Worlds

by PR on 17 Sep 2007
Tomas Hornos and Enrique Quintero of the USA are the new Snipe World Champions. The TMN Snipe World Championship, taking place at Leixoes, Portugal, most outstanding feature was the hard sailing conditions allowing only three races to take place.

At last the wind showed up for the Championship and allowed the realisation of a desperately needed third race, hence ratifying the World Championship. The effort of the Race Committee finally paid off after waiting since 08:00 am. A total of 57 crews, representing 18 countries raced, raced on the final day .

Tomas Hornos/Enrique Quintero, from the United States, prooved to be the strongest, succeeding their compatriots Augie Diaz/Mark Ivey, the latter finishing the championship in fourth. In fact, the North-American fleet showed their might on the last race by having three crews among the first four at the finish line, with the crew Peter Commette/Sheehan Commette, winning bronze. Horno, turning 19 today ,had a very special anniversary.

The Portuguese also made good use of this last race. Diogo Cayolla/Rui Castilho and Gonçalo Guerra/Tiago Guerra, finished the TMN Snipe World Championship in 7th and 9th, respectively. They ended up making it clear that, had the Championship race schedule been kept, they could have made better rankings.

Tomas Hornos, New Snipe World Champion

'It is an honour and a privilege to conquer the title. The light shifty winds we got are our preference, favouring us. On this last race, because we have a good speed, we managed to cover our closest adversaries till the end',

Enrique Quintero, New Snipe World Champion

'I'm still in shock. We didn't expect this outcome because just starting to sail together. At most we were hoping to make the top 20 because we sort of looked at the regatta as an opportunity to practice together',

Miguel Lopes Cardoso, Chairman of the TMN Snipe World Championship

'It must have been the hardest World Championship ever. The sailors are satisfied, the organisation was excellent and the Race Committee was unrelenting. Overall it was a very good championship, showing that Portugal is fully able to cope with organising major events. The weather was unfortunate since there is no memory of Leixões having a whole weak without wind. It's easier to do indoor competitions but we also treasure our wind and sea and, fortunately, all ended well'.

Snipe - Overall leading Results

1º Tomas Hornos/Enrique Quintero – United States
2º Kenji Abe/Hiroshi Yamachica – Japan
3º Peter Commette/Sheehan Commette – United States
4º Augie Diaz/ Mark Ivey – United States
5º Pablo Defazio/Eduardo Medici - Uruguay
6º Bart Bomans/Jill Ponet – Belgium
7º Diogo Cayolla/Rui Castilho – Portugal
8º Brian Bissell / Danny Pletsch – Spain
9º Gonçalo Guerra/Tiago Guerra – Portugal
10º Pablo Fresneda/César Travado – Spain

Event website - http://www.worldsnipe2007.org