NEWS

Saturday, 17 August, ARENDAL (Norway): Despite the frustration of missing out on valuable time on the water due to a broken driveshaft in yesterday’s official practice, Welmax’s team boss and throttleman, Jorn Tandberg, is optimistic about their chances this weekend. "I would rather have problems in practice than the race. As long as we find reliability we will be in their fighting for the win.

"For this circuit we need top end speed and we need to take full advantage of the long straights. We don’t have the acceleration of some of the other boats and take time to hit our optimum pace. We also carry extra fuel, nearly 200kgs, at the start because of the V8s so this is a disadvantage for us.

"Of course it would be nice to win pole position but it is not important for us in terms of the race. We know we will be third or fourth from the start, but our performance always picks up by the mid-point. I think we can win. We will push hard and when I won in the past in Arendal, we came from fifth place."