Doha: Race one victory in the SuperCat Lite category went to Victory S-3’s Arif Saif Al Zafein and Nader Bin Hindi at the inaugural UIM Qatar Cup in Doha Bay on Thursday afternoon.
The Dubai team qualified on pole and managed to fend off a strong field to pass the chequered flag well ahead of pole runners-up Robert Nunziato and Dan Lawrence in The Hulk.
Team Abu Dhabi’s Faleh Al Mansouri and Rashid Al Tayer qualified third and rounded off the podium positions, while Mohammad and Nasser Al Nasser climbed from fifth, at the expense of Grant Bruggemann and Gary Ballough in Smart Marine, to snatch fourth place.
Pole position qualifying for Saturday’s Qatar round of the 2015 UIM World Offshore 225 Championship took place at lunchtime on Doha Bay. EFE Project topped the times with a quickest lap of 1min 57.671sec, while Bigchefs-EFE Project qualified second over two seconds behind.
The first C1 and C2 races for an impressive array of Qatari, Kuwaiti and Bahraini teams took place on Thursday morning on the shorter inshore course.
Ten laps were on the agenda for the C1 fleet and Kuwait’s Mohammad Turki Juma snatched a 3.12-second victory from Qatar’s Jassim Abdullah Al Bu Ainain. An impressive 10 boats took the start and Kuwait’s Khalid Ahmad Al Hassan rounded off the podium.
Six C2 boats ran for nine laps in their opening race and Kuwaiti Ahmad Sulaiman Al Fassam reached the chequered flag with a margin of just under six seconds from fellow countryman Ahmad Fouad Abul. Qatar’s Rashid Al Muhannadi was third.
Friday is a more relaxed day for the international crews as the local aquabike racers take centre stage in front of the pit area. After a briefing and technical checks, the Pro Marathon competitors have a 30-minute practice session from 1pm before their race starts at 1.45pm.
Both the inshore and offshore courses are then open for afternoon testing for the remainder of the UIM Qatar Cup field.
