DOHA: Team Russia’s Andrei Panyushkin and Konstantin Ustinov snatched a comfortable victory in the 2015 UIM Nations Cup World Series in Qatar after two thrilling sprint races on Doha Bay yesterday.
The duo were first and fifth in the opening race and second and third in the second to confirm the victory from Team Belarus and Team Germany.
Team UAE’s Rashed Al Qemzi was the sole entrant in the Emirati team yesterday and was impressive in both sprint races. In the first, he stormed through from the rear of the field to snatch third, but he was deprived of second overall in the second when he was penalised a lap and slipped to 10th after striking a turn buoy.
A thrilling three-way fight developed to the chequered flag in the first 22-lap sprint race and long-time leader Andrey Panyushkin of Team Russia managed to fend off a fierce challenge from Team Belarus driver Roman Vandyshev to take a 1.14-second victory even though he had been overtaken by the Belarussian at the start of the yellow flag lap.
Team UAE’s Rashed Al Remeithi withdrew to enable Rashed Al Qemzi to fight for the outright victory in the number 14 boat and the Emirati produced the drive of the race to power his way from the rear of the field to third place. After an early yellow delay for a start system failure, the race appeared to be incident free until Roberto lo Piano spectacularly flipped his Team Italy boat in front of the timing tents on the penultimate lap. Mike Szymura claimed fourth for Team Germany and the outcome meant that Team Russia headed into the second race with a 23-point lead over Team Belarus.
Panyushkin headed Vandyshev and Al Qemzi from the start of the second race and the trio were the class of the field, with Vandyshev hitting the front from a hard-charging Al-Qemzi.
The Emirati survived a scare when he came close to flipping on lap 14, but he remained well clear of Panyushkin in second position until he was penalised for hitting a turn buoy.
Vandyshev claimed the win at the chequered flag and Ustinov benefited from Team UAE’s misfortune to snatch third.
Team Russia had gained the early advantage in the 2015 UIM Nations Cup on Tuesday afternoon. Andrei Panyushkin ran for 13 laps in the time trials and posted the quickest lap of 50.94sec on the 1,580-metre, four-pin Doha Bay course. With Team Qatar’s Khalid Abdullah Al-Kuwari non-starting, 13 boats took to the water and Panyushkin was over half a second quicker than Roman Vandyshev of Team Belarus. Team UAE’s Rashed Al Remeithi ran for seven laps before the Match Races, but Rashed Al Qemzi only managed one lap of the course in windy conditions, which forced qualifying to be delayed by two hours.
Team Russia controlled proceedings in the Match Races and Konstantin Ustinov beat Panyushkin in an all-Russian final to give the team a lead of 16 points over Team Germany heading into Wednesday’s sprint races. Ustinov managed to beat Team UAE’s Al-Remeithi in their first Match Race heat and edged a tense quarterfinal against Vandyshev, before beating Team Saudi Arabia’s Ahmed Saud Abdulaziz in the semi-final.
Panyushkin had beaten Team Qatar’s Mohammed Al-Obaidly and Team Germany’s Mike Szymura on the way to the final, with the German seeing off Ahmed Saudi Abdulaziz to take the win in the third place play-off.
Team UAE finished the first day of the UIM Nations Cup World Series in fifth position and Al Qemzi went on to record the quickest lap at yesterday’s morning’s practice session.
Team Saudi Arabia and Team Qatar failed to start.
The Peninsula
