First place in the Europeans short offshore race today!

Today on day 5 of the European Championship in offshore sailing we sailed the short offshore race, a 43 nm course outside Hankö, Norway. Conditions was yet again great with lighter wind after postponing the start two hours. We sailed the course in around 7 hours. We managed to win and this was our third race win in the Europeans. We sailed really well today with great speed, maneuvers, tactics and strategy.

- Our start and first beat was nor great but then we found the right way on the course and noticed changes quickly and had great boat speed with a dedicated and focused team that did everything to go as fast as possible, say Peter Thorwid tactician.

After today's win in the seventh race we have the series: 1, 4, 1, (6), 5, 3 and 1 with a total of 15 after one discard. Overall, after today we are in second place and have secured a medal overall but the tomorrow it will be decided if we get a silver or bronze. We congratulate Estonian Katarina 2 who won class C having 10 points after today and then Estonian Matilda 4 (with 17 points after today) will also be on the podium.

Results in the open division is here: Open results

In the Corinthian division it is already clear that we won the gold medal. Results in the Corinhian division is here: Corinthian results

Tomorrow is the final day of the Europeans and plan is to sail one inshore race. We will try to do our best to fight for the silver medal but competition will be hard but in any case we will end at the podium in in an all European competition plus winning the Corinthian (amateur) division.

European Championship day 4

Today day four of European Championship in offshore sailing was completed in Norway. We sailed another two inshore races in great conditions, wind between 15-20 knots with sunshine so real sailing propaganda! Overall today we have sailed relatively well and managed to get a 5th and 3rd place in the two races. The competition mainly from the two Estonian boats Katarina 2 and Matilda 4 however is really tough and even when you sail relatively well it is not enough to beat them in conditions as today.

After today we have sailed 6 races out of 8 and we have the series 1, 4, 1, (6), 5 and 3 with a total of 14 after one discard. In the lead is Katarina 2 with 8 points and Matilda 4 with 11 points.

Results are here.

We are in the lead in the Corinthian division, results here.

Tomorrow EC continues with the next to last race day with the short offshore race and this will also be very important as it cannot be discarded. We will try to do our very best to score well to try to get closer to the two Estonian boats in the lead but it will not be easy. Then on Saturday EC will be finalized with one inshore race.

Inshore races today at EC in Norway

Today European Championship in offshore sailing continued in Norway. Great conditions with average wind and nice weather. We did three inshore races today and we came places 4, 1 and 6 in the three races. In the first day we did not make a good start and had to fight to sail in free wind and suffered from that and then we came fourth. In second race today we did a good start and generally sailed very good and managed to win our second race in the regatta. In todays last race we did not sail so well and did not find the correct way and finished in 6th place.

Overall, we now have the series 1, 4, 1, 6 with a total score of 12. We are in third place overall and Estonian Katarina 2 is in the lead with Matilda 4 in second place.

Results are here.

We are of course pleased with being the only boat so far with two race wins but we are not so happy with todays 4 and 6 race scores. Tomorrow we will try to consistently produce better results.

The plan is that there will be two inshore races.

Seee all about EC here.

European Championship: We won the long offshore race!

Today we finished the long offshore race in the European Championship (EC) that is ongoing in Hankö, Norway. We sailed a course that went into the Oslo fjord and then out on Skagerak and two times to Sweden and back. The course was 144 nm and we managed to sail the course in around 24 hours coming to port this morning around 10.

We did a very good race and we managed to win the class C with a margin of 38 minutes. In second place cam Estonian Katarina 2 and in third Norwegian ibb. Generally, it was a great team win and we have great speed, good maneuvers and generally we sailed in the right places, so overall we are very pleased with our performance and how we conducted the race. It is also great that we managed to get a good score in this long offshore race as it cannot be discarded in the total count.

The results from the race is here.

- It is great to be off to a good start of the regatta and I am very pleased how the crew drove the boat fast and how well we performed. We now look forward to more race days and and some inshore races tomorrow, says Patrik Forsgren skipper.

The EC continues tomorrow with two planned inshore races and the weather forecast looks promising so we have to continue working hard. The plan overall is for 8 races and the EC continues this week and finshes on Saturday.

More about the EC can be found here.

Incident during our Norway training week prior to EC

During our training in Norway before the Europeans we had a strange incident. We were out practicing training in the dark and we were caught in a fishing net.

We unfortunately got the fishing equipment in our propeller when we had ended the training and the motor stopped. The wind were around +20 knots and complete darkness. We had to contact the Norwegian sea rescue and in some 30 minutes they came to our assistance.

First they towed us into more calm waters and then took us beside their sea rescue boat and then they dived under out boat.

This was a real adventure with a happy ending but we came to bed around 5 in the morning after a very exciting night on sea! We want to make a big thank you to the Norwegian sea rescue boat and crew that helped us, very professional and friendly - many thanks from us!

EC in Norway started today

We are in Hankö, Norway for the European Championship in offshore sailing. We have been here a few days for preparations and training and today the championship was started with a tune-up race to prepare for the real races that will start tomorrow.

The tune up race today went well and we managed to win the class C ahead of a few Italia 11.98's. Results are here. Not all boats competing in the Europeans participated so competition will increase when the real races starts but still a good tune up for us. The conditions today was very good with around 15-18 knots of wind and good weather. During our training days we have had quite a lot of rain so we hope this will improve now for next race week.

Tomorrow we will start on the long offshore race and it is calculated to take around 36 hours depending on wind. We plan to start 10 in the morning and sail all day/night and finish sometime on Tuesday.

The EC can be followed here: https://www.orcieuro2022.no/

Team Pro4u won Baltic Offshore Week today!

Today the Baltic Offshore Week and Estonian and Finnish Offshore Sailing Championship ended with three inshore races in very windy conditions with 20-30 knots of wind and sunshine. We managed to continue to sail well in the windy conditions with two new race wins and one second place. Overall, during the 8 races during BOW we have had the series 1, 1, 1, (2), 1.4, 1, (2) and 1 with a total of 6.4 after two races was discarded (and offshore race had weight 1.4). All BOW Results here. Second in the regatta was Estonian Arcona Katarina 2 and in third Estonian First Amserv Toyota. Great to see two First 36.7 on the podium!

We are very happy now to also be Estonian and Finnish Champions in Offshore sailing this year in addition to the Swedish Championships we won two weekends ago.

- It was a very good and useful regatta for us with a lot of race practice in a lot of wind, especially today when we raced in around 25 knots gives a lot of new learnings and experiences, says Peter Thorwid tactician.

We want to thank the Estonian hosts for an excellent regatta and everything around the races such as courses, results, information has been excellent. We hope that we will be able to come back to BOW another year.

Finally, big thanks to Måns Håkansson for great support with weather prediction and he is an important part of our team.

Photos BOW/ © Janis Spurdzins

First place in today's BOW Offshore race!

Baltic Offshore Week, BOW, continued today in Tallinn with the offshore race. The course was 35 nautical miles and the rain started around when we started at 11 hours but good sailing conditions with wind and wind shifts (big right shift). We had at the start 14 knots of wind and then gradually increasing during the day topping at around 25 knots. We managed to win the race in class ORC B and now after 5 races we have the series 1, 1, 1, (2) and 1.4 with a total of 4.4 (the offshore race scored 1.4 and cannot be discarded). Estonian Katarina 2 is in second place with 9.8 and Directo in third place with 15.6. All BOW Results here.

We had great boat speed, good start and good maneuvers during the offshore race today and even if we did not take all the wind shifts perfectly we sailed relatively conservative and managed to win the race with 3 min 17 sec after a bit over 5 hours sailing. As usual we worked hard the entire race and the team had great focus and positive team spirit!

Tomorrow is the last day of BOW and the Finnish and Estonian Offshore Sailing Championship and the plan is to have 3 inshore races. If there will be 3 more races one more inshore race will be discarded. We are happy to be in the lead after two days with 5.4 points and tomorrow we will just continue sailing in the good way we have been doing this weekend.

We notice that Estonia is really a land of sailing the arrangements with courses, information and everything around the regatta is really excellent and we enjoy very much sailing here in Tallinn!

Photos BOW/ © Janis Spurdzins

In the lead after BOW day 1

Today Baltic Offshore Week (BOW) started with four inshore races. Conditions was excellent with sunshine and wind, the day start with around 12 knots of wind and during the day increasing and in the fourth and last race of today we had 20+ knots.

We have sailed well overall today and we are in the lead in ORC B class with our series of 1, 1, 1, (2) with a total of 3 after one discard. Estonian Katarina 2 are second on 7 points and Directo third with 10 points, all results here.

Our sailing in the first three races was good with great speed, starts, maneuvers and tactics and we are overall pleased with our performance even if there are still things that could be improved of course. In todays last race when the wind picked up a bit we did not sail as well and made a few more mistakes but still happy to finish second in that race.
Tomorrow we continue with the offshore race with a 35 nautical miles course that will be very important as it cannot be discarded and also the weight will be 1.4 for the race.

Baltic Offshore Week starts tomorrow

Team Pro4u arrived in Tallinn, Estonia yesterday and during this long weekend we will race in the Baltic Offshore Week that is also the Open Estonian and Finnish Offshore Sailing Championship. Overall, there are 26 boats participating in the Championships, 13 in ORC A (larger boats) and 13 in ORC B (smaller boats). We will race in the class ORC B and are the only boat attending from Sweden.

Everything about the regatta including participating boats can be found here: BOW

We have very good memories from BOW 2021 in Helsinki that we managed to win, we will try our best this year as well but competition from the Estonian and Finnish boats are usually hard so we expect tight racing! This is also one of the reasons we participate in BOW to be able to race against very good boats.

Today we did some practice sailing just to get the crew up to speed and had great conditions outside Tallinn. Tomorrow the plan is to start the Championship with 4 inshore races, then on Saturday one offshore coastal race is planned (6-10 hours) and then finally on Sunday 3 inshore races is planned. Overall 8 races planned.

We will provide daily updates so we will do what we can to defend the Swedish colors over here in Estonia!