Friday, March 15: Aquabike Promotion has issued the provisional entry list for next weekend’s opening round of the 2024 UIM-ABP Aquabike World Championship.
Sixty-two riders from a staggering 26 countries grace the list for the first round to be held at Quy Nhon in the province of Bình Đinh in central Vietnam on March 22nd-24th, although additional southeast Asian entrants are expected to bolster that number still further next week.
The list includes 24 riders in the flagship Runabout GP1 category, 22 in Ski Division GP1, 12 women taking part in Ski Ladies GP1 and four Freestyle entrants.
Late additions to the Runabout GP1 field - who are set to take on the defending two-time World Champion François Medori and his main rivals, Jeremy Perez, Andrzej Wisniewski – include Australian rider Guy Greenland and Nguyen Hào, who will represent the host nation.
Greenland competed on the UIM-ABP tour back in 2018 and is a former US National champion with considerable experience of racing in Asia and Australasia. Six years ago, he took part in both the Grand Prix of Italy and the Grand Prix of the Mediterranean and amassed 12th points that put him 23rd in the Drivers’ Championship.
Lining up alongside the likes of defending World Champion Mickael Poret and his brothers, Jeremy and Morgan, will be three additional French riders in the Ski Division GP1 category. They include the latest entrant Alex Barret who has competed on the UIM-ABP tour previously and stole the early headlines at the Offshore Grand Prix of France in Guadaloupe back in 2015 and 2016 when he led the 18th and 19th editions of the daunting Karujet Runabout GP1 Pro category after the first two heats.
The dozen Ski Ladies GP1 entrants include the defending champion Jessica Chavanne, who heads to Vietnam fresh from receiving her 2023 UIM Driver of the Year award at the annual awards’ ceremony in Monte-Carlo. The French girl’s great Estonian rival Jasmiin Ypraus and the Swedish trio of Emma-Nellie Ortendahl, Janina Johansson and Sofie Borgström will also be challenging for the podium in Quy Nhon.
Aquabike Promotion had already announced that the world number one Roberto Mariani, multiple former champion Rashid Al-Mulla and Portugal’s Paulo Nuñes were registered for the Freestyle category. The provisional entry list also shows a fourth registration for the Kiwi amateur racer Tayne Lemon Junior. The 19-year-old Auckland rider has already won numerous titles in New Zealand and Australia and has competed with success in the United States.
The Quy Nhon race weekend gets underway with registration and technical scrutineering next Thursday (March 21st).