Friday, June 21: Estonian Jasmiin Ypraus, the Belgian duo of Quinten Bossche and Anthony Beernaut, American Dustin Farthing and Frenchman François Medori topped the times in their respective Ski Ladies GP1, Ski Division GP1 and Runabout GP1 categories in free practice at the Regione Sardegna Grand Prix of Italy in Olbia on Friday morning.

The dozen Ski Ladies GP1 entrants were permitted to carry out their opening free practice session to kick-start the on-water action. The stint saw championship leader Jasmiin Ypraus lock horns with her great French rival Jessica Chavanne once again, in addition to a host of other world class opponents.

The Estonian carded the early target lap of 1min 37.337sec on her second tour of the circuit and that lap was comfortably the quickest in a 15-minute session where Benedicte Drange (1min 41.691sec), Chavanne, Estelle Poret, River Varner and Emma-Nellie Ortendahl rounded off the top six.

A staggering 39 riders had entered the Ski Division GP1 category and free practice was split into two sessions for non-contracted or supported racers and contracted riders. Thirty riders took part in the first of the sessions and Belgian sensation Quinten Bossche continued where he left off in Vietnam by topping the times in heavy traffic on the circuit. He ran for five laps and posted a best run of 1min 47.650sec to finish the stint well clear of French rival Jeremy Poret.

Young Australian talent Jayden Richardson, Slaven Ivancic, Devon Farthing and Austrian legend Kevin Reiterer filled the top six places. Japan’s Toshi O’Hara sat out the stint and Paul Thomas managed one lap near the end.

Nine racers took part in the second Ski Division GP1 stint for contracted riders and the top of the leaderboard swapped and changed throughout the session with Mickael Poret, his brother Morgan, Axel Courtois and Anthony Beernaut all topping the times at one point. Beernaut kept the run of Belgian form running strongly, however, and a lap of 1min 38.896sec gave him the bragging rights after a tight session where Mickael and Morgan Poret were second and third and Oliver Koch Hansen, Courtois and Matteo Benini filled the top six positions.

Nineteen of the 21 non-contracted Runabout GP1 entrants were next on to the course and Dustin Farthing was the class of the field with a storming lap time of 1min 38.056sec that put the flying American legend 6.095 seconds clear of second-placed Rasmus Koch Hansen. Portugal’s Lino Araújo finished third ahead of Lithuania’s Egidijus Kirilevicius, Mattias Siimann and Juan Cruz Lezcano. Ruben Riquelme and Jun Ikoma were non-starters.

The nine contracted Runabout GP1 riders rounded off the morning’s high-speed free practice sessions before the six Freestyle entrants took to the water for the first time.

Current World Champion François Medori hit the front with an opening lap of 1min 43.615sec and that time stood until the end of the session when he posted a flier of 1min 38.784sec to top the times by 5.280 seconds. Poland’s Andrzej Wisniewski, current joint championship leader Samuel Johansson, Hungarian Gyorgy Kasza and France’s Jeremy Perez filled the remaining places in the top five.

Martin Doulik was sixth, Lorenzo Benaglia and Anthony Radetic were classified in seventh and eighth, but Kuwait’s former champion Yousef Al-Abdulrazzaq only managed three slow laps at the foot of the standings.